We are closing this blog now. Thanks for following along. Our new coronavirus live blog, with all the latest developments, is here.

Markets rallying after Donald Trump announces ‘major’ economic measures in response to coronavirus

The US President said his administration is proposing measures including working with hourly wage earners to ensure they can take time off and creating loans for small businesses so they can weather the coronavirus outbreak.

“This is something we were thrown into and we have been handling it”, Trump said.

Markets are already responding positively:

Scott Morrison is appealing to Australians’ patriotism to guide the nation through the spread of the deadly coronavirus as his government prepares to jettison its planned surplus, AAP reports.

But the prime minister has also reassured Australians his government won’t look at further cuts to essential services such as schools, hospitals and the NDIS as it deals with the economic impact of the health crisis.

His government is putting the final touches on a stimulus package, expected to be worth as much as AU$10bn ($US$6.6bn).

In a speech to business leaders on Tuesday morning, Mr Morrison outlined seven principles guiding that economic response.

The coronavirus is a “new, complex, hydra-headed and rapidly evolving challenge”, Morrison told the Australian Financial Review summit in Sydney.

“Whatever you thought 2020 was going to be about, think again,” Mr Morrison said.

“We now have one goal together this year: to protect the health, the wellbeing and livelihoods of Australians through this global crisis, and to ensure that when the recovery comes, and it will, we are well-positioned to bounce back strongly on the other side.”

It is important to remember the problem is only a temporal one, not structural, and learn the lessons of the global financial crisis, he said.

After plunging at the open, the ASX200 has clawed back most of its losses to be down just 0.8% by 11.10am.

The monthly survey of businesses conducted by the NAB is due out at about 11.30am and could provide the market’s next cue.

The travel ban for international excursions for Western Australian schools has been extended due to the spread of coronavirus across the United States.

WA Education Minister Sue Ellery said her decision to extend the ban was following advice from the Chief Health Officer.

Due to its close proximity to the US border, Canada has also been included.

All public, private and Catholic schools will be banned from travelling to those countries.

New Zealand is the only country where international travel will be considered for WA school groups.

“We have a duty of care to school students and staff, with the aim of reducing the possibility of exposure to the coronavirus while overseas,” Ms Ellery said.

Hi, Helen Sullivan here. I’ll be taking over the blog for the next while.

The coronavirus crisis has edged closer to the Oval Office after it emerged that Florida congressman Mark Gaetz, who travelled with Donald Trump on Air Force One from his state to Washington on Monday, is now in self-isolation.

He took the action after it emerged that he was one of several Republican lawmakers who were exposed to a person at last month’s Conservative Political Action Conference who tested positive for the virus.

The president meanwhile continued to play down the impact of the virus and again compared it with the common flu.

He blamed the stock market collapse on Monday on the oil price war and “fake news”.

We’ll have a full story on this shortly, so stay tuned.

We’ve got more on the Australian share market from our business editor, Ben Butler, including news that while the Qantas boss was speaking, the airline’s shares fell 6%:

A 3.7% fall in the Australian market this morning has been driven by tumbling airline, retail and financial stocks.

Oil and gas producers have also been punished for a second day running after Saudi Arabia flooded the market with cheap crude.

Australia’s flag carrier, Qantas, plunged more than 6% after the opening bell after telling the market it has slashed international routes by a quarter due to the coronavirus outbreak.

Travel groups Flight Centre and Webjet also tumbled more than 5%. Woodside Petroleum slumped 4.4% and Whitehaven Coal crumbled by 6.6%.

In tumultous early trading oil and gas producer Santos, which on Monday crashed 27%, opened down by 4% before surging to be up about half a percent by 10.30am.

Insurance companies have been hit hard, with QBE shedding 4.2%, bancassurance Suncorp down 3.4% and insurance sales group Steadfast diving 5.9%. The medical sector is also in the gun - private hospital operator Ramsay Health shed almost 7%.

A Royal Bank of Canada employee working at one of the lender’s suburban Toronto offices, who was earlier suspected of having contracted coronavirus, has tested positive, Reuters is reporting.

Citing a bank spokeswoman, the news agency said the employee worked in the Meadowvale office complex in Mississauga, about 25 miles west of the bank’s downtown Toronto headquarters. The person has remained at home in self-isolation since late last week, the bank said.

Last week, Royal Bank advised other employees working on the same floor to self-quarantine until further notice. The bank has also disinfected the affected floor, and all common areas, including elevators, the cafeteria and wash rooms, the spokeswoman said.

We continue to work with Public Health in determining advice and next steps for our employees on the impacted floor.

More than 111,600 people have been infected by the coronavirus across the world and over 3,800 have died, according to a Reuters tally of government announcements.

A patient at the Royal London hospital in Whitechapel has tested positive, Barts Health NHS Trust has confirmed. A spokesman has told the Guardian that “staff in close contact with the patient have been sent home to self-isolate, as per PHE guidance”.

The department of health and social care says it’s unable to say whether or not the patient’s included in or additional to the number of confirmed cases it released earlier today. It plans to update the figure tomorrow.

The benchmark Australian index, the ASX200, is set to open down almost 5% after a horror day on US markets.

It is likely to be the second day running of heavy falls, following a 7.4% tumble on Monday amid growing fears the coronavirus crisis will plunge an already weak global economy into recession.

US markets plunged more than 7%, triggering a 15 minute “circuit-breaker” halt to trading in New York – a precaution put in place following the global financial crisis in an attempt to stop enormous one-day falls.

European markets were down almost 8%.

Order books indicate Qantas, which fell almost 11% on Monday, was due to fall another 1.2% as the airline grounded more flights, reducing its international capacity by about a quarter.

Qantas has reduced its international flying capacity by a quarter, grounding eight Airbus A380s, and leaving just two of the largest planes in its fleet flying.

The cuts to international routes will last for six months following a “sudden and significant drop in forward travel demand”. Smaller planes will now service a number of key international routes.

The airline’s signature Sydney-Singapore-London return service (QF1 and QF2) will be temporarily re-routed to become a Sydney-Perth-London service.

To help cut costs, Qantas’s chief executive Alan Joyce – Australia’s highest paid executive who took home nearly AUD$24m (about £12m) in 2018 – will take no salary this financial year.

The Australian prime minister, Scott Morrison, is due to reveal some of his government’s plan to protect the economy from a recession caused by the coronavirus. The stimulus package, likely to include cash payments for pensioners, welfare recipients and small business owners, could cost up to $10bn (AUD).

Morrison will argue that, while the covid-19 is a global health crisis, it will have real and significant economic impacts for Australia, potentially greater than the global financial crisis of 2008. According to preview reports of his speech, he’s due to say:

The epicentre of the crisis is much closer to home. The [global financial crisis] impacts were centred on the North Atlantic and back then China was in a position to cushion the blow.

Australia’s economy is hugely dependent on China. The country is the largest export destination for Australian resources and Australia relies heavily on imports of Chinese manufactured products. Additionally, Australia is a significant destination for Chinese students and tourists. Morrison will argue:

We now have one goal in 2020: To protect the health, wellbeing and livelihoods of Australians through this global crisis, and to ensure that when the recovery comes, and it will, we are well positioned to bounce back strongly on the other side.

Saudi Arabia has detected five new cases, Reuters is reporting; citing state TV.

Four Saudi citizens have been diagnosed – three of whom had arrived from Iran and Iraq. The fifth case is of an Egyptian man who arrived from Egypt to the kingdom, the ministry has added. They bring the total of coronavirus cases detected in the kingdom to 20.

Burkina Faso has reported its first two cases of coronavirus, making it the sixth nation in sub-Saharan Africa to be affected by the virus.

Its health minister, Claudine Lougue, has told reporters the two patients – a husband and wife – recently returned to Burkina Faso from a trip to France and are now in isolation.

The US and UK stock markets have both suffered their worst daily slump since the 2008 financial crisis. In New York, the Dow Jones industrial average has plunged by more than 2,000 points, closing down 7.8% tonight.

Earlier, Britain’s FTSE 100 posted its fifth biggest fall ever. The index closed down 7.7%, which wiped £125bn off the biggest companies listed in London. Italy’s FTSE MIB index slumped by 11% (and was closed before PM Conte announced the country’s new lockdown).

Our business liveblog has more details.

The announcement in Italy spells out the restriction of movement of more than 60 million people.

The decree provides for banning all public events, closing cinemas, theatres, gyms, discos and pubs, funerals, weddings and all sport events, including Serie A matches. All schools and universities will remain close until 3 April

Conte added that he will sign the decree now and it will come into effect on Tuesday morning.

All sporting events will be suspended, Conte has told a press conference. The country is grappling to contain Europe’s worst outbreak of covid-19, which has claimed 463 lives and infected a total of 9,172 people.

A second Oxford University student has tested positive, the institution has said.

Public Health England (PHE) has confirmed that a student at the University of Oxford has tested positive for coronavirus. Our priority is providing support for affected students and their families, as well as offering support and information to other university staff, students, visitors and the local community. This brings the total number of confirmed cases to two.

PHE is currently assessing the individual and contacting those who had close contact with the student and will issue them with health advice about symptoms and emergency contact details to use if they become unwell in the 14 days after contact with the confirmed case. PHE will also be advising the university on any necessary next steps.

We reported earlier that the Madrid regional government has ordered the closure of all schools and universities for a fortnight. Madrid has a population of 6.6 million and the school shutdown is expected to have a direct impact on 1.5 million people.

The president of the Madrid regional government, Isabel Díaz Ayuso, said she was sorry to have to inform people of the new measures that will come into force on Wednesday but insisted they were necessary given the spread of the disease.

These decisions haven’t been easy to take, but we know that public health must come before everything else.

Díaz Ayuso also urged anyone showing symptoms of the virus to remain at home and not to go to work or to medical centres. People should instead call the coronavirus hotline, she added.

Moreover, the regional government warned against all but essential travel and encouraged older people or those with chronic illnesses to remain at home. Salvador Illa, the Spanish health minister, also advised people to work from home.

Data indicate a turn for the worse in Spain. Yesterday, there was a significant increase in the number of cases, especially in the Madrid area.

In Catalonia, where 101 cases have so far been reported, the regional government also urged people to work from home and to avoid travel. A nursery school in Barcelona was closed today as a result of the virus but as yet the Catalan government is not proposing to shut down schools.

The Photography Show and the Video Show, which organisers claim attracts more than 30,000 visitors and which was due to start in Birmingham this weekend, has been postponed amid coronavirus concerns.

Organisers have said:

To date, the Photography Show and the Video Show has been following government guidelines regarding the continuation of our event surrounding the outbreak of coronavirus. However, as the news has been progressing we have listened to the concerns, from all parties, around the health and welfare of their staff.

The wellbeing of our visitors, exhibitors and staff is of the utmost importance, we have therefore taken the extremely difficult decision to postpone the Photography Show and the Video Show until later in the year, when we will be able to deliver the show you deserve. We are now working through the ramifications of this unprecedented situation.

Iraqi authorities have ordered the closure of the Najaf province, home to holy Muslim Shi’ites sites, for non-residents starting on Wednesday for a week to prevent the spread of the coronavirus, the state news agency has said. Najaf is a major destination for Shi’ite pilgrims.

A taskforce bringing together unions, employers and government agencies should be convened to help tackle the outbreak, the Trades Union Congress (TUC) has said. The union body says the taskforce’s main priorities would be:

Designing an emergency support package to prevent businesses from folding and workers losing jobs and pay.

Ensuring public services are kept running and public sector workers are protected from the virus.

Fixing the UK’s sick pay rules so that every worker has financial support regardless of how much they earn.

The TUC’s general secretary, Frances O’Grady, has said:

Getting unions, employers and government agencies around the table will help contain the damage to the public health and our economy. Ministers must do all they can to protect public services, workers and businesses.

Taiwan’s Centre Epidemic Command Center has disclosed information about a Taiwanese woman who showed symptoms upon her return to Taiwan; countering multiple Egyptian government statements that she was the source of the virus in their country. Instead, they said, the woman contracted the virus during her visit to Egypt.

The woman returned to Taiwan in late February after taking a Nile cruise in the southern city of Luxor. 12 staff members on the same boat later tested positive for the virus, along with 33 passengers who arrived for a later cruise on the same ship. All 45 have been quarantined at a separate site, while other passengers on board told reporters they remain quarantined onboard.

Egyptian officials have repeatedly said the Taiwanese woman was the source of the virus in the country; the Arab world’s most populous nation. But, according to a statement from Taiwan’s Centre for Disease control, the woman known as case #39 contracted a different strain of the virus to other Taiwanese patients.

The strain of virus from Case #39 belongs to the same clade of the strains of virus in Europe, Nigeria, Brazil and Italy. The study showed that Case #39 is only an index patient who was first diagnosed with covid-19 but not the source of infection.

