Coronavirus Live Updates (Thursday): U.S. Stocks Sink Into Bear Market; Brazilian Official Who Met Trump Tests Positive

Friday, March 13, 3 a.m.

The U.S. stock market plunged into bear market territory Thursday amid fears of the Covid-19 pandemic, triggering a second circuit breaker in a week that halted trading for 15 minutes as losses reached 7% shortly after market opening.

The market rout reflected investors’ rising anxiety over the Trump administration’s economic and medical response to the outbreak. Late Wednesday, U.S. President Donald Trump announced a sweeping ban on travel from mainland Europe after the World Health Organization declared the new disease a global pandemic.

The market sell-off continued in the afternoon even after the Federal Reserve moved to pump more than $1 trillion into the market to calm investors. All three major U.S. indexes fell more than 9%, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average losing nearly 10%, the worst day since the Black Monday crash in 1987. 

The outbreak also sent jitters to global political circles as senior officials in several countries were reportedly infected or under observation. Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau is in self-isolation as his wife Sophie exhibited mild flu-like symptoms after returning from the U.K., Ottawa confirmed Thursday. She is waiting for Covid-19 test results.

“The doctor's advice to the prime minister is to continue daily activities while self-monitoring, given he is exhibiting no symptoms himself,” Trudeau’s office said. “However, out of an abundance of caution, the prime minister is opting to self-isolate and work from home until receiving Sophie's results.”

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro is being monitored and tested for coronavirus after one of his aids tested positive for the virus, Brazilian newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo reported Thursday.

Fabio Wajngarten, the president’s press secretary, was diagnosed after returning from a trip to the U.S. with Bolsonaro where they met Trump. A photo posted by Wajngarten showed him standing with Trump and U.S. Vice President Mike Pence at Mar-a-Lago over the weekend.

When asked about the news, the U.S. president said at a press conference that he was “not concerned.” The White House said Trump doesn’t need to be tested at the moment as he had “almost no interactions” with Wajngarten.

In other coronavirus-related news:

• Iran is seeking $5 billion of financial aid from the International Monetary Fund to help fight the outbreak. It is the first time the country has turned to the IMF for help since the 1960s.

• New York State banned all public gatherings of more than 500 people to contain the outbreak. The rule will apply to Broadway, starting Thursday night.

• Perhaps 5,000 to 10,000 British people are likely to be infected by the coronavirus, said the government’s chief scientific adviser, Patrick Vallance. The peak of the outbreak may be 10 to 14 weeks away in the U.K., Vallance said.

Prime Minister Boris Johnson said at the same event that the government has moved on from trying to contain the virus to instead focusing on delaying the worst of outbreak.

• Luxury cruise operator Carnival Corp. said it will pause global operations for two months because of the Covid-19 outbreak. Carnival’s business has been hit hard by the pandemic after one of its ships, the Diamond Princess, became the host of one of the biggest cluster infection cases.

Compiled by Han Wei

Thursday, March 12, 8 p.m.

On Thursday, the European Union hit back at U.S. President Donald Trump’s travel ban, Ireland closed its schools and universities, and Australian authorities defied pressure to cancel their biggest annual motorcar racing event.

There was also new peer-reviewed research suggesting the virus could live in patients for up to five weeks after they were infected, and an update on the Hong Kong dog that caused a global stir last week when news broke it had tested “weak positive” for coronavirus.

Growing calls for Australia to cancel Formula One event

As fears of possible community spread in Australia increase, there is growing pressure on local officials to cancel the Formula One Grand Prix in Melbourne set for this weekend, or tell the crowds to stay home.

The car race, which is expected to draw a quarter of a million spectators, has already seen eight race car team members quarantined with flu-like symptoms, and British team McLaren has pulled out entirely.

But officials have stood firm. Victorian health minister Jenny Mikakos said it was not yet time to take “extreme measures,” but said her government would “prioritize public health.”

“I am really very, very surprised that we are all here,” six-time world champion race car driver Lewis Hamilton told a press conference in Melbourne on Thursday. “For me, it is shocking that we are all sitting in this [media conference] room.”

One high-profile Australian doctor lashed out at plans to hold the event as “outrageous” and “absolute stupidity.”

“It’s politics and it’s money, and people will actually suffer because of it — and there’ll be an outbreak in Victoria that you’ll live to regret,” physician and broadcaster Norman Swan told ABC Radio in Melbourne.

In other coronavirus news

• “The coronavirus is a global crisis, not limited to any continent, and it requires cooperation rather than unilateral action,” the heads of the European Union’s main institutions said in a statement in response to Trump’s decision to ban incoming travelers from Europe. “The European Union disapproves of the fact that the U.S. decision to impose a travel ban was taken unilaterally and without consultation,” Ursula von der Leyen and Charles Michel said in a joint statement, Bloomberg reported.

• New research published in The Lancet found those sickened with Covid-19 can keep the virus in their system for as long as 37 days after they became infected, with the median duration being 20 days. Lead author Cao Bin told the journal the finding could overturn previous assumptions about treatment and quarantine times. Read the full details here.

• China’s war on the coronavirus is now targeting inbound travelers. Beijing, Shanghai and Hong Kong are ramping up their quarantine measures for those arriving from overseas. Those who arrive in Beijing from abroad, regardless of citizenship or country of origin, will be subject to 14 days of medical isolation at home or at a government-designated location.

