Coronavirus: National and international news

The former chief inspector of schools in England has said the government’s approach to education has been an “absolute tragedy”.

Sir Michael Wilshaw told ITV’s Good Morning Britain this week: “What’s happened over the last few weeks and months has been an absolute tragedy.

“And it’s been a tragedy for those youngsters who need school, need the structure of school, need the routine of school, need teachers who will be working with them, to support them when they get very little support at home.

“I just don’t know how we’ve made such a mess of it, because head teachers, and I know lots of head teachers, will have been saying to the Department for Education, ‘you’ve got this wrong’.”

More than half the residents tested in Italy’s northern province of Bergamo have coronavirus antibodies, health authorities said on Monday, citing a sample survey.

Of 9,965 residents who had blood tests between April 23 and June 3, 57 per cent had antibodies, indicating they had come into contact with the coronavirus, the survey showed.

Health authorities in Bergamo said the results were based on a “random” sample which was “sufficiently broad” to be a reliable indicator of how many people had been infected in the province, which became the epicentre of Italy’s outbreak.

In a separate statement issued later, the Bergamo health agency said that most of those in the sample were residents of the worst-hit areas. Many had already been put under quarantine, the statement added.

Spain has said it will not negotiate with the UK Government to set-up an ‘air bridge’ for British holidaymakers.

The Spanish government would prefer a Europe-wide approach to tourism this summer to arranging deals with individual countries, it is believed.

Britain introduced a 14-day quarantine period for overseas arrivals on Monday, but government ministers have said they are examining if travel corridors could be established to allow Britons to holiday in locations with low coronavirus infection rates.
Spain will officially open up to foreign travellers from July 1.

New Zealand has successfully wiped out coronavirus after the final person known to have been infected recovered.

Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern said she was confident the country had halted the spread of Covid-19, but said it would “almost certainly” see more cases in the future.

She said: “We are confident we have eliminated transmission of the virus in New Zealand for now, but elimination is not a point in time, it is a sustained effort.”

Brazil has restored a website that lists the full data on Covid-19 in the country, just hours after it was ordered to do so by the Supreme Court.

The health ministry stopped releasing cumulative totals for deaths and cases on Saturday, provoking uproar.

On Tuesday a Supreme Court judge ordered the government to release the figures, amid accusations of censorship.

Brazil has the world’s second-highest number of cases – and has now more daily deaths than any other nation.

Earlier, President Jair Bolsonaro said the change in policy was a result of actions being taken to improve Covid-19 reporting.