It is determined that Case #39 contracted the novel coronavirus in Egypt, and developed symptoms after returning to Taiwan and that this is an imported case.

Public health officials in Canada have recorded the country’s first fatality from the coronavirus outbreak, after a man in his 80s died on Monday.

He had been a resident in a long-term care facility in the province of British Columbia, where a number of cases have been documented. The provincial health officer, Bonnie Henry, has told reporters:

He had a number of underlying health conditions, unfortunately, so (he was) in that risk group for people who were more likely to have severe disease.

Two care workers at the Lynn Valley care centre in North Vancouver and two residents have also tested positive for the virus.

The announcement comes two days after Henry, a veteran doctor who has worked on the frontlines of viral outbreaks including Sars, Ebola, H1N1 and polio, grew emotional during a daily briefing. “It’s a very difficult time,” she told reporters, fighting back tears. “I’m feeling for the families and the people that are dealing with this right now.”

Canada has detected at least 74 cases – a number health officials believe will increase in the coming days. On Monday, Reuters reported that millions of safety masks in Ontario, stockpiled after the country’s Sars outbreak, have expired. The news calls into question preparedness in British Columbia, which said it had a sufficient supply medical necessities to handle a spike in cases.

• This post was amended on 11 March 2020 to remove an incorrect reference to British Columbia as Canada’s “most populous province”.

The Grand Princess cruise ship has arrived at a temporary berth in the Port of Oakland to the cheers of its weary passengers, the Reuters news agency reports.

The 2,400 holidaymakers, who have been largely confined to their rooms since Thursday, are to begin disembarking on Monday for transport to either healthcare facilities or quarantine stations, depending on whether they need immediate medical attention.

As we reported earlier, the UK government has set in motion plans to repatriate British passengers.

Iran’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, has cancelled his speech in the city of Mashhad for Persian new year on 20 March, to prevent further infections of coronavirus, according to his official site. The statement reads:

The ceremony for the speech of the supreme leader of the Islamic revolution, which happens every year on the first day of the new year in (Imam Reza’s holy shrine) will not take place this year and the supreme leader will not travel to holy Mashhad.

It adds that the decision was based on the recommendation of health officials to minimise travel and attending gatherings to prevent the spread of coronavirus.

Iran’s health ministry has announced a total of 7,161 infections and 237 deaths from the virus, one of the highest death rates outside of China.

The Madrid regional government has ordered the closure of all schools and universities for a fortnight in an attempt to halt the spread of the coronavirus.

Spain’s total confirmed cases as of 6pm CET is 1,204; 577 of which are in Madrid. The country’s death toll at 28 people – 13 of them in the Madrid region.

The decision was apparently taken during an emergency meeting on Monday afternoon and the closure will begin on Wednesday.

Earlier on Monday, authorities in the Basque country also announced the closure of educational centres around the regional capital, Vitoria, where the second-worst cluster has been identified.

*This post has been amended to correct the numbers of confirmed cases and deaths

AFP also reports that Riester’s feeling in good shape:

The French culture minister, Franck Riester, has tested positive for the virus, his staff have told the Agence France-Presse news agency. They said he had spent a few days at the Assemblée Nationale – the lower house of the French parliament – last week, where “several cases have been confirmed”.

Romania has announced that all schools and kindergartens will be closed from 11-22 March, with the option of extending the period further.

“Our concern is to prevent children from any risk of contamination that may arise during courses organised at school,” the prime minister, Ludovic Orban, said on Monday evening. Companies and institutions will be required to allow employees to work from home, where possible.

There have been 17 confirmed cases of coronavirus in the country, of which five people have been discharged from hospital. There have been no fatalities related to the virus.

Romania has suspended all flights to and from Italy until at least 23 March. There is a large Romanian community in the country.

The Grand Princess cruise ship is expected to dock in Oakland at about noon PST. The vessel’s 3,500 passengers, 21 of whom have tested positive for Covid-19, are to remain under 14-day quarantine.

More on this story from our west coast reporters:

While coronavirus deaths increase day after day in Italy, good news has emerged from the hospital in Pavia where Mattia, the Italian patient 1, has been treated since 21 February, is breathing autonomously and has been discharged from intensive care.

A medical taskforce worked for weeks, day and night, to keep him alive. The man, 38, was the first Italian patient infected with the virus. To many, his recovery has inspired optimism that the battle against Covid-19 can be won.

According to the patient’s wife, Mattia had met an Italian friend, a manager in Castiglione D’Adda who had returned from Wuhan, China, on 21 January. After some research, the manager, suspected of being patient zero, was tracked down but, incredibly, he tested negative for coronavirus.

After analysis, the suspect seems not to have had any recent infections. Antibodies are a sort of register that collects, in molecular form, traces of infections that our immune system is called to cope with. The search for the origin of the epidemic in the country seems to be an impossible mission.

The Irish government has allocated €3bn (£2.6bn) to deal with coronavirus in anticipation of a surge in cases.

The package includes €435m for the Health Service Executive, which runs hospitals, and a promise of €305 per week in sick pay for those affected by the virus, starting from their first day of illness. The self-employed will be eligible for payments.

The taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, announced the measures at a sombre press conference in Dublin. “It is possible we are facing events that are unprecedented in modern times,” he said.

Earlier, the government announced it was cancelling all St Patrick’s day parades, dealing a heavy blow to pubs, hotels and other sectors that rely on a boost in sales in mid-March.

Ministers are curbing St Patrick’s-themed visits to New York and Washington – the highlight of the Irish-American political calendar – but Varadkar is still due to meet Donald Trump at the White House.

The taoiseach said responses to coronavirus would be determined by medical advice and not be made “on foot of pressure” from business, politics, the media or social media.

US authorities are planning a flight tomorrow to repatriate Britons on the coronavirus-hit Grand Princess cruise ship.

The UK Foreign Office issued the following statement:

We continue to work closely with the US authorities to repatriate British nationals on board the Grand Princess. The US are currently planning for a flight to leave tomorrow evening, returning to the UK on Wednesday afternoon. We remain in contact with all British nationals on board and will continue to offer support.

Chinese authorities reportedly scrambled to move people out of quarantine hotels which need safety inspections after the deaths of at least 10 people in a collapsed hotel.

Laura (not her real name), a British teacher and her partner were suddenly placed in enforced isolation in Shenzhen after a ferry trip about 10 days ago. On Thursday, she told the Guardian she endured a “terrifying” experience as five people in hazmat suits came to test them at her home before they were whisked to quarantine.

But their period in isolation has taken a new twist after a transfer to another hotel. “We were sitting on the bed and noticed orange speccy marks,” she said.

“We soon realised it was bed bugs and we were moved into the room next door. But the moment we came into the second room we lifted a corner of the sheet and a live bed bug ran across the sheet, then we found another one under the pillow.”

They were moved to a third room, but also found blood marks resembling those created by bed bugs. “Clearly the whole hotel is infested with bed bugs,” she said.

The couple have four days remaining in quarantine at Yinglun hotel in Shenzhen, but they don’t want to risk sleeping in the bed.

“We’ve been sitting on the table and window sill, avoiding fabrics, asking for help because there is nothing else we can do,” Laura said.

“It’s hard to know who to be most frustrated with. Everybody here is just doing their job. They can clearly see this is ridiculous but they can’t offer us a solution.

“Our school is saying they could deliver us some pesticide or send a mattress. It’s really sweet but is this what it has come to? It’s a farce.”

At the previous hotel, she had been passing the days practising yoga, reading and watching the sitcom Parks and Recreation, but she has spent her time at the new lodgings demanding another room while taking videos of the mess and lice.

The hotel has offered the couple a “final deal” to remove the pillowcases and sheet, but cannot provide another double mattress. It has threatened to separate the couple into different rooms if they do not accept. “I think it’s just a threat,” Laura said. “Be quiet or we’ll separate you.”

Twenty-three people remain missing after the five-storey hotel in Quanzhou, about seven hours from Shenzhen in southern China, collapsed on Saturday.

According to Laura, this led to an assessment of all other quarantine hotels amid fears of others falling down. “Ours needed a full inspection,” she said. “I’d questioned whether smoke alarms were working as there were guards smoking beneath the sensors.

“I was also told the electricity was extremely unable, which is why we could not have a fridge in our room. The whole building is being inspected today after it was abruptly emptied.”

Health authorities in Guangdong province have fiercely guarded against “imported cases” of coronavirus, after a 35-year-old man from Shenzhen who had been working in Bristol tested positive this month after flying from Heathrow to Hong Kong.

It was unclear whether he became infected in the UK, but Chinese authorities said two of the patient’s colleagues in Britain had reported coughs and fever.

• This post was amended on 19 March 2020 to remove some personal information.

Iraq has banned all public gatherings and called on citizens to avoid visiting sacred cities and sites to stop the spread of the virus.

Authorities also called on Iraqis arriving from Iran, China, South Korea, Italy, Japan, Thailand, Singapore, Kuwait and Bahrain to stay at home for self-quarantine for 14 days.

Israel will force anyone arriving in the country, from any part of the world, to self-isolate for at least 14 days, The prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has announced. The government has so far imposed some of the most stringent rules globally to block the spread of the virus.

The move has also been interpreted domestically as a measure to avoid irking the country’s close ally and benefactor in Washington, Donald Trump. Israel already requires travellers arriving from more than a dozen countries to spend two weeks in home isolation, in effect killing off incoming tourism.

After outbreaks in the US, pressure had been building to add the country to the list. But rather than extending the rules specifically on US travellers, and risk an angry backlash from the White House, Israel broadened its policy out to the entire planet.

Netanyahu spoke to the US vice president, Mike Pence, on Sunday, after Israeli media reported the country was considering barring visitors from parts of the US, such as New York and California.

Health authorities have said the number of coronavirus cases in Israel jumped from 25 to 39 over the weekend. Approximately 80,000 Israelis are in self-isolation.

Here are the main points from the press conference held by Boris Johnson. He was joined by Prof Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical adviser, and Sir Patrick Vallance, the government’s chief scientific adviser.

• Ministers will within a fortnight advise anyone with a fever or a mild respiratory tract infection to stay at home for seven days, Whitty revealed. He said the government was not issuing this advice at present, because the chances of someone with a fever now having coronavirus are very low, he said. But he said that would change very quickly. Soon the number of infections would rise “really quite fast”, he said.

He went on:

We are now very close to the time, probably within the next 10-14 days, when the modelling would imply we should move to a situation where everybody with even minor respiratory tract infections or a fever should be self-isolating for a period of seven days.

This advice is likely to have huge repercussions for workplaces across the country.

• Johnson stressed that it was important for the government not to implement its delay and mitigating measures too early. He said:

It is absolutely critical in managing the spread of this virus that we take the right decisions at the right time based on the latest and the best evidence, so we mustn’t do things which have no or limited medical benefit, nor things which could turn out actually to be counter-productive.

He sounded more defensive on this point than he was when he held a press conference last week, reflecting the fact that the government has been accused by some of being too complacent.

• Johnson said he was no longer shaking hands. Last week he was shaking hands but he said at today’s Commonwealth Day service he was advised against this. He explained:

We were all given an instruction not to shake hands, and there’s a good reason for not shaking hands, which is that the behavioural psychologists say that if you don’t shake somebody’s hand then that sends an important message to them about the importance of washing your hands.

So there’s a subliminal cue there to everybody to wash your hands, which is, I think I’m right in saying … far more important.

• Whitty refused to comment on suggestions that 2 million people could be admitted to hospital. He said such figures were “largely speculative”.

• Whitty said from tomorrow the government would start screening everyone arriving at hospital with a respiratory illness. Until now people were screened only if they were in intensive care and had coronavirus-type symptoms, he said.

• Vallance said the aim of the measures to be introduced by the government would be to lower the mortality rate of those in the at-risk group by 20 to 30%. But he said it would be wrong to try to “suppress” the disease completely because it could result in a winter outbreak at a time of maximum pressure for the NHS.

He said:

What you can’t do is suppress this thing completely, and what you shouldn’t do is suppress it completely because all that happens then is it pops up again later in the year, when the NHS is at a more vulnerable stage in the winter, and you end up with another problem.

In the past 24 hours the number of deaths from coronavirus in Italy has risen from 366 to 463, officials have announced.

They said 7,985 people were infected – 1,598 more than Sunday. The total number of cases is 9,172; 724 have recovered from the illness.

Italy is considering extending the closure of schools until 3 April.

The UK government has announced it will work with local authorities to extend the hours that deliveries can be made to supermarkets and other food retailers to help the industry respond to the coronavirus.

The new measures would mean firms can increase the frequency of deliveries to their stores and move stocks more quickly from warehouses across the country to replenish their shelves.

