May is bringing cautious reopenings from coronavirus lockdowns, from Beijing's Forbidden city to shopping malls in Texas, as the grim economic toll from the pandemic ticks higher.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
or signup to continue reading
Many communities around the world are inching toward normality without certainty over whether they have vanquished outbreaks of the virus. However, bleak new figures have underscored the pain inflicted by the disease and added to pressure on leaders to end shutdowns.
The number of Americans filing for unemployment benefits surpassed a staggering 30 million and the European economy shrank a record 3.8 per cent in the first quarter as hotels, restaurants, building sites and manufacturing were frozen by lockdowns.
As bad as those and other numbers are, some are outdated because of the lag in gathering data so the true situation is almost certainly much worse.
Still, analysts saw a glimmer of hope in the way new unemployment claims have fallen for four straight weeks. Andrew Stettner, a senior fellow at the Century Foundation, said the wave of lay-offs at vulnerable businesses such as restaurants, hotels and stores may have largely run its course.
Lay-offs amount to one in six American workers. Some economists say the US unemployment rate for April may be as high as 20 per cent - a figure not seen since the Depression of the 1930s, when joblessness peaked at 25 per cent.
China's Forbidden City reopened on Friday with all tickets for the May 1-5 holiday period sold out, and a limit of 5000 visitors a day, down from the earlier maximum of 80,000. Beijing reopened its parks and museums, with controlled entries, about three months after hundreds of millions of people were ordered into a near lockdown as the coronavirus outbreak erupted in Wuhan.
China on Friday reported 12 new cases, six of them brought from overseas, and no new deaths for the 16th day.
In the US, where large numbers of people are still dying from COVID-19, health officials are warning of the danger of a second wave of infection and some employers and employees have expressed fear of going back to work.
Some states remain cautious: California Governor Gavin Newsom has ordered beaches in Orange County closed after tens of thousands of people flocked to the sand last weekend.
Still, many states and counties are relaxing stay-at-home restrictions amid impatience among those who complain of lost livelihoods and say their rights are being trampled.
Simon Property Group, the biggest US mall operator, plans to open 49 shopping centres on Friday across 10 states, including Texas, Indiana and Georgia. Malls will keep workers masked and limit the numbers of shoppers.
The Texas coronavirus death toll hit a single-day high of 50 on Thursday as the state was preparing for a slow reboot by reopening retailers, restaurants, malls and movie theatres to limited numbers of customers.
In other parts of the world, shutdowns are winding down, with caution.
Malaysia's Prime Minister Muhyiddin Yassin said most business activities would reopen from Monday, days before a two-month lockdown is due to end, after infections fell sharply in recent weeks. Thailand was preparing to reopen parks and some retailers, hair salons and restaurants, while keeping a night-time curfew and extending its ban on alcohol sales.
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who recently recovered from COVID-19, said the UK was "past the peak" and "on a downward slope" in its outbreak but was expected to extend precautions, while Germany, Portugal and the Czech Republic were set to start loosening their restrictions.
With signs the outbreak has stabilised in places, and after news the US economy shrank at a 4.8 per cent annual rate in the first three months of the year with a crushing 40 per cent drop projected for this quarter, President Donald Trump chose not to extend the White House's social-distancing guidelines past their expiration on Thursday.
Trump has continued to speculate on the origins of the coronavirus, saying China could have unleashed it on the world due to some kind of horrible "mistake" or it might have been released intentionally. Intelligence agencies said they were still examining a notion put forward by the president and aides the pandemic may have resulted from an accident at a Chinese lab.
The virus has killed more than 230,000 people worldwide, including more than 61,000 in the US, according to Johns Hopkins University. Confirmed infections topped 3.2 million, with one million of them in the US, but the true numbers are believed to be much higher.
Australian Associated Press
