Health

Italy hopes to become self-sufficient in producing protective masks against the coronavirus outbreak within two months, the national commissioner for the emergency said on Tuesday.

Renault workers in Spain have begun using 3D printers to manufacture visors for health workers from home, the French carmaker said on Tuesday, in a scheme that could be expanded to make other medical equipment elsewhere.

British health minister Matt Hancock said on Tuesday the government had bought 3.5 million antibody coronavirus tests so that people who suspect they have had the virus would be able to check for sure.

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on Tuesday reported 44,183 cases of coronavirus, an increase of 10,779 cases from its previous count, and said the death toll had risen by 144 to 544.

The number of coronavirus cases in Italy is probably 10 times higher than the official tally, the head of the agency collating the data said on Tuesday as the government readied new measures to force people to stay at home.

Austria will massively expand coronavirus testing in coming days to locate and isolate infected people and avoid an Italian-like overload of its health system, Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said on Tuesday.

Ford Motor Co said on Tuesday it does not plan to restart production at its manufacturing plants in the United States, Canada and Mexico on March 30, as was originally planned.

Britain went into virtual lockdown on Tuesday to try to curb the spread of the coronavirus, but London underground trains were crammed and streets were far from deserted amid confusion over the government's advice to workers.

Lockdown measures set out by the British government on Monday are rules, not advice, and will be enforced, health minister Matt Hancock said on Tuesday.

German Economy Minister Peter Altmaier said that an aid package worth up to 750 billion euros ($816.38 billion) that the government announced on Monday was just an initial step in tackling the coronavirus crisis.

Germany is working on a post-coronavirus stimulus package to put Europe's biggest economy back on track once the outbreak is contained, ministers said on Tuesday.

The number of confirmed coronavirus cases in Germany has risen by 4,764 within a day to reach to 27,436, the Robert Koch Institute for infectious diseases said on Tuesday.

When panic over the coronavirus spurred a run on hand sanitizer in Cape Town, gin maker Andre Pienaar realized there was something he could do with all the waste alcohol his small distillery produces.

Turkey's government increased support for elderly people isolated at home and tightened restrictions on food shopping and travel on Tuesday after the country's death toll from the coronavirus rose to 37.

Spain reported its sharpest daily increase in coronavirus cases on Tuesday with infections rising among health workers, while funeral vans began arriving at Madrid's ice rink, hastily transformed into a makeshift morgue.

South African businesses braced for a nationwide lockdown and panic buyers stockpiled food and other essentials on Tuesday as the number of confirmed coronavirus cases jumped to 554 from 402 a day earlier.

A key modeling study from Singapore has found that putting multiple social lockdowns in place - including school closures - will have the biggest impact on curbing COVID-19, the pandemic disease caused by the new coronavirus.

China's Hubei province where the coronavirus pandemic originated will lift travel restrictions on people leaving the region as the epidemic there eases, but other regions will tighten controls as new cases double due to imported infections.

Scientists in Singapore say they have developed a way to track genetic changes that speeds testing of vaccines against a coronavirus that has killed more than 16,000 people worldwide.

The United States has the potential to become the new epicenter of the coronavirus pandemic due to a "very large acceleration" in infections there, the World Health Organization said on Tuesday.