Covid-19: Italy, Spain suffer record virus deaths as infection rate surges

Rome: Italy has logged a shocking spike in its already staggering coronavirus death toll, with officials warning the peak of the crisis was still days away, as the global infection rate surges relentlessly upwards.

With more than 300,000 people infected in Europe alone, the disease shows few signs of slowing, and has already cast the world into a recession, economists say.

In the US, which now has more than 100,000 COVID-19 patients, President Donald Trump invoked wartime powers Friday to force a private company to make medical equipment, as the country’s overburdened healthcare system struggles to cope.

“Today’s action will help ensure the quick production of ventilators that will save American lives,” Trump said as he issued the order to auto giant General Motors.

With 60 per cent of the country in lockdown, and infections skyrocketing, Trump also signed the largest stimulus package in US history, worth USD 2 trillion.

It came as Italy recorded almost 1,000 deaths from the virus on Friday — the worst one-day toll anywhere around the world since the pandemic began.

One coronavirus sufferer, a cardiologist from Rome who has since recovered, recalled his hellish experience at a hospital in the capital.

“The treatment for oxygen therapy is painful, looking for the radial artery is difficult. Desperate other patients were crying out, ‘enough, enough’,” he told AFP.

In one bright spot, infection rates in Italy continued their recent downward trend. But the head of the national health institute Silvio Brusaferro said the country was not out of the woods yet, predicting “we could peak in the next few days”.

Spain too said its rate of new infections appeared to be slowing – despite also reporting its deadliest day.

Europe has suffered the brunt of the coronavirus crisis in recent weeks, with millions across the continent on lockdown and the streets of Paris, Rome and Madrid eerily empty.

In Britain, the two men leading the country’s fight against the coronavirus -Prime Minister Boris Johnson and his Health Secretary Matt Hancock, both announced Friday they had tested positive for COVID-19.