The announcement follows last week’s talks between the British environment secretary, George Eustice, and leading supermarkets, during which the industry said a relaxation of curfews would help retailers respond to the increased consumer demand for some products, namely hygiene goods and a limited number of long-life items.

Current rules mean deliveries are prohibited overnight so vehicles don’t disturb residents. The government will temporarily relax the enforcement of restrictions to give greater flexibility.

Drive-through coronavirus testing is under way in a hospital car park in Seattle, NPR reports.

Employees at the University of Washington’s UW Medicine Center can get checked for the virus without leaving their cars if they have symptoms.

The virus has claimed 17 lives in Seattle and infected at least 83 people.

In a briefing this afternoon, Nancy Messonnier, the director of the National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, gave the latest US coronavirus figures:

As of Sunday evening, 34 states, plus New York City and DC, have reported more than 500 cases of Covid-9 to CDC. We’ve also received reports of 19 deaths. Nearly half of reported cases are in California and Washington; 18 of the deaths are in Washington. The remaining one is in California.

On the issue of testing, which has been held back by a production flaw in the initial version of the publicly issued kits, Messonnier said: “State and local public health labs across 50 states now have the capacity to test up to 75,000 people for Covid-19.”

Messonnier also gave this advice for caring for the elderly and vulnerable:

If you do end up in the role of helping to care for a family member or friend who is at greater risk, we recommend you familiarise yourself with your loved one’s medications to help them get extra to have on hand. Help them also get food medical supplies and other necessities, so they can minimise trips to the store. And create a plan for if they do get sick, and if you get sick. You may need to identify backups, who can take care of them if you can’t.

Residents recount to the Guardian’s Jon Henley and Lorenzo Tondo what it feels like to be in Milan, Italy’s financial and economic capital, during lockdown:

Erika, 30:

Personally, this situation has been scary for several weeks – although many have not felt it that way, probably aggravating the situation. The city felt surrounded by a feeling of unease and fear – fear not born from the limitation of movement, but from the awareness that the intensive care units are collapsing.

For the past two weeks, my husband and I have been living with the awareness that precautions must be taken. We use gloves and masks to go out, especially to go to the market or to the pharmacy. I have often regretted seeing that so few of us took these precautions, despite not having any symptoms. Just care.

I believe this is the reason that should push everyone to understand that we must stay at home and respect the measures. I hope there is no need to prolong them, but that depends on citizens and their common sense. I hope the civic sense will prevail in order to be able to fight this situation to get up again.

Natalie, a French woman who has lived in Milan for 30 years:

It’s like a ghost town. Everything’s basically shut, even the malls – only the supermarkets are open. You just have to ask yourself: do you really need to go out, and for what reason. If it’s to buy food, you go – but you keep your distance from everyone, as instructed. It helps that some supermarkets are allowing only small groups of shoppers to enter at a time.

It feels like the month of August. Worse – empty. It’s really drastic. Like being in prison. In fact, there are prison sentences, up to three months for people who don’t respect the orders. I work for a big company so there’s been no problem working at home, but I worry that people won’t take these measures as seriously as they should. It’s not a good situation, and it’s going to happen elsewhere …

And I worry about the Italians – I love them, I’ve been here 30 years, but disobeying the rules is like a national sport. You still see people driving with kids sat in the front of their car without a seat belt, so when it comes to this lockdown … There are always idiots. The real worry is that the hospitals won’t be able to cope.

Ryanair has announced it will suspend all domestic flights to red zones in Italy – from and to the airports of Bergamo, Milano Malpensa, Parma e Treviso. The suspension will start from midnight until 8 April.

Pregnant women do not appear to be more susceptible to the consequences of coronavirus than the general population, and there is no evidence the virus can pass to a foetus during pregnancy, according to national guidance published by the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists.

The guidance says that, as a precautionary approach, pregnant women with suspected or confirmed coronavirus when they go into labour are being advised to attend an obstetric unit but their birth plan should be followed as closely as possible.

There is no evidence the virus can be carried in breast milk, so it is felt the benefits of breastfeeding outweigh any potential risks of transmission of coronavirus.

The full guidance on Covid-19 infection and pregnancy can be found here.

At the press conference Boris Johnson says he is no longer shaking hands. At his press conference last week, he said he was still shaking hands with people.

When asked during his press conference about panic buying, Boris Johnson urges anyone thinking of stockpiling to “behave responsibly” and think of others.

Back in Geneva, Dr Michael Ryan, the executive director of the WHO’s health emergencies programme, says the real tragedy and moral dilemma that healthcare workers will face in coming days if they do not have personal protective equipment is whether to treat a Covid-19 patient in front of them.

He says:

We’re still very much in the up cycle of this epidemic.

But he says China and South Korea have shown “an element of controllability”, which gives him hope.

His colleague Dr Maria Van Kerkhove says:

In many countries it will get worse before it gets better.

But she says there is an opportunity in countries which have had very few or no cases. She cites the example of Wuhan, the Chinese province at the centre of the current outbreak, and the “drastic action” in Singapore that has reduced transmission.

She adds:

We can see light at the end of the tunnel but how quickly we get there will depend on what countries do.

At the press conference in Downing Street, Prof Chris Whitty, the government’s chief medical adviser, has been speaking.

• He says soon coronavirus will spread “really quite fast”.

• Within about 10 to 14 days the government will advise people with even minor respiratory tract infections or a fever to self-isolate, he says. But that is because by that point the chances of their having coronavirus will be much higher than they are now.

At the press conference in London, Sir Patrick Vallance, the UK government’s chief scientific adviser, says it is important to introduce measures to delay the spread of coronavirus “at the right time in the right combinations”.

Boris Johnson has just started giving a press conference in London about coronavirus. Earlier today he chaired a meeting of Cobra, the UK government’s emergency committee to discuss the outbreak.

• Johnson says the UK is still “in the contain phase of the outbreak”. But he says scientists believe “containment is extremely unlikely to work on its own”.

• He says the government is now preparing to move to the “delay” phase of the action plan.

There is further coverage of the press conference here, on Andrew Sparrow’s UK politics live blog.

Asked about use/or lack of of the word “pandemic”, Dr Michael Ryan, from the WHO, says countries such as Singapore and China have “demonstrated real success in turning the disease around”.

Tedros adds:

Whether it’s a pandemic or not, the rule of the game is the same: never give up.

Ryan says a number of countries have imposed restrictions on the import of personal protective equipment. He describes such “hoarding”, preventing material reaching those who need it, as something the WHO would like to avoid.

Our most exposed workers to this virus at the moment are frontline healthcare workers.

Dr Maria Van Kerkhove says transmission in health facilities has not been a significant driver of the spread of the virus.

Ryan adds:

It’s difficult to build a global picture in real time when you’re not receiving real-time data from everyone.

Tedros says only a handful of countries have signs of sustained community transmission.

We must all take heart from that. Of the four countries with the most cases, China is bringing its outbreak under control and there is also a decline in new cases in South Korea. The rule of the game is never give up.

Tedros praises Italy’s aggressive measures:

Let hope be the antidote to fear. Let solidarity be the antidote to blame.

The World Health Organization is currently giving a press conference (you can watch the live feed at the top of this page).

Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the director general, says the world “is not at the mercy” of the virus. He says with decisive, early action the spread of the virus can be slowed.

Most people with the virus will recover, he says, pointing to China where he says 70% have recovered. Tedros also highlights that 93% of cases are from four countries.

Closing schools and cancelling mass gatherings in countries can be considered in countries where the virus is rife, he says.

More than 111,600 people have been infected by coronavirus across the world, and 3,884 have died, according to the latest Reuters tally.

Here is our video explainer featuring the Guardian’s health editor, Sarah Boseley, on what we can do to protect ourselves.

Madonna has cancelled shows in Paris on Tuesday and Wednesday due to restrictions imposed over the coronavirus outbreak, the promoter Live Nation has told Reuters.

On Sunday France banned gatherings of more than 1,000 people as the death toll and number of coronavirus infections continued to rise.

The Guardian’s film editor, Catherine Shoard, reports that the organisers of the Cannes film festival continue to plan for the event to go ahead, despite France’s ban on gatherings of more than 1,000 people.

The Irish government has decided to cancel the St Patrick’s Day parade in Dublin, after advice from the National Public Health Emergency Team, according to the Press Association news agency.

The head of the port authority of New York and New Jersey has tested positive for coronavirus, the governor of New York has announced.

Andrew Cuomo posted this thread on the most recent confirmed cases in New York state:

Following an emergency meeting of the party leaders, the European parliament will sit for only one day this week, on Tuesday, and there will not be any votes as the chamber does not have the facility for its members to vote remotely.

In the UK, the commissions of the House of Commons and the House of Lords have confirmed there are no plans to suspend parliament because of coronavirus.

A joint statement said: “The commissions of both houses met today to discuss parliament’s response to coronavirus. “There are no plans to suspend parliament.

“We continue to act entirely in line with the advice of Public Health England, and the speakers and political leadership of both houses are keeping the situation under constant review.”

A priest in the Washington DC area has tested positive for coronavirus, according to local media.

Worshippers who visited Christ church Georgetown last week have been instructed to self-isolate and the church has suspended all activities.

In Brussels, the first case of coronavirus has been diagnosed among staff at the European commission. The woman had returned from Italy and has been in quarantine since last week. She is the third official or diplomat working within the EU’s institutions in the city to be diagnosed.

All St Patrick’s Day parades in Ireland are expected to be cancelled in an effort to curb the spread of coronavirus, the Irish Times is reporting.

Cork was the first Irish city to cancel its parade, with Dublin and others to follow.

“Based on the demographic of those attending the parade, the close proximity of people attending the event and the duration of the event (among other considerations), Cork city council is not in a position to provide the necessary assurances in relation to current WHO guidelines,” the council said.

The government was expected to make a similar announcement later on Monday after the taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, chaired a cabinet subcommittee on coronavirus.

Pressure had grown on the government to cancel the event, which draws 500,000 spectators and participants, after local authorities axed dozens of smaller parades around the country.

Ireland has recorded 21 cases of coronavirus, including at least three involving community transmission.

Authorities said over the weekend they could not dispute a report that 1.9 million people could become infected.

Here is an update on the situation in Luxor.

Egypt’s ministry of tourism and state information service has announced that tour sites remain open in Luxor, despite an earlier statement from the national Tour Guide Association that trips would be cancelled today owing to concerns about coronavirus.

“Tourist activities are proceeding normally in Luxor today,” said the Ministry of Antiquities. “Thousands of visitors have flocked onto its different archaeological sites.”

The Tour Guide Association said this morning that hot air balloon rides, organised visits to archeological sites and other gatherings would be cancelled today.

A tour guide in the area told the Guardian several tourists had been quarantined in their hotel rooms and on cruise ships, as they awaited a visit by officials to screen them for Covid-19, after 45 passengers and crew on a cruise ship tested positive for the virus and were quarantined last week.

But some tourists arriving in Luxor today were not subject to the same measures, and moved freely around the ancient city.

“We reached Luxor in the morning and were supposed to get to the cruise [ship] by 10am,” said Ananya Bhattacharya, who arrived in Egypt for a holiday on 7 March and took a train to Luxor, arriving this morning. She said that her temperature was taken on arrival at Cairo airport and she was made to sign a declaration concerning the virus.

Bhattacharya arrived in Luxor as Egyptian officials tried to contain the virus, while attempting to prevent damage to its tourism industry, which accounts for about 12% of GDP.

“We visited Karnak and Luxor temples – both were open when we went,” she said. “We were then told we’d have to wait around until our cruise received an all-clear from health officials, who were inspecting it for signs of coronavirus.”

She added that they were finally able to board the ship at 3.30pm local time.

An Indian passenger on the Asara nile cruise in Luxor, where 45 passengers and crew were quarantined after testing positive for the virus, told the Bangalore-based site the News Minute that many remained quarantined on the ship.

This followed an onboard announcement on 6 March – hours before passengers were expecting to disembark – that they would be quarantined on board for 15 days, the passenger, Vanitha Rengaraj, said. “We have been asked to stay inside our rooms and not venture outside.

There is a doctor on the ship all the time, and a few nurses. “They [officials] have also briefed us on what to do if we have symptoms like vomiting, fever etc,” Rengaraj said.

Manchester airport’s Terminal 3 seems a lot quieter than usual. It was home to Flybe, which collapsed last week, so that is perhaps one of the reasons why.

There are posters instructing people to self-isolate if they have flown in from certain parts of Italy. Terminal 3 also seems to be where most of the inbound and outbound Italian flights are.

Seana Corr, from Wirral, travels to Milan quite often for work. Describing her flight from Milan today, the 27-year-old said it was one of the easiest she had experienced because there were only about five people onboard, so passengers got through security quickly. There did not seem to be any special checks or precautions, she said.