• A Hong Kong dog that tested “weak positive” for coronavirus has tested negative for antibodies in the blood that would have confirmed it had contracted and fought the disease. However, it has continued to return a “weak positive” result in nucleic acid tests (NAT) from oral and nasal swabs, puzzling researchers. In a statement, a spokesperson for Hong Kong’s Agriculture, Fisheries and Conservation Department said the dog had not shown any symptoms of the disease. Virologists said previously the NAT findings could be explained by the dog licking up some bits of virus from its infected owner, rather than actually being infected. Caixin has confirmed the researchers are also attempting a viral culture that could show whether the virus is viable. The dog remains in quarantine. There is no evidence that pets can transmit coronavirus to humans.

• In an explosive opinion piece, Wuhan author Fang Fang blasts Chinese officials’ arrogance after they tried to roll out “gratitude education” to make sure local residents thank the Communist Party for controlling the coronavirus that has killed nearly 2,500 people in the city.

• Ireland has closed all schools and universities until March 29 as a result of the Covid-19 outbreak, according to The Standard.

• The WHO’s special envoy on Covid-19 David Nabarro warned there could be some “very serious problems” in the U.S. and that the country should pay careful attention to what’s happening domestically in terms of the outbreak, Bloomberg reported.

• Caixin’s publisher Hu Shuli covered the U.S. response to SARS back in 2003. In a look back she discusses the dramatic difference between then and now.

• A Caixin feature looks at how the coronavirus outbreak has given China’s robotic industry an unprecedented chance to showcase its latest advancements.

Compiled by Flynn Murphy

Caixin’s coverage of the new coronavirus

Thursday, March 12, 11:30 a.m.

Today we can expect more reactions to the World Health Organization’s decision overnight to declare the world’s first coronavirus pandemic.

The number of new cases in China and South Korea continued to slow, with the Chinese mainland reporting only 15 new cases at the end of Wednesday, as outbreaks elsewhere gathered pace.

U.S. President Donald Trump declared a ban on travel and cargo from Europe, with aides later correcting that the ban applied only to people, not to the movement of goods.

Meanwhile, Hollywood film star Tom Hanks is in isolation in northeast Australia after testing positive for the virus while filming a movie there. And in the U.S., the NBA has suspended its 2020 basketball season after a player with the Utah Jazz tested positive.

The global caseload is now more than 125,000, with more than 4,600 dead. The number of cases outside China has grown 13-fold in the past two weeks, and the number of affected countries had tripled, according to the World Health Organization.

U.S bans travelers from Europe

U.S. President Donald Trump banned travel from every European nation except the United Kingdom. He initially said the ban would also apply to trade and cargo, though the White House later walked back those comments to say it would only apply to travelers.

The proclamation signed by the U.S. president did not mention a cargo ban.

Trump also asked Congress to approve paid sick leave for contract workers, and said he would defer tax payments for certain affected businesses and individuals.

In a televised address Wednesday from the Oval Office, Trump said the nation’s early decision to ban travel from China had worked, but that the European Union had “failed to take the same precautions.”

“As a result, a large number of new clusters in the United States were seeded by travelers from Europe.”

Trump said the 30-day ban, scheduled to begin midnight Friday, would not apply to Americans that had undergone appropriate screening. The Department of Homeland Security later clarified it would also not apply to legal permanent residents or immediate family members of U.S. citizens, Politico reported.

The ban is “unprecedented in its scale and implications,” said Adam Kamradt-Scott, a health security researcher at the University of Sydney. But he said it was “somewhat bizarre” to exclude the UK, which has recorded more than 450 cases.

“The reality is (Covid-19) is already circulating within communities in North America so the primary focus really needs to be on the United States’ domestic response. In this respect, the associated increase in funding to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is welcome news indeed given its budget had been previously cut.”

In other coronavirus news

• Actor Tom Hanks and his wife Rita Wilson tested positive for the coronavirus in Queensland, Australia, where they were filming an Elvis biopic. Hanks confirmed his positive test result in a Twitter post Thursday morning, saying he would comply with the directions of local health officials.

• The NBA has suspended its 2020 season after a Utah Jazz player tested positive for coronavirus. The organization was determining the “next steps for moving forward in regard to the coronavirus pandemic,” it said in a statement.

• German Chancellor Angela Merkel said with no vaccine or cure yet available for the virus, as much as 70% of the German population could be at risk.

• The Chinese mainland reported only 15 additional cases in its one-day total for Wednesday, the lowest increase in almost two months.

• Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte is being tested for the new coronavirus after his finance and transportation secretaries said they were exposed to an infected person, Bloomberg reported.

• New research from U.S. experts adds weight to the theory the virus may be transmittable through the air. A team that included researchers from the U.S. National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention detected viable virus in the air for up to three hours after aerosolization, as well as on plastic and stainless steel two-to-three days after contamination. The research has not been peer reviewed.

• Denmark closed all state schools and told non-emergency public sector employees to stay home, as cases in the Nordic nation climbed 10-fold in just three days to more than 500, Bloomberg reported.

• India's health ministry announced it would quarantine all incoming travelers who arrived in the country after Feb. 15 from seven nations — China, Italy, Iran, South Korea, France, Spain and Germany — for 14 days. It has also stopped issuing most visas, the nation’s health ministry said in a tweet.

Compiled by Flynn Murphy

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Coronavirus Live Updates (Wednesday): WHO Declares Pandemic; Countries Gear Up to Counter Economic Fallout