Health News (Reuters)

Senator Edward Markey, a Democrat and online privacy advocate, said in a letter released Wednesday that any digital coronavirus contact tracing should be voluntary, transparent and collect only the information needed to identify who might be at risk of contracting the respiratory ailment that has killed more than 45,000 people in the United States.

On January 21, the day the first U.S. case of coronavirus was reported, the secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services appeared on Fox News to report the latest on the disease as it ravaged China. Alex Azar, a 52-year-old lawyer and former drug industry executive, assured Americans the U.S. government was prepared.

As the novel coronavirus spread through New York City in late March, doctors at Mount Sinai Hospital noticed something strange happening to patients' blood.

The Trump administration's plans to reopen the country's national parks and other public lands in line with coronavirus guidelines, U.S. President Donald Trump said on Wednesday, with more details to be announced on specific parks in coming days.

Governors of about half a dozen U.S. states pushed ahead on Tuesday with plans to partially reopen for business despite warnings by some health officials that doing so could trigger a new surge in coronavirus cases.

(This April 21 story has been edited to correct name of radio show in third paragraph)

California Governor Gavin Newsom said on Wednesday during a news conference that hospitals and health care facilities in his state can begin scheduling surgeries again after they were postponed due to the spread of COVID-19.

Reported cases of the coronavirus have crossed 2.57 million globally and 178,574 people have died, according to a Reuters tally as of 1400 GMT on Wednesday.

The family of acclaimed physicist Stephen Hawking has donated his ventilator to a hospital that had treated him in Cambridge, the English university city where he lived and worked, to help care for COVID-19 patients.

Some blood tests being marketed to tell people if they have had the new coronavirus are a "disaster", Roche Chief Executive Severin Schwan said on Wednesday as he prepares to launch the drugmaker's own antibody test next month.

Leading Pakistani doctors on Wednesday urged the government and clerics to reverse a decision to allow prayer congregations at mosques during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, warning that the spread of coronavirus could spiral out of control.

A U.S. appeals court on Wednesday allowed Arkansas to enforce a ban on most surgical abortions a part of a state directive aimed at postponing medical procedures not deemed urgent during the coronavirus outbreak.

President Donald Trump on Wednesday applauded steps taken by a handful of Republican-led U.S. states to start reopening their economies despite warnings of a potential fresh surge of coronavirus infections.

A handful of mostly southern U.S. states will begin loosening economic restrictions this week in the midst of a still virulent pandemic, providing a live-fire test of whether America's communities can start to reopen without triggering a surge that may force them to close again.

The number of people who have died in hospitals in the United Kingdom after testing positive for the coronavirus has risen to 18,100, the health ministry said on Wednesday, an increase of 763 on the figures published 24 hours earlier.

Germany's confirmed coronavirus cases increased by 2,237 to 145,694, data from the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) for infectious diseases showed on Wednesday, marking a second consecutive day of new infections accelerating.

India has ordered a pause in testing for antibodies to the coronavirus because of concern over the accuracy, health officials said on Wednesday, complicating the fight against the epidemic as its tally of cases nears 20,000.

The number of people who have died in hospitals in England after testing positive for COVID-19 has risen by 665 to 16,272, health officials said on Wednesday.

In the weeks since the coronavirus pandemic put the world into a tailspin, the humble face mask has evolved into an American fashion statement.

Peru's hospitals are straining to deal with a rapid rise in the number of COVID-19 infections, with bodies being kept in hallways, masks being repeatedly reused, and protests breaking out amongst medical workers concerned over their safety.