“Information-wise, they told us to wash our hands frequently, which we should all be doing anyway, and there were signs everywhere. They gave us the standard information.”

Corr said in Milan it seemed like “everything has been cancelled”, adding: “There are no social gatherings anymore. It’s all closed down.

“The area is supposed to be in lockdown. whether they’re enforcing it or not right away is another matter. The streets are empty, people are out of work, the shops are empty because people have started stockpiling. Bars and restaurants are closed. There are no guards on the streets. Children are playing out in the streets, however, because they are not in school.”

Corr decided to find the earliest UK-bound flight available because she was afraid of being trapped in Milan. “I was worried I wouldn’t be able to get back, so I went online and panic-booked. Same-day flights were very expensive.”

A lot of people were feeling the area was like a “post-apocalyptic war zone”, she said. “It’s really not. It’s just quite boring because there’s nothing on. It’s not as exciting as everyone’s making out. It was the right decision to leave.”

A total of 23 people have tested positive for coronavirus in Scotland, up from 18 on Sunday, as the first minister warned of a “significant outbreak” across the UK.

Nicola Sturgeon told a press briefing on Monday afternoon that none of the Scottish patients were significantly unwell, and that Scotland may be a few days “behind the current”, compared with some parts of the UK.

“There is an increasing inevitability that we will face a significant outbreak of coronavirus across the UK,” she said.

She said Scotland, like the rest of the UK, was still in the containment phase of the outbreak. Measures to delay the spread of the virus – the next stage of the UK’s response to the outbreak – would be “about mitigating the impact of the outbreak of the coronavirus, not eradicating it”, Sturgeon said.

“And I think it’s important to say, so there is clarity. Even with all these measures we are, in all likelihood, facing over the next number of weeks a very challenging situation.”

When asked whether Scotland’s rurality would protect it from a large outbreak, Sturgeon said: “I would expect to see an increase of cases … I would not want to assume our rurality would protect us in any way from this virus. I think we would be affected broadly in the same way as the rest of the UK.”

Dr Catherine Calderwood, Scotland’s chief medical officer, said: “I wouldn’t read anything into the small numbers at the moment being reassuring. This is what happened in England at the beginning of the outbreak.”

A maintenance worker at Disneyland Paris has tested positive for coronavirus, but the theme park remains open in line with current official guidance about public gatherings, Press Association has reported.

A spokesman said: “We have been notified that a cast member, who works backstage and does not have contact with guests, has tested positive and is receiving treatment.

“We have been in regular contact with the local health authorities and continue to implement preventive measures in line with their recommendations to help protect our guests and cast members.”

On Friday, as French health authorities reported 577 confirmed cases of the virus including nine deaths, President Emmanuel Macron said the country was likely move to the highest level of epidemic alert in the coming days.

Our Brussels bureau chief, Daniel Boffey, reports that the EU’s heads of state and government will hold a video conference on Tuesday to discuss the implications of coronavirus.

The leaders will discuss sanitary, scientific and economic cooperation. The president of the European council, Charles Michel, tweeted: “Following consultations, I will hold a EUCO members conference call shortly on Covid-19 to coordinate EU efforts. We need to cooperate in order to protect the health of our citizens.”

With cases of coronavirus jumping from 45 to 73 in less than 48 hours in Greece, health authorities have announced further precautionary measures to be enforced with immediate effect.

The measures, which include a two-week ban on sporting events, came as Greece’s Olympic Committee announced that for the first time since 1984 this week’s flame-lighting ceremony for the Tokyo 2020 games will be held without spectators.

The event, which usually takes place in front of an audience of thousands, is unlikely to be seen by more than a hundred people when it gets under way in ancient Olympia on Thursday, organisers say.

The prefecture of Ileia in the west of Greece, to which Olympia belongs, is one of the regions hardest hit by the outbreak, although there were signs today of more cases in Athens, with media reporting that personnel at the Israeli embassy had also tested positive for the virus.

A 40-year-old woman, who had visited Israel on a tour of the Holy sites, is in isolation in a hospital in Mytilene, the capital of Lesbos, also suspected of having contracted the virus.

Although an official announcement is expected later today, doctors say the case has all but been confirmed and the woman’s two children have been withdrawn from school at their mother’s request.

The case has raised fears of an outbreak on the island, which is hosting 27,000 migrants and refugees – with most housed in notoriously unhygienic conditions in Moria, its biggest camp.

The woman, who works in a supermarket in Plomari, had by her own admission been in contact with countless people upon her return from the trip.

A coronavirus outbreak on the island would seriously test its overstretched medical services.

A body representing thousands of hospital doctors has postponed its annual conference so they can help the NHS’s efforts to tackle the virus, amid fears that services could become overwhelmed.

The Royal College of Physicians (RCP) announced it was putting off its Medicine 2020 gathering from April to next January “so that doctors can concentrate on looking after patients with Covid-19 and avoid putting themselves at any increased risk from the virus. [The] move … signals the RCP’s concern to protect the NHS frontline workforce as best it can”.

About 1,000 health professionals were due to attend the event at the ICC in Birmingham city centre. The college represents about 28,000 hospital doctors in England, though has some members elsewhere too.

Prof Andrew Goddard, the RCP’s president, said:

Our aim is always to protect people’s health, and it simply wouldn’t be sensible to bring together hundreds of doctors from all over the UK, – and other countries too – when they are already stretched dealing with Covid-19 on top of all the other pressures on the NHS.

We shouldn’t put doctors at unnecessary risk of contracting or spreading the virus, so it is a wise precaution to postpone Medicine 2020. Now, as always, I want to protect the wellbeing of the NHS workforce.

The RCP is the latest medical body to postpone a large gathering. Last week the Royal College of Emergency Medicine, which represents A&E doctors across the UK, cancelled its spring CPD conference.

As the number of coronavirus cases in Italy soars, Italians seem to be following the official instructions to keep at least one metre apart in public spaces. So reports the Wall Street Journal’s Milan correspondent:

More details have been released about the six inmates who died while protesting against virus containment measures at a northern Italian prison.

The deaths occurred after prisoners broke into the infirmary and took overdoses, Associated Press reports. The protest in Modena was among the first of more than two dozen riots at Italy’s overcrowded prisons.

Human rights advocates have been warning that increasing tensions over coronavirus were hitting inmates particularly hard, especially after restrictions were imposed on family visits to prevent transmissions.

On Monday, inmates climbed on to the roof of the San Vittore prison in Milan and held up a painted sheet reading Indulto, Italian for “pardon”.

The secretary general of the penitentiary police union accused the government of abandoning the prison system, refusing to provide sufficient measures to prevent the spread of the virus and leaving guards on their own to deal with prisoners who could now only speak to relatives via phone or Skype.

He said there were more than two dozen prisons where protests were under way, including in Foggia where some inmates had escaped.

Italy’s overburdened court system has ground to a near halt because of virus containment measures. This has heightened tensions among prisoners, many of whom are already enduring long delays in justice.

The Guardian has produced an interactive photo gallery that shows tourist sites in Asia before and after the coronavirus crisis.

The World Tourism Organization has said the number of international arrivals is expected to drop sharply this year, reversing a previous forecast of a substantial increase. Arrivals are now projected to fall by 1-3%, instead of the previous estimate of 3-4% growth, with losses of $30-$50bn (£23bn-£38bn) in international tourism receipts anticipated.

A member of staff at Transport for London has tested positive for coronavirus. A spokeswoman said:

We are working closely with Public Health England and are following their advice after a member of staff tested positive for Covid-19.

The safety of our staff and customers is our top priority, so we are taking all necessary precautions and a deep clean has taken place within the building used by the staff member.

The party leaders of the European parliament are to hold an emergency meeting this afternoon on whether to cancel this week’s session in light of the growing incidents of coronavirus infection in Brussels, reports the Guardian’s Daniel Boffey. There were 39 new recorded cases of infection confirmed in Belgium on Monday, including a handful of cases among staff working within the EU’s institutions.

The tour guides association in Luxor, southern Egypt, has told its members that trips have been cancelled for the day, including big archeological sites, hot air balloon rides and a film festival.

According to one guide, who spoke to the journalist Ruth Michaelson, the lockdown is being enforced by local police, with tourists shut in their cabins on cruise ships or inside hotel rooms. “The tourists are OK, they’re happy to be checked,” said the guide, who could not be named as they were not permitted to talk to the media.

Officials from Egypt’s health ministry are travelling to Luxor today to screen tourists for Covid-19 amid indications of a large outbreak. The city welcomed extra visitors this week for the film festival, which suspended some events due to the outbreak.

The health ministry said overnight that 55 people were now infected with Covid-19 nationwide. Egypt, the Arab world’s most populous country, reported its first death from the virus on Monday, a German tourist who was infected in Luxor and died in the resort town of Hurghada.

Egypt’s Ministry of Health said the tourist was transported from Luxor to Hurghada on Friday and died on Sunday in hospital. The tourist declined to be quarantined.

A tally of officially reported cases indicates the German man was not included in the previous toll of those infected, despite official insistence that Egypt is being “transparent” on this issue.

Officials have tried to project an image of business as usual, sending the minister of tourism to inspect cruise ships after 45 passengers aboard one in Luxor tested positive for the virus.

But the number of visitors developing symptoms after leaving the country in recent weeks has risen sharply. At least 25 foreign nationals have reported signs of the virus since returning home. This includes a Taiwanese national, reported to be the source of the outbreak on the Asara cruise ship in Luxor, who had symptoms after returning home in late February.

Workers on the vessel contracted Covid-19 but remained on board to welcome new passengers last week, increasing the spread. Several cruise ship staff in the city have reportedly quitbecause of rising concern over the spread of the virus.

The first case of Covid-19 has been confirmed on Lesbos, prompting concerns it could spread to refugee camps, reports the journalist Katy Fallon from the island.

This morning, a hospital in Mytilene said the woman, who was admitted on Sunday morning, had been diagnosed with the virus. She had reportedly experienced flu-like symptoms in recent days and, according to local news reports, had returned to the area about a month ago after a trip to Israel.

There are concerns about the extent to which coronavirus will have spread, because the woman, as yet unnamed, worked in a supermarket in the town of Plomari, about 14 miles away from Mytilene, the capital.

The management of Covid-19 has been low on people’s priorities on Lesbos, particularly in the humanitarian community, which has been focusing on staff securityafter attacks on aid workers, journalists and refugees in the past week.

Given the recent unrest, the Moria refugee camp, a 15-minute drive from Mytilene, which has a population approaching 20,000, was calm this morning before the official announcement. However, camp residents, often with little else to occupy themselves, have been talking about the virus for weeks.

Nearly everyone in Moria has some kind of health complaint, and most believe the poor living conditions have made them sick.

Muhamad Abud, 50, originally a farmer from the outskirts of Idib province in Syria, sat smoking a cigarette at the top of the olive grove, an unofficial overspill site next to the main camp walls. He arrived with his wife four months ago. She has diabetes and her health has deteriorated drastically since she arrived, he says.

“She’s lost her sight a lot since being here and she coughs a lot from the dust. In Syria we had a good situation: the health services were really good, but they collapsed after the war. We came here thinking the health situation would be better but it’s worse,” Abud said.

As a young boy from the camp walked along one of the dusty pathways, he sneezed. “Hey, he’s got corona,” his friend joked.

An announcement by the island’s authorities is expected this afternoon, which should detail how the virus will be treated and contained.

The Irish Times is reporting that the France-Ireland rugby match, which was scheduled to conclude the Six Nations tournament in the Stade de France next Saturday, will be postponed.

Six prisoners have died in Modena, Italy, after a riot erupted when inmates were informed that the new emergency decree includes restrictions on face-to-face visits with relatives.

Lorenzo Tondo, the Guardian’s southern Italy correspondent, reports that similar clashes also broke out in prisons in Salerno, Naples, Alessandria, Vercelli, Bari, Palermo, Foggia and Frosinone. Prisoners in several facilities set fire to mattresses, and two guards were held hostage briefly in Pavia.

An investigation has been launched into the causes of the inmates’ deaths.

Iranian state television has confirmed 595 new coronavirus cases in the past day including 43 deaths. The new totals are now: 7,161 total infections and 237 deaths, with 2,394 confirmed recoveries.

A reminder of this morning’s dramatic events in the financial markets –

Global stock markets have had their biggest falls since the 2008 financial crisis, while the oil price crashed amid panic selling because of the double threat of a coronavirus-driven global recession and an oil price war.

Julia Kollewe reports that the FTSE 100 in London plunged almost 9% and fell through 6,000 points when trading began on Monday morning. It is currently trading 6% lower at 5,991, down 471 points. The index is on track for its worst one-day decline since 2008, when the collapse of Lehman Brothers heralded the onset of the global financial crisis. Oil stocks are the biggest fallers, with BP and Shell down 18%, while the travel company Tui dropped 14%.

