AP News in Brief at 6:04 p.m. EST
'Time is everything': World braces for spread of new virus
China's massive travel restrictions, house-to-house checks, huge isolation wards and lockdowns of entire cities bought the world valuable time to prepare for the global spread of the new virus.
But with troubling outbreaks now emerging in Italy, South Korea and Iran, and U.S. health officials warning Tuesday it's inevitable it will spread more widely in America, the question is: Did the world use that time wisely and is it ready for a potential pandemic?
“It’s not so much a question of if this will happen anymore, but rather more a question of exactly when this will happen — and how many people in this country will have severe illness,” said Dr. Nancy Messonnier of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
Some countries are putting price caps on face masks to combat price gouging, while others are using loudspeakers on trucks to keep residents informed. In the United States and many other nations, public health officials are turning to guidelines written for pandemic flu and discussing the possibility of school closures, telecommuting and canceling events.
Countries could be doing even more: training hundreds of workers to trace the virus' spread from person to person and planning to commandeer entire hospital wards or even entire hospitals, said Dr. Bruce Aylward, the World Health Organization's envoy to China, briefing reporters Tuesday about lessons learned by the recently returned team of international scientists he led.
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Stocks sink, bonds soar on fears virus will stunt economy
Stocksfell sharplyagain on Wall Street Tuesday, piling on losses a day after the market's biggest drop in two years as fears spread that the growing virus outbreak will put the brakes on the global economy.
Nervous investors snapped up low-risk U.S. government bonds, sending the yield on the 10-year Treasury note to a record low.
The S&P 500 has lost 7.6% in the last four days since hitting a record high last Wednesday. That's the benchmark index's worst such stretch since the end of 2018, resulting in $2.14 trillion in losses, according to S&P Global. Tuesday also marked the first back-to-back 3% losses for the index since the summer of 2015.
The latest wave of selling came as more companies, including United Airlines and Mastercard, warned that the outbreak will hurt their finances, and more cases were reported in Europe and the Middle East, far outside the epicenter in China. Meanwhile, U.S. health officials called on Americans to be prepared for the disease to spread in the United States, where there are currently just a few dozen cases.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 879 points, for a two-day loss of 1,911 points. Travel-related stocks took another drubbing, bringing the two-day loss for American Airlines to 16.9%. The large publicly traded cruise operators have also suffered double-digit losses.
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Democrats warm up for big debate, unloading on Sanders
CHARLESTON, S.C. (AP) — Bernie Sanders' Democratic rivals prepared to unleash a new wave of attacks against the party's presidential front-runner in a high-stakes debate Tuesday night, perhaps their final prime-time opportunity to change the direction of the 2020 nomination fight.
Almost all of the six other candidates set to debate in South Carolina went after Sanders in the hours leading up to the 8 p.m. EST affair.
Pete Buttigieg, the former mayor of South Bend, Indiana, highlighted Sanders' call for a government-financed health care system as an example of his “polarization.” Former Vice President Joe Biden accused Sanders of trying to undermine President Barack Obama's 2012 reelection. And former New York Mayor Mike Bloomberg assailed Sanders' record on gun control.
Five Bloomberg supporters, all current or former black elected officials, blasted Sanders’ record on gun control as well as other priorities for the black community on Tuesday.
“Too often, Bernie Sanders has been on the wrong side of history, missing in action or unable to make progress on virtually every issue for black voters,” New York Rep. Gregory Meeks told reporters, predicting that viewers would “see a 180-degree shift tonight” from Bloomberg after his lackluster showing in last week’s Democratic debate.
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Study begins in US to test possible coronavirus treatment
OMAHA, Neb. (AP) — The first clinical trial in the U.S. of a possible coronavirus treatment is underway in Nebraska and is eventually expected to include 400 patients at 50 locations around the world, officials said Tuesday.
Half of the patients in the international study will receive the antiviral medicine remdesivir while the other half will receive a placebo. Several other studies, including one looking at the same drug, are already underway internationally.
Dr. Andre Kalil, who will oversee the study at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, said the clinical trial was developed quickly in response to the virus outbreak that originated in China. Patients who are hospitalized with the COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, will be eligible to join the trial if they have at least moderate symptoms.
“The goal here is to help the people that need it the most,” Kalil said.
Fourteen people who were evacuated from a cruise ship in Japan are being treated at the University of Nebraska Medical Center. Twelve of them have tested positive for COVID-19.
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As world scrambles, experts warn virus spread in US certain
NEW YORK (AP) — U.S. health officials warned Tuesday that the burgeoning coronavirus is certain to spread more widely in the country at some point, even as their counterparts in Europe and Asia scrambled to contain new outbreaks of the illness.
“It’s not so much a question of if this will happen anymore, but rather more a question of exactly when this will happen — and how many people in this country will have severe illness,” Dr. Nancy Messonnier of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a call with reporters.
The CDC's call for Americans to be prepared added new urgency to response efforts that, until this week, focused on a disease largely confined to China, where it apparently originated, and neighboring countries.
In other developments Tuesday:
— New clusters of the illness popped up far from China, causing increased concerns for officials in some of the wealthiest nations in Europe and Asia, as well as in countries with far fewer resources. But many remained uncertain about how best to contain it.
