The British Housing Secretary, Robert Jenrick, defended top government official Dominic Cummings on Wednesday, amid a national controversy over Cummings breaking lockdown.
Cummings, a top advisor to British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, traveled 260 miles across England in March while his wife was sick with coronavirus symptoms — at a time when the public was being urged not to leave their homes.
“No, he shouldn’t (resign),” Jenrick said on the BBC’s Breakfast show. “He has given his explanation to the Prime Minister, who listened and concluded that he’d acted reasonably and legally.”
He added that it was time to “move on” to other matters that the nation needed to focus on.
“It’s important obviously that everybody sticks to the rules and acts within the guidelines and Dominic Cummings did do that,” he said. “People will disagree with the decisions that he made, many people do, but he did stick to the guidelines, it was within the law.”
When asked if he was one of those people who disagreed with Cummings’ decisions, Jenrick said he was “not going to judge how individuals have made those decisions.”
“The Prime Minister supports him, the Cabinet supports him, I think it’s now for him to go about his job and more importantly, for the rest of us to get on with ours,” he said.
In South Korea, a total of 259 coronavirus cases have now been linked to a cluster in Seoul’s entertainment district of Itaewon, known for its nightclubs and bars.
It may also have given rise to a second cluster, which authorities are now racing to contain.
The nightclub cluster emerged on May 9, after an infected person visited multiple clubs. In the following weeks, authorities tested tens of thousands of people who were in either in the area or may have been indirectly exposed.
One person, who had been infected from the nightclub cluster, visited a buffet restaurant. Then, another diner there was reported infected — and brought it back to a logistics center in the city of Bucheon.
36 cases have now been linked to that logistics center — 32 employees and four of their family members, according to the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Authorities estimate up to 4,000 people may have been exposed to the virus through this cluster, and so far have conducted about 1,920 tests.
City and health officials are still carrying out the epidemiological investigation, said the KCDC.
The global death toll from the coronavirus pandemic has now reached 350,531, according to a tally by John Hopkins University.
There are now close to 5.6 million cases worldwide.
The United States remains the country with the highest number of cases and deaths. Brazil has the second highest number of cases, while the UK has the second highest number of deaths.
If you’re just joining us now, here are the latest developments on the global coronavirus pandemic:
- South Korea cluster: A total of 257 cases have now been linked to the nightclub cluster in Seoul’s entertainment district of Itaewon. The country reported 40 new cases today, the highest daily rise in cases since early April.
- Japanese warning: A Japanese city is reported more than a dozen new cases, after going 23 days without any new infections. The mayor warned that they could be “on the doorstep of a second wave.” Just earlier this week, the government lifted all lockdown measures across the country.
- Google reopening plans: The company said it plans to reopen “more buildings in more cities” starting July 6, but did not specify which. Employees at those locations will be able to gradually return to the office in phases.
And some big headlines from earlier:
- Latin America buckles: Latin America is now at the center of the global outbreak, experts say. On Tuesday, Peru reported more than 5,700 cases. Mexico recorded its largest single-day increases in both new cases and deaths. And Brazil has had more daily new cases than the US for two days in a row.
- A British scandal: Junior UK minister Douglas Ross has resigned over the controversy surrounding Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s senior adviser, Dominic Cummings, who broke lockdown and traveled more than 250 miles from his London home in March.
Germany has reported 47 new deaths from coronavirus in the past 24 hours, said the Robert Koch Institute (RKI) on Wednesday.
This raises the nationwide death toll to 8,349, according to the RKI, the national agency for disease control and prevention.
The country also confirmed 362 new cases, raising the nationwide count to 179,364 cases.
On Tuesday, the German government announced social distancing restrictions will be extended through June 29. Under the restrictions, no more than 10 people, or two households, are allowed to gather in public places.
Thousands of American doctors and nurses have gotten sick caring for Covid-19 patients, the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Tuesday.
Of an estimated 62,344 health care professionals who have contracted the disease, at least 291 have died, said the CDC.
And these numbers are likely higher in reality, since the agency only has death status data for a little over half of cases it has information on. Many reports on cases also don’t include whether the person worked in health care, meaning there are probably cases left out of this count.
The last time the CDC highlighted the number of cases among health care workers was on April 15. At that time, the number of infected health care workers was 9,282 — a fraction of what it is now.
Health care workers around the country have also complained for months that they do not have enough access to protective equipment.
Japan may face a second surge of coronavirus infections, said Kenji Kitahashi, the mayor of the southern port city Kitakyushu.
“We are on the doorstep of a second wave,” he warned, pointing to a string of new infections.
The city, home to about 937,000 residents, had had no new cases for 23 days, said Kitahashi. Then, the virus returned; since last Friday, there have been 14 new cases.
One patient showed no symptoms but tested positive after a precautionary test, according to the mayor.
The city is located in Fukuoka prefecture, where the state of emergency order was lifted on May 14.
The nationwide state of emergency was lifted in some low-risk areas earlier in the month, before being fully lifted everywhere on Monday.
South Korea reported 40 new cases of the novel coronavirus on Wednesday, the highest daily figure since early April.
Among these new cases, 37 are believed to be locally transmitted, according to the South Korean Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The last time South Korea’s daily case figures were this high was April 8, when it reported 53 cases.
Since then, cases have largely stayed at around 30 or below per day.
Case numbers began spiking again recently, after a new cluster was identified in the capital Seoul’s entertainment district of Itaewon, popular for bars and nightclubs. Nearly 250 cases have been linked to the cluster since it emerged on May 9.
The country now has a total of 11,265 cases and 269 related deaths, according to the KCDC.
The US reported 18,611 new cases of Covid-19 and 693 related deaths on Tuesday, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.
That raises the national total to at least 1,680,913 cases and 98,913 deaths.
The totals includes cases from all 50 states, the District of Columbia and other US territories, as well as repatriated cases.