The FTSE 100 is trading at levels last seen at the time of the Brexit vote.

As panic selling spread across Europe, Germany’s Dax tumbled 7.5%, France’s Cac dropped 7.6% and Spain’s Ibex lost 7%. The biggest sell-off was in Italy, the European country worst hit by Covid-19, with the FTSE Mib index down 10%.

You can read all the latest updates from Graeme Wearden on our Business live blog here.

The government was scheduled to hold a Cobra meeting at 11am. The Guardian’s defence and security editor, Dan Sabbagh, has this explainer of how exactly such meetings work.

Cobra meetings are held in the basement of the Cabinet Office, not far underground from the Cabinet War Rooms, and represent the crown jewel of Britain’s emergency planning system.

Prime ministers, minsters, chief advisers and the most junior official have to hand in their mobile phones and tablets, encouraging attendees to concentrate on the topic in hand – ranging from a terrorism incident, a natural disaster or, in this case, a threatened pandemic.

The acronym stands for Cabinet Office Briefing Room A, although in reality the largest meeting room is Room F, which sits 20 or so people around a coffin shaped table. Screens are mounted on the walls to show presentations and to patch in those who have to participate remotely, such as Scottish first ministers.

The meetings are tightly structured to a pre-written “chair’s brief”, which is intended to allow somebody to lead a meeting at short notice, if they are stressed, and to get quickly to key decisions. The first step is the Common Recognised Information Picture, the CRIP, an agreed statement of facts – designed to prevent needless arguments about what is going on on the ground. CRIPs are put together in advance, and may well be the product of a considerable amount of work.

Boris Johnson, or whoever is chairing, then solicits advice from key figures such as the chief medical officer, Prof Chris Whitty, or the chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance, plus the senior ministers present. More junior officials are housed in satellite rooms in case there is a technical question that needs to be answered immediately; the idea is that there is nothing that should not be able to be clarified straight away.

A good brief will warn the chair of likely points of conflict, or if there are going to be ministerial disagreements, and may even suggest ways through. But the idea is that after a relatively short period – it is not uncommon for a Cobra meeting to last just 45 minutes – it will reach the key decision point, in this case whether to formally move to the delay phase of dealing with the coronavirus outbreak.

Meeting over and phones recovered, the idea is that everybody in the room will have a concise shared understanding of the problem and agree what the next steps are in tackling it. But some aspects sit ultimately with the prime minister alone: as when Tony Blair decided not to close the London Underground the day after 7/7, after what had been deemed to be a credible terrorism threat. No attack took place.

The European commission president, Ursula von der Leyen, has said the coronavirus is a having a “vast impact” on Europe’s economy during a press conference in Brussels to mark the first 100 days of her tenure leading the EU’s executive branch. She said:

The spread of the virus has a vast impact on people’s lives but it also has a vast impact on our economy. We are looking into everything that we can do to help to address the impacts on the economy.

In light of the epidemic, Von der Leyen criticised the EU’s 27 member states for failing to agree on the next seven-year budget for the bloc.

She said: “If I look at the tasks ahead of us we’re running short of the flexibility to act in crises as we see them right now. I call urgently on all member states to find agreement now.”

More than 100 Britons stuck on a coronavirus-hit cruise ship off the coast of California will soon be allowed to leave, Press Association has reported.

Passengers will disembark the Grand Princess from Monday, a process the liner’s operator said would take a number of days. Britons onboard have described feeling tired and “fed up”, having been confined to their cabins since Thursday. See my earlier post here for background.

A spokeswoman for the ship’s operator, Princess Cruises, said: “Disembarkation will commence in order of priority, as defined and directed by both state and local authorities. It is expected to be a multiple-day process.”

The government has said it is working to secure a repatriation flight for Britons stuck on a coronavirus-hit cruise ship.

There are thought to be more than 140 British nationals onboard the Grand Princess, which is currently off the coast of California. 21 people onboard have tested positive for Covid-19.

The ship is expected to dock in Oakland on Monday, but only passengers requiring treatment and state residents are expected to be able to disembark.

The Foreign Office said it had contacted all British nationals on board the ship:

We are working intensively with the US authorities on arrangements for a flight for British nationals who are currently on the Grand Princess cruise ship off the coast of California. We are in contact with all British nationals on board to offer assistance, as well as local authorities and staff on board the ship.

Albania has announced measures to tackle a potential outbreak of Covid-19 after confirming its first two cases of coronavirus, reports Helena Smith, the Guardian’s correspondent in Greece, Turkey and Cyprus.

Speaking to the media this morning, the prime minister, Edi Rama, said all schools, as of today, would be closed for the next two weeks and flights to northern Italy cancelled until at least 3 April.

Authorities in the country – one of Europe’s poorest states – said two people, described as a father and son, had tested positive after recently returning to Albania from Italy. A short distance across the Adriatic Sea, Italy, like Greece, is home to a large community of Albanians who migrated after the collapse of communism.

Calling for calm, Rama said a €3.2m fund had been set up to deal with the disease, with public health officials devising a plan of action to limit and delay the spread of the virus.

Albania, which is desperate to begin accession talks with the EU, is still recovering from years of Stalinist rule with a health system that is far from robust. Rama said the government was in close consultation with the World Health Organization.

The transport secretary, Grant Shapps, has written to the EU commission calling for an end to “use-it-or-lose-it” rules, which he said could lead to some airlines running “ghost” services to ensure they do not have their flight slots taken from them.

The “80:20” rule – which means airlines must use 80% of their allocation – has already been eased on flights to and from Hong Kong and mainland China, and Shapps said such measures should be widened to cover other flights in and out of Europe.

Dr David Nabarro, one of the World Health Organization’s six special envoys on coronavirus, has said the government is likely to be considering restrictions on religious and community gatherings to help delay the spread of the disease. The PA news agency reports that he told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:

We need to recognise that it is advancing and the focus now needs to move to delay. In order to do that, it is really important to try and take the heat out of transmission, and that means helping people to stay further away from each other and reduce the risk they get infected.

Dr Nabarro added:

Very importantly, if you have symptoms that suggest you might have Covid, you absolutely must not be in contact with others. You are trying to reduce the spread. Then you look at large events. But it is not just the big events. I want to stress it is also gatherings in community halls, in religious spaces and services, and also in pubs and the like. It will be that sort of gathering that the government will look at, as well as of course the big events.

The family of Nazanin Zaghari-Ratcliffe, a British-Iranian dual national imprisoned in Iran, say she has been seen by a doctor and advised that her condition is likely to improve. They announced a week ago that they believed she had contracted coronavirus in Tehran’s Evin prison, where she is serving a jail sentence for espionage, a charge she strenuously denies. The Free Nazanin campaign said in a statement on Sunday night:

[A doctor] confirmed to her that her symptoms were clearly a virus and were consistent with coronavirus but he also confessed he was unable to test her with a testing kit … The doctor, however, did reassure Nazanin that since her symptoms had stabilised it was likely a positive sign that she was hopefully soon going to start to recover.

Her family added that she was still not healthy and was persistently becoming sick even before the outbreak of coronavirus in Iran.

Vietnam has suspended its visa-waiver programme for citizens from Denmark, Norway, Finland, Sweden, the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Spain, in an effort to prevent the spread of coronavirus within its borders.

The Guardian’s south-east Asia correspondent, Rebecca Ratcliffe, reports that the announcement follows confirmation of several new cases linked to a flight that arrived in Hanoi from London on 2 March. The country had gone 22 days without reporting any new infections before the new cluster of cases emerged.

Seven British citizens are among the 14 new patients to test positive over recent days. Officials have since quarantined tens of passengers from the flight as well as their contacts.

The British Foreign Office said it was in contact with authorities in Vietnam over the issue, but did not state how many British citizens were in isolation. As of Sunday, Vietnam reported that it had recorded a total of 30 infections.

University Hospital Southampton has closed its surgical high dependency unit to new admissions after a staff member tested positive for coronavirus. They said in a statement:

A healthcare professional who worked a single nightshift in our surgical high dependency unit on Friday 6 March has tested positive for coronavirus (Covid-19). They are now isolated at home.

The small number of patients and staff who came into close contact with this individual have been informed and will be appropriately isolated.

The surgical high dependency unit is temporarily closed to new admissions. Any patient affected by the temporary closure will be contacted directly.

The former UK chancellor, George Osborne, has urged the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, to use this week’s budget to introduce immediate measures to help individuals and smaller companies cope with the economic shock of the coronavirus, saying he would expect the UK to see an upsurge in cases in the coming weeks.

The Guardian political correspondent Peter Walker reports that Osborne told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme:

I’m not an epidemiologist, but I can’t help noticing that the UK cases are quite like the Italian cases were two weeks ago. And they’ve gone and sealed off the whole of northern Italy, and an enormous city like Milan has been closed. I’m not saying we will be there, but we could be there in the next two or three weeks. If I was chancellor I don’t want some complicated scheme that’s working in six months’ time. I need to use the tools that are available to me right now.

Ideas could include direct cash grants to people such as the self-employed, to “create an incentive that if they feel ill they stay at home”, and for smaller businesses with low cash reserves to be let off national insurance or other taxes for a period, Osborne said.

The argument over longer-term fiscal rules could be set aide while the economy dealt with “a very short, sharp shock to the system”, he added.

Asked if he would be nervous if he was in Sunak’s shoes, Osborne added:

I’m not sure I’d be nervous. I think this is what chancellors and the Treasury are for. They are there to deal with events, and in any period of time there’s going to be things thrown at you. This is exactly why we have a well-oiled democracy and a strong government.

Reacting to the news of the third UK death from coronavirus, Dr Stephen Griffin, associate professor at the University of Leeds’s Institute of Medical Research, said more such announcements were likely to be made.

It is therefore critical that we do not overlook the many thousands of people in our country above retirement age, those who are living with chronic health conditions, or those with suppressed immune systems resulting from medication, infectious (eg untreated HIV) or inherited causes.

In the absence of a vaccine for the short to medium term, this population would benefit tremendously from the availability of antiviral drugs. Thus, the ongoing trials of eg remdesivir in China and elsewhere are of critical importance for the short- to medium-term management of Covid-19. Going forward, the development of bespoke antivirals to combat infections such as this virus should be prioritised.

The EU council, the Brussels institution that brings together diplomats and ministers from the member states for policy-making, said this morning it would hold only essential meetings due to coronavirus – and officials have suggested everyone avoid “handshakes and kisses”.

Meanwhile, the former prime minister of Romania, Dacian Cioloș, who leads the Renew group in the European parliament, is seeking either the suspension of the chamber or a substantial reduction to its agenda. The session this week has already been moved to Brussels rather than Strasbourg because of the epidemic.

Iranian state-linked media have announced that 16 people have died from alcohol poisoning in the south-western city of Ahvaz, the latest in a wave of deaths apparently driven by the mistaken belief that alcohol is a vaccine against the coronavirus. Alcohol is banned in the country but is still illegally imported or brewed at home – the latter occasionally resulting in deaths from bad batches.

The head of Iran’s crisis management authority, Ismail Najjar, is the latest official who has contracted the virus, which has infected 6,500 people according to Iran’s official tally. Nearly 200 people have died, including at least 49 people over the weekend.

The German government has decided on a raft of measures to soften the blow of the corona irus on Europe’s largest economy, as the number taken ill rose to 1,112 on Monday, reports the Guardian’s Berlin correspondent, Kate Connolly.

The measures include giving bridging loans to businesses and extending their tax payment deadlines as well as partially compensating employers who are forced to introduce reduced working hours to allow them to continue paying their employees’ wages.

In an emergency meeting that went on into the night, the Christian Democratic Union and their junior partners, the Social Democrats, who make up the grand coalition under Angela Merkel, said the measures – including a €12.4bn state investment package – were meant to ensure that Corona does not completely upend the German economy.

It has already done considerable damage, with the German stock index, the DAX taking a severe hit, the nation’s flagship airline, Lufthansa forced to cut its flights by half in an attempt to cope with the collapse in ticket sales, and large scale conferences and trade fairs, such as the international tourism fair, the ITB, and the Leipzig Book Fair having been cancelled. Bundesliga matches are likely to soon follow the list of cancelled events, after health minister Jens Spahn yesterday recommended that all gatherings involving 1000 people or more should be banned.

The likelihood that schools and universities in the regions hardest hit – such as the western state of North Rhein Westphalia, which has 484 cases – will close in the coming days is growing, particularly if the number continues to rise.