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Trump says without evidence Dems leak intel to hurt Sanders
NEW DELHI (AP) — President Donald Trump suggested on Tuesday that Democrats who don't want Bernie Sanders to win their party's presidential nomination tried to hurt the senator's chances by leaking information about Russian activities promoting his campaign. Trump gave no evidence for his claim.
“Bernie is probably winning — looks like he's winning and he's got a head of steam,” Trump said during a news conference near the end of his two-day visit to India. “And they maybe don't want him for obvious reasons. ... So they put out a thing that Russia is backing him.”
Trump accused California Rep. Adam Schiff, the Democratic chairman of the House intelligence committee, of leaking the information to the media. Schiff has denied the allegation.
Sanders has confirmed that U.S. officials told him last month about Russian efforts to boost his chances to challenge Trump in November.
Trump said he thought it was “strange" that U.S. officials told Sanders but nobody told him.
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'A world of hurt': 39 states to investigate Juul's marketing
HARTFORD, Conn. (AP) — A coalition of 39 states will look into the marketing and sales of vaping products by Juul Labs, including whether the company targeted youths and made misleading claims about nicotine content in its devices, officials announced Tuesday.
Attorneys general from Connecticut, Florida, Nevada, Oregon and Texas said they will lead the multi-state investigation into San Francisco-based Juul, which also is facing lawsuits by teenagers and others who say they became addicted to the company's vaping products.
The state officials said they also will investigate the company's claims about the risk, safety and effectiveness of its vaping products as smoking cessation devices.
“I will not prejudge where this investigation will lead," Connecticut Attorney General William Tong said in a statement, “but we will follow every fact and are prepared to take strong action in conjunction with states across the nation to protect public health.”
Juul released a statement saying it has halted television, print and digital advertising and eliminated most flavors in response to concerns by government officials and others.
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Disney CEO Bob Iger steps down in surprise announcement
NEW YORK (AP) — Disney CEO Bob Iger, who steered the company's absorption of Star Wars, Pixar, Marvel and Fox's entertainment businesses and the launch of a Netflix challenger, is stepping down immediately, the company said in a surprise announcement Tuesday.
The Walt Disney Co. named as his replacement Bob Chapek, most recently chairman of Disney's parks, experiences and products business.
"Did not see this coming -- Wowza," tweeted LightShed media analyst Rich Greenfield.
Iger will remain executive chairman through the end of his contract on Dec. 31, 2021. Besides leading the board, Iger said he will spend more time on Disney's creative endeavors, including the ESPN sports network, the newly acquired Fox studios and the Hulu and Disney Plus streaming services. He said he could not do that while running Disney on a day-to-day basis.
“It was not accelerated for any particular reason other than I felt the need was now to make this change," Iger said on a conference call with reporters and analysts.
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NTSB: Driver in fatal Tesla crash was playing video game
WASHINGTON (AP) — The National Transportation Safety Board says the driver of a Tesla SUV who died in a Silicon Valley crash two years ago was playing a video game on his smartphone while his vehicle was being controlled by a partially automated driving system.
Chairman Robert Sumwalt said at the start of a hearing Tuesday that systems like Tesla's Autopilot cannot drive themselves, yet drivers continue to use them without paying attention.
“If you own a car with partial automation, you do not own a self-driving car,” Sumwalt said in opening statements. “This means that when driving in the supposed ‘self-driving’ mode, you can’t read a book, you can’t watch a movie or TV show, you can’t text and you can’t play video games.”
The board will determine a cause of the crash at the hearing and make recommendations to prevent it from happening again. Sumwalt says government regulators have ignored the board's previous recommendations for measures to prevent these crashes.
The March 2018 crash involving a Tesla Model X SUV killed Apple engineer Walter Huang when it swerved and slammed into a concrete barrier dividing freeway and exit lanes in Mountain View, Calif.
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East Africa's huge locust outbreak now spreads to Congo
KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — A small group of desert locusts has entered Congo, marking the first time the voracious insects have been seen in the Central African country since 1944, the U.N. Food and Agriculture Agency said Tuesday as U.N. agencies warned of a “major hunger threat” in East Africa from the flying pests.
Kenya, Somalia and Uganda have been battling the swarms in the worst locust outbreak that parts of East Africa have seen in 70 years. The U.N. said swarms have also been sighted in Djibouti, Eritrea and Tanzania and recently reached South Sudan, a country where roughly half the population already faces hunger after years of civil war.
A joint statement Tuesday from FAO director-general Qu Dongyu, U.N. humanitarian chief Mark Lowcock, and World Food Program Executive Director David Beasley called the swarms of locusts “a scourge of biblical proportions” and “a graphic and shocking reminder of this region’s vulnerability.”
The FAO said mature locusts, carried in part by the wind, arrived on the western shore of Lake Albert in eastern Congo on Friday near the town of Bunia. The country has not seen locusts for 75 years, it said.
“Needless to say the potential impact of locusts on a country still grappling with complex conflict, Ebola and measles outbreaks, high levels of displacement, and chronic food insecurity would be devastating,” the U.N. officials said in the joint statement.