The culture secretary, Oliver Dowden, has been speaking to BBC Breakfast before a meeting organised by his department with sporting bodies and broadcasters. Asked about holding games behind closed doors as is the case in Italy, he said:

That is an option in the future but we are clear at this point there is no need for events to be cancelled. We are very cognisant of the impact the cancelling of events may have both in terms of the economic and social impact.

He added:

Any decision will be taken on the basis of the facts and the evidence. But we are very clear – at this stage we are still in the contain phase and that means that there is no need to cancel such events, there’s no need for people not to go to sporting events, to museums and so on.

Today’s Cobra meeting will be attended by senior ministers as well as the chief medical officer and chief scientific adviser. In comments released before the meeting, Boris Johnson said:

The number of coronavirus cases continues to rise in the UK and around the world. We are well prepared and will continue to make decisions to protect the public based on the latest scientific advice. Tackling coronavirus will require a national and international effort. I am confident the British people are ready to play their part in that. The most valuable thing people can do is wash their hands with soap and water for 20 seconds.

The government has set up a counter disinformation unit “to protect and secure the UK from interference and disinformation linked to the coronavirus”. The culture secretary, Oliver Dowden, said:

Defending the country from misinformation and digital interference is a top priority.

As part of our ongoing work to tackle these threats we have brought together expert teams to make sure we can respond effectively should these threats be identified in relation to the spread of Covid-19.

This work includes regular engagement with the social media companies, which are well placed to monitor interference and limit the spread of disinformation, and will make sure we are on the front foot to act if required.

Israel is considering forcing anyone arriving in the country, from any part of the world, to self-isolate for at least 14 days, reports the Guardian’s Jerusalem correspondent Oliver Holmes. Its government has already imposed some of the most stringent rules globally to block the spread of the virus.

The potential move has also been interpreted domestically as a measure to avoid irking the country’s close ally and benefactor in Washington, Donald Trump. Israel already requires travellers arriving from more than a dozen countries to spend two weeks in home isolation, effectively killing off incoming tourism.

Following outbreaks in the US, pressure has been building to add the country to the list. But rather than extending the rules specifically on US travellers, and risk an angry backlash from the White House, Israel might broaden its policy out to the entire planet.

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with US Vice President Mike Pence on Sunday, after Israeli media reported the country was considering barring visitors from parts of the US, such as New York and California.

The Israeli government has still not made a decision, although it could be announced in the coming hours.

Health authorities have said that the number of coronavirus cases in Israel jumped from 25 to 39 over the weekend. Around 80,000 Israelis are already in self-isolation.

The department of digital, culture, media and sport is to host a meeting of sports governing bodies and broadcasters to discuss holding events behind closed doors if the coronavirus outbreak worsens.

The Italian government has ordered all major sporting events to be held without fans and the Italy v England Six Nations rugby match, due to be held in Rome in this weekend, has been postponed.

Hello from London.

The UK prime minister, Boris Johnson, will chair an emergency Cobra meeting later today to discuss the response to the coronavirus outbreak. The meeting is expected to consider whether or not to move from the ”contain” phase to the “delay” phase of the government’s four-part action plan. The “delay” phase involves an acceptance that the virus has taken hold in the UK and focuses on “lowering the peak impact and pushing it away from the winter season”. The phase could involve closing schools, banning large public gatherings and urging people to work from home.

Here’s a reminder of the phases of the government’s plan to respond to coronavirus.

• Contain: detect early cases, follow up close contacts, and prevent the disease taking hold in this country for as long as is reasonably possible
• Delay: slow the spread in this country, if it does take hold, lowering the peak impact and pushing it away from the winter season
• Research: better understand the virus and the actions that will lessen its effect on the UK population; innovate responses including diagnostics, drugs and vaccines; use the evidence to inform the development of the most effective models of care
• Mitigate: provide the best care possible for people who become ill, support hospitals to maintain essential services and ensure ongoing support for people ill in the community to minimise the overall impact of the disease on society, public services and on the economy

That’s it from me, Helen Sullivan, for now. I’ll be back with you tomorrow. In the meantime, my colleague Frances Perraudin will be taking over the blog. You can find the latest summary of events here.

France has banned gatherings of 1,000, as two more MPs are infected, bringing the number of French lawmakers infected with the virus to four, AFP reports.

Oliver Veran confirmed the beefed-up measures on Sunday but said officials would issue a list of events considered “useful to national life” that would be allowed to continue – such as demonstrations.

With more than 1,100 recorded cases and 19 deaths so far, France is the second worst affected European country after its neighbour Italy, which has imposed a sweeping lockdown on the most hard-hit northern regions.

The French government had already banned gatherings in confined venues of more than 5,000 people – a measure that had been set to continue until 15 April. Veran did not specify the terms of the latest, stricter ban.

“This evening we are still in the ‘second stage’, meaning that our priority is to do everything to slow the spread of the virus in our national territory,” he said.

France is preparing to transition to its third level of alert, which would include school closures and public transport suspensions in an attempt to mitigate the consequences of an outbreak – measures that President Emmanuel Macron has said are “unavoidable”.

A swathe of northern Italy was sealed off Monday as authorities struggled to contain the spread and impact of the deadly coronavirus.

An area that is home to around a quarter of Italy’s population was effectively shuttered – including the cities of Milan and Venice – mimicking a lockdown at the centre of the outbreak of the disease in China.

Tens of millions of people are in virtual quarantine, but there are fears that the disease may spread further and disruptions could force several economies into recession.

In Italy, police will set up controls at train stations, stopping all cars on main roads in and out, flights from Milan are suspended and there will be penalties of three months in jail or a €206 (US$233) fine for flouting the rules.

The are mounting concerns that the US – the world’s largest and most connected economy – could be the next Covid-19 hotspot.

Germany announces economic measures to stall ‘corona-crisis’

Germany announced measures to boost its sputtering economy in the face of the fast-spreading coronavirus on Monday, while also calling for the cancellation of large events, AFP reports.

As the number of cases in Germany pushed beyond 900, Health Minister Jens Spahn said gatherings of more than 1,000 people should be scrapped.

Acknowledging the financial hit to organisers of such events in Europe’s biggest economy, Spahn said the government would help cushion the blow.

Germany has over the last week scrapped several huge fairs, including Berlin’s travel fest ITB, industrial show Hannover Messe and the Leipzig book fair.

The coalition “is taking action in the corona-crisis. Besides medical protection measures, we have agreed on a big aid package for the German economy,” tweeted Markus Soeder, leader of Merkel’s Bavarian allies CSU, calling the package “comprehensive”.

Rules governing compensation for workers forced to cut working hours because of the crisis will be eased, said the government in a statement after late-night talks.

The relaxed criteria will apply from April and will be valid up to the end of the year.

Berlin also pledged to draw up proposals on offering liquidity support for companies hardest hit by the impact of the outbreak.

Talks with key representatives of the German economy as well as trade unions will be held shortly on the proposals.

Separately, the government said it will also boost investments by €3.1bn per year between 2021 and 2024.

The total hike in investments totalling €12.4bn will be entirely funded by 2019’s budget surplus.

After what has been an incredibly tense day of news, Australia’s teenagers are here to offer some relief. While New South Wales Health Minister Brad Hazzard warned students on Monday that Covid-19 was “no joke”, toilet paper panic buying remains fair game.

The somewhat counterintuitive response to the outbreak of the novel coronavirus has become a meme on social media, with young Australian TikTok users mocking those who are stripping supermarket shelves bare..

The #ToiletPaperEmergency or the great #ToiletPaperApocalypse, as it was dubbed on Twitter, has inspired a wave of content on TikTok, the video app popular among teenagers and younger users.

One TikTok vidoe, set to the theme music used in the You Wouldn’t Steal a Car anti-piracy campaign of the 2000s, received 33,000 likes and features a young man parodying the ad.

Hannah Izzard reports.

In Vietnam, the British foreign office has confirmed that it is in contact with Vietnamese authorities, over tens of international travellers who are being quarantined over fears they may have been exposed to coronavirus after taking a flight from London to Hanoi.

Seven British travellers are among those who have reportedly tested positive for the virus over recent days, prompting officials in the country to race to isolate any other passengers or contacts who may have been exposed. An Irish and a Mexican passenger are also reported to have been infected.

The country had reported no new cases for several weeks, after schools were closed and employees told to work from home in an effort to halt a potential outbreak. But over recent days 14 new cases have been recorded, bringing the total number of confirmed infections in the country to 30. Officials are considering asking all citizens to complete a health declaration form as a precaution.

It is not clear how long tourists will be required to stay in quarantine. Karen Beland, whose friend is among those being isolated, said people have received little information about what is happening.

Her friend had travelled to Vietnam for a once in a lifetime trip to celebrate her 60th birthday. On Saturday, the cruise boat on which she was staying in Halong Bay was stopped, and she was brought by ambulance to a quarantine centre along with other tourists.

“They’re in a bare room, with six beds in a row with plastic mattresses, with no pillows, no sheets, no towels, and bars on the windows,” she said.

“These are people in their 50s, 60s, 70s, stuck with very little information and until recently not very much food either,” she said, adding that one had been ill due to dehydration on Sunday morning. They have been in Vietnam for a week and have not experienced any symptoms, but are worried about staying in a quarantine facility with others who may be ill.

The British Foreign Office said in a statement that it is “in close contact with the Vietnamese authorities” , adding: “We are providing consular assistance to the British people affected.

“We advise all British nationals in Vietnam to follow our travel advice, which is kept under constant review.”

Over to Wuhan for a moment, where top party official has come under fire after saying the government would implement “gratitude education” so citizens can properly thank the Chinese Communist party for its efforts fighting the coronavirus outbreak.

In comments published on Saturday, Wuhan party secretary Wang Zhonglin said: “The people of Wuhan are heroic people who understand gratitude,” echoing previous comments by Chinese leader Xi Jinping.

“[We] must through various channels carry out gratitude education among the citizens of the whole city as well as cadres so that they thank the general secretary [Xi Jinping], thank the communist party, listen to the party’s words, follow the party’s way, and create strong positive energy,” said Wang, who was sent to Wuhan in February to replace the former party secretary, amid rising public anger over local authorities’ handling of the crisis.

Wang’s statement was met with such scorn that the party affiliated paper that published his comments, the Changjiang Daily, appeared to remove the original article. Chinese media has reportedly been instructed not to publish the article, publish commentaries or mention the incident in anyway.

Australia ‘set for recession’

Here’s a more on the ASX plunge today. Bloomberg Economics says the country is headed for recession: “Australia’s economy will record its first recession since 1991 as the hit from China’s virus-induced slowdown is amplified by slumping confidence and domestic disruptions from the outbreak intensifying Down Under, according to Bloomberg Economics’s James McIntyre.”

Australian treasurer Josh Frydenberg says the Morrison government will use the tax and transfer system to get financial support to Australian households as quickly as possible as part of a looming stimulus package to counter the negative economic impact of the coronavirus, Katharine Murphy and Amy Remeikis report.

Ahead of a cabinet deliberation about the stimulus package expected on Tuesday, the treasurer was asked by reporters on Monday how the government intended to administer assistance to households, given the Coalition has criticised the Rudd government’s stimulus package deployed during the global financial crisis.

The ASX just closed with a 7.33% plunge, in the worst day of trading since the Global Financial Crisis. This represents around AU$140bn (US$90bn) being wiped off Australian shares. More soon...

The ASX is down 7.9%. Markets will be closing any minute now. We’ll have more exact figures soon, but this represents more than AU$130bn (US$85bn) being wiped off the Australian share market. This is the worst day of trading since the 2008 Global Financial Crisis.

Mutual travel restrictions imposed by South Korea and Japan took effect on Monday, rekindling a diplomatic and economic feud between the old foes.

South Korea suspended visas and visa waivers for Japan on Friday, after Tokyo announced travel restrictions, joining more than 100 other countries limiting arrivals from South Korea.

The spat, together with oil price swings, sent South Korean shares and the won sharply lower and prompted the finance ministry to issue a verbal warning against disorderly market movement.

South Korean officials expressed hope on Monday that the country was nearing a “turning point” in the crisis, as the pace of new infections trended lower.

The Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reported 69 new cases, continuing a downward trend. The death toll rose by one to 51

The new cases brought South Korea’s total infections to 7,382, while the death toll rose by one to 51, the KCDC said.

The rate of increase in new infections fell to its lowest in 10 days on Sunday in one of the countries most severely affected outside mainland China.

“I’m still extremely cautious, but there’s hope we can reach a turning point in the near future,” Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun said on Monday before returning to Seoul from the hard-hit southeastern city of Daegu.

Health authorities say the number of new infections being identified has dwindled as most of the roughly 200,000 followers of a fringe Christian church at the centre of the epidemic in Daegu have now been tested.

Staying in Western Australia for the time being, chief executive of east metropolitan health services, Liz McCloud is speaking about the clinics there, which she reiterates, “are to test those people who have cold and flu-like symptoms and have travelled overseas or believe they have in contact with a known case.”

In Western Australia, the health minister Roger Cooke is speaking at one of the new Covid-19 clinics which will be open from 8am to 8pm tomorrow: “The way these clinics will work is they are available to anyone who is experiencing flu-like symptoms; Have travelled overseas in the recent past; have come in contact with someone who has travelled overseas or believe they have come in contact with someone with a positive diagnosis. We are expanding the role of the clinics from when we announced them on the weekend.”

Goldman Sachs cut its second- and third-quarter Brent price forecasts to US$30 per barrel, citing the oil price war between Russia and Saudi Arabia and a significant collapse in oil demand due to the coronavirus.

Oil fell by the most since 1991 on Monday after Saudi Arabia started a price war with Russia by slashing its selling prices and pledging to unleash its pent-up supply onto a market reeling from falling demand because of the virus outbreak.

“The aggressive cut to Saudi’s Official Selling Prices and Russia’s reluctance to be pushed into a deal on Friday point to a low probability of an immediate (OPEC+) agreement,” Goldman said in a note dated March 8.

A three-year pact between the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries and Russia ended in acrimony on Friday after Moscow refused to support deeper oil cuts and OPEC responded by removing all limits on its own production.

Assuming no change in production policy, Goldman expects a supply deficit to emerge in the fourth quarter of 2020, which would run down excess inventories through 2021.
The bank said the prospect of inventory draws would help prices to rebound to $40 per barrel by the end of this year.

In Australia, Sky News has reported that Prime Minister Scott Morrison is considering cash handouts to ordinary citizens as part of an expected A$10 billion (US$6.50 billion) fiscal stimulus package.

However, the idea is facing fierce opposition from Finance and Treasury officials, Sky added.

Also on the table are wage subsidies for small businesses and business tax incentives as Morrison’s government work to combat the economic impact of the coronavirus outbreak.

Mark Scott from the New South Wales Department of Education is speaking now about the new cases confirmed at schools this morning. “Apart from those students asked to self-isolate, [Willoughby Girls High School] will be open again on Wednesday morning. Epping boys high school was closed last Friday, and Epping boys high has opened this morning and is operating successfully.”

In Australia, New South Wales Chief Health Officer Dr Kerry Chant is speaking now. She says, “While we are actually expecting to see continued rises in case numbers, that reflects very strong health protection system. We want people that are returning from overseas who develop symptoms within 14 days to present for testing. And that allows us to act promptly at identifying contacts and breaking the chain of transmission.”

New South Wales state health minister Brad Hazzard says of the new cases, “There was a14-year-old boy and a 15-year-oldgirl, both at year 10 at St Patrick’s Marist College, Dundas. There was also a 12-year-old, a young lady from Willoughby Girls High School.

“In regard to the two young people from Dundas, St Patrick’s MaristCollege, their fathers, aged in their 50s, have also been confirmed as having the coronavirus. We have the year seven student, her mum has also been confirmed as having COVID-19. She’s a lady of Iranian origin, but hasn’t travelled recently. So there’s a lot of work to do there to determine the source of that particular infection.”

We’re in Sydney now for another update state health minister Brad Hazzard, who says, “We’ve established now a new orthodoxy. If a child or anyone else at a school is found to have the Covid-19 virus then effectively a breather will be taken. They will take a day out.”

“This is the new normal,” he said.

A new song to wash your hands to:

In the US, the state of Maryland reported two new cases of coronavirus on Sunday, raising to five the total confirmed cases in the state.

In Maryland, a Harford County resident in her 80s who contracted the virus while traveling overseas and was hospitalized and a Montgomery County resident in his 60s who contracted the virus while traveling overseas and was briefly hospitalized.

A special North Korean flight carrying presumably dozens of diplomats and other foreigners arrived in Russia’s Far East on Monday as the country tightens its lockdown intended to fend off the coronavirus.

North Korea has not publicly confirmed a single case of the Covid-19, but its state media reports suggest about 7,000 North Koreans have been quarantined as part of strict prevention measures.

Seemingly dozens of passengers, most of them masked and some accompanied by children, lined up at Pyongyang International Airport. North Korean health workers wearing white protective suits scanned them for fevers.

It wasn’t immediately clear how many were flown out to Vladivostok. The North lifted a monthlong quarantine on foreign diplomats based in Pyongyang on March 2, allowing them to leave the country if needed.

Colin Crooks, the British ambassador to Pyongyang, tweeted:

The North has called its anti-virus campaign a matter of “national existence” while banning foreign tourists, shutting down nearly all cross-border traffic with China, intensifying screening at entry points and mobilizing health workers to monitor residents and isolate those with symptoms.

Many experts say North Korea is highly vulnerable to infectious diseases due to its chronic shortage of medical supplies and outdated health care infrastructure.

China’s excessive coronavirus public monitoring could be here to stay

Over the last two months, Chinese citizens have had to adjust to a new level of government intrusion.

Getting into one’s apartment compound or workplace requires scanning a QR code, writing down one’s name and ID number, temperature and recent travel history. Telecom operators track people’s movements while social media platforms like WeChat and Weibo have hotlines for people to report others who may be sick. Some cities are offering people rewards for informing on sick neighbours.

Chinese companies are meanwhile rolling out facial recognition technology that can detect elevated temperatures in a crowd or flag citizens not wearing a face mask. A range of apps use the personal health information of citizens to alert others of their proximity to infected patients or whether they have been in close contact.

State authorities, in addition to locking down entire cities, have implemented a myriad of security measures in the name of containing the coronavirus outbreak. From top officials to local community workers, those enforcing the rules repeat the same refrain: this is an “extraordinary time” feichang shiqi, requiring extraordinary measures.

There’s ‘No chance’ of the Australian Grand Prix happening behind closed doors, organisers say.

Italian Formula One teams have started arriving in Australia and there is no chance of the opening grand prix of the season being cancelled, postponed or being held behind closed doors, despite fears over the coronavirus.

Andrew Westacott, CEO of the Australian Grand Prix Corporation, said on Monday the race will proceed as planned at Albert Park, after it was announced the next race on the calendar, the Bahrain GP on 22 March, will be run without spectators present. April’s Chinese Grand Prix has already been postponed.

The operator of cruise ship Costa Fortuna said it was heading to Singapore to end its journey on Tuesday as planned, after it was turned away from ports in Malaysia and Thailand over coronavirus fears.

Italian cruise line Costa Crociere said there were no suspected virus cases among its guests, which includes Italians – Italy has the largest number of cases of the virus outside China with 7,375 infections.
Costa Crociere said it would cancel a cruise due to depart on March 10 from Singapore.
Singapore port authorities have not yet said whether they would allow the ship to dock.

New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern has announced the country will extend its ban on travellers from China and Iran for another seven days.

Walt Disney Co’s Shanghai Disneyland said on Monday it will resume a limited number of operations at its resort as part of the first step of a phased reopening, although the main theme park will remain shut amid worries about a coronavirus outbreak, Reuters reports.

A limited number of shopping, dining, and recreational activities would be available at Disneytown, Wishing Star Park and Shanghai Disneyland Hotel though they will operate under limited capacity and reduced hours of operation, Shanghai Disneyland said in a statement on its website.
The Shanghai Disneyland had been shut from Jan. 25 to prevent the spread of the coronavirus.

How to boost your immune system to avoid colds and coronavirus

You’re washing your hands 10 times a day and have stopped touching your face. What else can you do to improve your health and avoid bugs?

Sheena Cruickshank, a professor of immunology at the University of Manchester, has a “shocking cold” when we speak at a safe distance, over the phone. To know how to take care of your immune system, she says, first you need to understand the weapons in your armoury – a cheeringly impressive collection, it turns out.

“When you come into contact with a germ you’ve never met before,” she says, “you’ve got various barriers to try to stop it getting into your body.” As well as skin, we have mucus – “snot is a really important barrier” – and a microbiome, the collective noun for the estimated 100tn microbes that live throughout our bodies, internally and externally. Some of these helpful bugs make antimicrobial chemicals and compete with pathogens for food and space.

In Australia, a notice was sent to the parents at Willoughby Public School today – the school shares grounds with Willoughby Girls, which confirmed a case of Covid-19 among one of its students today – saying it is “business as usual” for now.

Willoughby public has around 1,000 students from kindergarten to year 6.

Hong Kong has had its third Covid-19 death, a 76-year old woman who had an underlying health condition who had been diagnosed early this month, the Hospital Authority said on Sunday. Her husband has also been confirmed to have the virus. The two lived in Sham Shui Po in Kowloon.

Hong Kong’s Centre for Health Protection said on Sunday that it was investigating five new cases, bringing the total confirmed infections in the city to 115. Two of the five new cases are related to a tour group that travelled to India.

Hong Kong stocks saw their worst fall in two years on Monday, with the Hang Seng index dropping by more than 4%, its worst one-day decline since February 2018.

As China reported no new cases outside of Hubei province, optimism is growing in Wuhan. According to CCTV, 11 out of 14 temporary hospitals built to take patients with milder conditions have now closed. The three remaining temporary, emergency hospitals have about 100 patients in each.

Deputy head of the central steering group leading the government’s response to the crisis Chen Yixin said at a meeting on Sunday: “We cannot be blindly optimistic.. we must concentrate our efforts in wiping out [the virus] and at the same time plan ahead for the resumption of work and allow people to leave Wuhan orderly and in batches.”

The message to doctors has always been clear: if you get sick, do it on your own time, writes Ranjana Srivastava.

“The rule of thumb in medicine is that if you aren’t sicker than your patients, you turn up to work.

After all, a temporary viral illness is nothing compared to conditions that some other doctors endure: the death of a parent; a complicated pregnancy; and of course, mental illness whose manifestations are far harder to share than a fractured arm or a blinding headache.

Organisations are splashed with well-intentioned messages highlighting the importance of self-care and even offering free help, because we know all too well that illness doesn’t distinguish between patients and doctors.

Unfortunately, like all attractive offers, there is a huge catch: in order to get better, you must be prepared to tax your fellow doctors. No one says you can’t take a day off, but it is an unspoken expectation that you will not be covered.”

Still in Australia for the moment, we have a bit more information on the coronavirus case at Willoughby Girls High school:

A letter sent from principal Ms E Diprose said the school will not be operational for the remainder of today, Monday 9 March, and tomorrow, Tuesday 10 March.

The letter to parents said:

A student at the schools has returned a positive test for Covid 19 at Willoughby Girls High School.

Students will be released from their classrooms from 11.30am. We are endorsing the use of mobile phones today so you can message your daughter when you arrive to collect her.

To provide time for NSW Health to conduct their contact tracing process the school will be non-operational today and tomorrow.

In accordance with NSW Health advice staff and students at the school should self-isolate for the next two days while the contact tracing process is finalised. Staff and students will be contacted again today and also advised if they can resume school as normal on Wednesday,11 March 2020 or if a further quarantine period will be required. Information on COVID 19 is available on NSW Health website.

The main takeaway from Australia’s shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers is that the economy was already in bad shape before coronavirus hit. “The government should be considering ways to get support into the hands of workers and businesses and communities as soon as possible,” he said.

Australia’s shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers says, “The response needs to be broad enough to make a difference and big enough and fast enough.”

He is now talking about petrol retailers who, he says, “should not be taking us for mugs” by holding on to petrol price reductions. Australians need this price relief he says.

Australia’s shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers is speaking now, with a much less reassuring message – albeit one focussed on criticising the government – listing the challenges faced by Australia’s economy beyond coronavirus.

“This Coronavirus will have a very big impact on our economy and it warrants and demands a substantial response from our government. The economy was already weak, heading into the challenges of the fire season and the Coronavirus and now it is getting weaker. Already before the virus hit, we had slowing quarterly growth, annual growth was well below average, business investment went backwards for three-quarters in a row. We have got stagnant wages, very high household debt, issues with consumption and productivity.”

Australian shadow treasurer Jim Chalmers is now speaking about the economy:

“I am conscious that the stock market has again taken a big hit, as confidence here and around the world has suffered from the outbreak of the virus. I know it is having an impact on our dollar as well, which is lower again. There is a lot of anxiety and a lot of concern in our economy and in our community.”

Brendan Murphy, Australia’s Chief medical officer, says “thousands” have been asked to self-isolate, but he does not have exact numbers.

The gist of that presser is:

• Return travellers with symptoms, get tested
• There has been only one case of community transmission in the country
• The focus at the moment is therefore on return travellers

Australian Chief medical officer Brendan Murphy is addressing media at the moment about the general status of the outbreak in the country.

Asked whether those who have not had contact with recent travellers from China or South Korea, but have a runny nose, whether you should get a test, Murphy says:

Not unless you are a returned traveller and you have symptoms, symptoms that suggest you might have an upper respiratory infection - a cough, a significant runny nose and fever.”

In Australia, we’re hearing from the chief medical officer Brendan Murphy, who says:

There may come a point where the focus is on isolating people who are symptomatic and test positive, and keeping them away from the rest of the community. And where contact tracing becomes less important. We are not at that point yet. At the moment, we’re focusing very aggressively on tracing and isolating contacts, because all of the evidence suggests that the best way to temper, delay and reduce the size of any outbreak in Australia is to contain it.

Australia’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy says pregnant women should take particular care with their health but that there haven’t been any major issues in pregnant women who’ve been infected – that’s the advice from China.

Australia’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy is talking a bit about the special clinics being set up to deal with the outbreak.

“Sometimes they might be located within an existing clinic, but with a separate entrance. The idea is to keep potential cases away from the general community,” he says.

REPORTER: So they will be essentially in the suburbs and towns, more so than the major metro areas?

Murphy: “We’re working for a range of them. It will be more difficult in rural and regional areas.”

Australia’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy says screening at the airport “hasn’t picked up many people so far. Most people end up becoming unwell when they come here. But we certainly do have very enhanced screening at the moment.”

Australia’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy is addressing the media about the status of the coronavirus outbreak in the country. Asked about travel bans – given he has just said the most important consideration for the spread of the virus in Australia is from return travellers to monitor themselves and report to doctors if they have any symptoms:

“Our current travel bans are proportionate. No more travel bans are recommended,” he says.

In Australia, the country’s chief medical officer Brendan Murphy says:

Our message remains. The most important thing for Australia to slow the progression of this disease is for return travellers who become unwell with flu-like symptoms, upper respiratory symptoms – cough, sore throat, fever and the like, to contact their doctor and get tested. That is the best way that we will contain the growth in this disease.

Australia’s Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy is speaking now about the country’s latest coronavirus cases.

He says Australia still has only one case of community transmission, in Sydney. “The majority of cases in Australia continue to be from return travellers from an increasing number of countries around the world.”

The Hang Seng index has open down nearly 4%, in line with the falls we’ve already seen in Australia and Japan this morning.

For the record the ASX200 in Sydney is off an eyewatering 6.2% now and Tokyo has lost 5%.

Saudi seals off Shiite-majority region, closes schools over coronavirus

Saudi authorities Sunday cordoned off the eastern region of Qatif, a stronghold of the kingdom’s Shiite minority, in a bid to contain the fast-spreading coronavirus as the total number of cases rose to 11, AFP reports.

The lockdown on Qatif, home to around 500,000 people, is the first action of its kind across the Gulf region that has confirmed more than 230 coronavirus cases – most of them people returning from religious pilgrimages to Shiite-majority Iran.

“Given that all 11 recorded positive cases of the new coronavirus are from Qatif... it has been decided... to temporarily suspend entry and exit from Qatif,” the interior ministry said in a statement carried by the official Saudi Press Agency.

Although the ministry said the lockdown was temporary, it risks fuelling resentment in the flashpoint region whose residents have long accused the Sunni-dominated government of discrimination, a charge Riyadh denies.

Saudi Arabia’s Eastern Province – which includes Qatif – has seen bouts of unrest since 2011 when protesters emboldened by that year’s Arab Spring uprisings took to the streets.

Air New Zealand has withdrawn full-year guidance it downgraded just two weeks ago amid mounting disruption from the global coronavirus outbreak.

The carrier’s chief executive has also taken a pay cut as it braces for a greater-than-expected hit from virus-related closures and travel bans that are hurting the wider aviation industry.

Air NZ in February predicted the Covid-19 hit to FY20 earnings would be in the range of $NZ35 million ($A34 million) to $NZ75 million ($A72 million) due to lower demand and capacity cuts.

The company on Monday said financial impact is now likely to be more significant than previously estimated.

“And with the situation evolving at such a rapid pace, the airline is not in a position to provide an earnings outlook to the market at this time,” Air New Zealand said in a release.

The company has already cut flights to Hong Kong, suspended Shanghai services until March, and Seoul flights from March to June.

Australia’s Qantas airline on Friday announced it would cut more international flights as it too grapples with falling demand.

Qantas’ latest cuts to destinations including Tokyo, Sapporo, Osaka, Hong Kong and Auckland are on top of its grounding the equivalent of 18 planes as it cut international and domestic capacity last month.

The ASX is now down 6%. The Australian Financial Review is reporting that “Australian shares are on track for their worst day since the GFC.”

Australian Treasurer Josh Frydenberg is wrapping up now, he says there is a coordinated response to the crisis from central banks.

I was on a call with the International Monetary Fund just the other day. And on that call were Central Bank governors from China, from the United States, the European Central Bank, the Bank of England. Everyone is equally concerned. We’re seeing this in the global economy. But this is very different to the GFC, and so the response needs to be very different. And our response is both on the supply and the demand side, because we are seeing disruptions to the economy.

Still in Australia, where Treasurer Josh Frydenberg is addressing the media. Asked about the concerns casual workers have over disruptions caused by the coronavirus outbreak, he says:

I’m very conscious that Australians in employment, be it casual or permanent, will be concerned about their job security. This is obviously an issue that will be raised at tomorrow’s meeting between the Minister for Industrial Relations and the peak employee and employer groups. Our focus is on getting a cooperative workplace. Our focus is ensuring that businesses are flexible, given the stresses and the strains that we will see as a result of the spread of the coronavirus.

The ASX-200 is now down 5.8%.

Australian treasurer Josh Frydenberg says, “Australia is well prepared, economically, and we go into this challenge from a position of strength.”

Asked about today’s ASX tumble, Frydenberg says, “This is a very different situation to what we saw through the GFC, which was essentially, a problem with the banking and the financial system and issues of liquidity. We haven’t seen those same problems in relation to this health crisis.”

Australian treasurer Josh Frydenberg says the economic impact of Coronavirus is “very significant”.

We’ve seen disruptions to international supply chains. We’ve seen a hit on particular sectors, including the tourism sector, agriculture sector, seafood sector and education sector. We’ve already seen the Reserve Bank adjust interest rates downwards and the major banks pass those rate cuts on in full.

Still in Australia for the moment, the ABC’s state political reporter in Perth Jacob Kagi said in a tweet that the fifth case in Western Australia contracted the virus from her husband, who had recently returned from Iran.

A fifth case of Covid-19 has been confirmed in Western Australia, the ABC reports.

In Australia, “as far as prioritising our testing capacity in coming weeks, the state government will be prioritising testing for health care workers,” says health minister Jenny Mikakos.

Victorian health minister Jenny Mikakos is briefing the media on the latest cases in the state. Asked whether she would like to apologise for her use of the word “flabbergasted” referring to the story of a doctor who presented to work last week with symptoms, she says:

“Look, I needed to stress – and I will continue the stress the fact – we need to be alive to the facts. This is a public health emergency of an unprecedented nature that our nation and that the entire global community is facing.”

In Australia, Victoria health minister Jenny Mikakos is asked whether she wishes to apologise to Chris Higgins, the doctor who presented to work despite having flu-like symptoms and was later diagnosed as having Covid-19.

She responds by thanking all health care workers for their work.

“We will not make any apology for the fact that we will always prioritise public health,” she adds.

There are three additional cases today in Victoria.

Victoria health minister Jenny Mikakos is giving a press conference, she says there have been around three hundred presentations at hospitals in the state.

She is issuing a reminder to health care practitioners to not come to work if they are showing any symptoms and to stay away until those symptoms have completely gone away.

In Australia, Victoria health minister Jenny Mikakos is giving a press conference. In this emergency, “We cannot operate on fear or favour,” she says.

Still in New South Wales Australia, for the moment, where state health minister Brad Hazzard says, “This is a virus is active across the world. We can anticipate it will be active here, although thus far, New South Wales and Australia are doing extraordinarily compared to the rest of the world.”

New South Wales’ Health Minister Brad Hazzard says “These are matters are evolving and literally as I walked into the media conference I was being informed [of what was happening]”.

He adds that if you have mild systems, you should call your GP for advice. If you have severe symptoms you should call your ED right away to arrange a visit.

More on the response at St. Patrick’s Marist College in Dundas, Executive director of Catholic Schools Parramatta, Greg Whitby, who says parents have been directed to pick their children up from school when they are able to.

He does not know how long measures will be in place for, and said the school could not close as not all parents are able to arrange child care on short notice.

We couldn’t close the school because we had students who may or may not have access to childcare. We briefed the staff, as soon as they arrived, on the situation. Asked those that felt that they had close contact that they might need to self-isolate, and then we did the same process with the students.

In Australia, New South Wales’ Health Minister Brad Hazzard says a year seven student has been confirmed at Willoughby High school. The other cases include two men in their fifties who “appear to have some connection, – family contact – with some of the cases that have previously been announced.”

The other four new infections are the two students at St. Patrick’s Marist, the student at Willoughby and a mother connected with the Willoughby student.

In Australia, New South Wales’ Health Minister Brad Hazzard says there are another six cases confirmed in the state.

The Australia Securities Exchange (ASX) is now down 5.5%, wiping more than AU$140bn off the Australian share market.

US senator Ted Cruz has released a statement saying he “briefly interacted with an individual who is currently symptomatic and has tested positive for Covid-19” while at the Conservative Political Action Conference ten days ago.

He says he is not experiencing any symptoms and that the interaction – “a brief conversation and a handshake – does not meet the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s criteria for self quarantine and that none of the people Cruz has interacted with in the last 10 days.

He has nevertheless decided to remain in Texas for the remainder of the 14-day period.

In Australia, the ASX is now down 5.3%.

In Australia, the ASX is now down 5%, or nearly 300 points, in the worst day of losses since the start of the coronavirus outbreak.

The ABC is reporting that Epping Boys school was thoroughly cleaned over the weekend after a year 11 student there tested positive last week. Here’s that story from Friday:

In Australia, we’re expecting to hear shortly from a New South Wales representative regarding the two new infections in Sydney among two Year 10 high school students at St. Patrick’s Marist College in Dundas. Stay tuned.

The Australian share market is down 4% in what could be the most turbulent day yet during this coronavirus-driven markets crisis.

Michael McCarthy, chief market strategist at CMC Markets and Stockbroking in Sydney, said

US stock futures are trading significantly lower this morning after crude oil futures dropped more than 20% at the opening of the US Sunday night session.

“Russia’s hard line at a Friday meeting of OPEC+ oil producing nations means it will no longer observe supply restraint to keep crude oil prices higher. The break down in supply agreements comes as the Covid-19 virus has many analysts revising demand forecasts downward, and the double-hit is playing havoc with prices.

The growing fears over the impact of virus containment measures and the slump in crude prices may see stocks outstrip falls foreshadowed on Saturday morning.”

Full story on that crucial Saudi Arabina decision on oil is here:

Australian Unions will ask the federal government for compensation for casual workers who don’t get paid sick leave, AAP reports.

The government is preparing a multi-billion dollar stimulus package to offset the impact of coronavirus on the economy.

Australian Council of Trade Unions secretary Sally McManus said the package must address the financial risk to Australia’s 3.3 million casual workers in retail, hospitality, health and aged care, who will lose pay if they get sick.

“We don’t want people with virus or people with symptoms going to work, but they are going to have to choose between paying the bills and feeding themselves or going to work,” she told Nine’s Today program on Monday.

In Sydney, Australia, Channel Nine is reporting that two Year 10 pupils at St Patrick’s Dundas in Sydney have tested positive for coronavirus.

We’ll have more on this shortly.

Hello and welcome to the liveblog.

If you’re just joining us, here’s a summary of the latest coronavirus developments.

• The UK has announced its third death from the virus. He was a man in his 60s who had underlying health problems.
• The decree imposing a lockdown for more than a quarter of Italy’s population was officially approved by the government and checkpoints are expected to appear at toll booths, stations and other points of entry to Lombardy.
• Five more people have tested positive in Northern Ireland, bringing the UK total to 278.
• The UK Department of Health is now advising anyone who has returned from the lockdown areas in northern Italy to self-isolate for two weeks, even if they do not have coronavirus symptoms.
• The number of deaths from coronavirus in Italy has risen from 233 on Saturday to 366, officials have said. The 57% increase is the steepest daily rise in fatalities since the outbreak came to light.
• Deaths from coronavirus in France rise from 11 to 19. French health officials have confirmed 1,126 cases of coronavirus.
• Israel declared on Sunday that it will close its border with Egypt, beginning 5pm local time.The Taba border crossing between Egypt’s Sinai region and the Israeli town of Eilat is a popular crossing point for tourists.