Author: CensorBiz

Our new normal will not be life as we knew it before the coronavirus traveled around the world.That is what Dr. Tom Frieden said April 13 in a Zoom remote event sponsored by STAT, a news publication about health.Frieden is head of Resolve to Save Lives, a global public health initiative. He is also the former director of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.In a wide-ranging discussion, he compared fighting the coronavirus to fighting a global war. He described the virus as an infectious and deadly enemy and said the more we learn about it, the more fearsome it appears.Frieden warned that we are at least a year, perhaps many years, away from having a vaccine.FILE – President Donald Trump speaks about the coronavirus in the James Brady Press Briefing Room of the White House, April 8, 2020.President Donald Trump and some of his advisers have been anxious to reopen businesses that have been shuttered since mid-March, but Frieden said health officials must first “box in” the virus.The four corners of the box include widespread testing, so health officials know where the virus is going, finding people who are sick, tracing their contacts and mandating a 14-day quarantine for all contacts, whether they test positive or not, and finding ways to isolate or treat everyone with COVID-19.”If any one of those four sides is weak,” Frieden said, “the virus will escape, will get out, and will spread widely in society.”Frieden added that before the U.S. is ready to reopen, deaths have to decrease, the health care system has to be more robust, health care workers have to be protected from infection, and people with severe coronavirus disease have to be well cared for, as well as those who have chronic health conditions.Even with these actions, Frieden said the virus will still be there.”We’re going to need to keep it at a simmer rather than let it explode,” he said.And when society reopens, Frieden said life will not be the same as before. We may have to continue with more social distancing, more telecommuting, fewer business meetings and no handshaking, in addition to other changes.”There is no immunity to it in society, as far as we know,” Frieden said. “This is a virus that should never be underestimated. It is very hard to fight.”WATCH: Dr. Tom Frieden talks about COVID-19 pandemic 
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Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders on Monday formally endorsed his erstwhile rival, former U.S. Vice President Joe Biden, for U.S. president in the November national election against Republican President Donald Trump. “We’ve got to make Trump a one-term president and we need you in the White House,” Sanders told Biden in joint virtual appearance on a Biden webcast. “I will do all that I can to see that that happens, Joe,” Sanders vowed. “I want to thank you for that,” Biden responded. “It’s a big deal. Your endorsement means a great deal, a great deal to me.” Democratic U.S. presidential candidate and former Vice President Joe Biden speaks about the COVID-19 coronavirus pandemic at an event in Wilmington, Delaware, U.S., March 12, 2020. REUTERS/Carlos BarriaSanders, a self-declared democratic socialist, was Biden’s last challenger for the Democratic presidential nomination, but suspended his campaign last week in the face of Biden’s seemingly insurmountable lead in pledged delegates to the party’s national presidential nominating convention in August. Sanders had pushed for several significant U.S. policy changes that Biden has resisted, such as a government takeover of medical health insurance — Medicare for All, Sanders called it — and free tuition for college students at public universities.When Sanders ended his active campaigning after the Democratic presidential primary in the Midwestern state of Wisconsin last week, Biden adopted modified stances on the Sanders health insurance and tuition positions, an effort to woo Sanders supporters to his candidacy. Biden, on his third run for the U.S. presidency over three decades, said that rather than a full government takeover of health insurance, Americans should be able to adopt government-assisted care at age 60 instead of the current 65. On tuition, Biden called for writing off student debt for low-income and middle-class families who attended public colleges and universities and some private institutions. Sanders had said since the outset of his 2020 campaign that he would do whatever he could to help the eventual Democratic nominee, if it wasn’t him, to defeat Trump.  But it remains unclear whether the most ardent supporters of Sanders’ progressive policy stances will follow him to support Biden. In 2016, even though Sanders eventually endorsed the Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, after losing to her in a long party nomination campaign, post-election polls showed about 12% of Sanders supporters voted for Trump over Clinton as she lost the national election. 
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Taiwan’s long-running campaign for a role in the World Health Organization is getting fresh backing in response to its successful handling of the coronavirus pandemic, which has included assistance to other suffering nations.The public in Taiwan, considered a breakaway Chinese province by Beijing, were ecstatic when the European Union, in a break with past policy, included an image of Taiwan’s flag on a Twitter posting last week expressing appreciation for a donation of face masks.”Our flag has appeared on the EU’s official tweet,” Taiwan’s Central News Agency gushed.A worker packs surgical masks on the production line in a factory in Taoyuan, Taiwan, April 6, 2020.It was a breakthrough of sorts for Taiwan after decades of being blocked from any significant role in the WHO by China, which opposes any action that would appear to confer nation status on the autonomously ruled island. Beijing has long been accused of using its economic and political power to pressure member countries to support its stand.The issue has become more immediate in the face of COVID-19 which has caused about 1.9 million reported infections and more than 118,000 reported deaths worldwide. Despite having one of the world’s best records in fighting the disease Taiwan has been excluded from WHO emergency meetings on the crisis.However, Taiwan officials are encouraged by U.S. President Donald Trump’s signing last month of the Taiwan Allies International Protection and Enhancement Initiative (TAIPEI) Act, designed to bring pressure on countries whose actions serve to undermine Taiwan’s alliances.Taiwanese army soldiers wearing protective suits spray disinfectant on a road to prevent community cluster infection, in New Taipei City, Taiwan, March 14, 2020.Amid the diplomatic back-and-forth, Taiwan has made its case by simply doing a better job than almost any country of containing the coronavirus. Despite its close proximity to China – where the contagion began – and being one of the first places to be affected, it has held its caseload to just 393 people with a mere six deaths.Speaking electronically to a conference at the A medical staff collects a sample for testing during a drill organized by the New Taipei City government to prevent the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus, in Xindian district, Taiwan, March 14, 2020.Medical institutions were “rearranged,” he said, enabling the establishment of “160 testing facilities around the country,” along with “134 facilities to treat milder cases, or 50 large regional centers for more severe cases.” In order to prevent in-hospital outbreaks, Wu said, hospitals “were clearly demarcated internally.”The minister also cited Taiwan’s national health insurance policy, “which has 99% of the population enrolled,” as key to enabling health authorities to trace patients’ contacts and to permitting an equitable society-wide distribution of medical supplies.Each adult citizen, upon showing proof of citizenship, is allotted nine face masks every two weeks, which come at a cost of 17 cents apiece, and can be obtained at local pharmacies, and now even vending machines. Children are allotted a higher number of masks.At the heart of Taiwan’s success story, Wu said, is its chosen way of governance. He contrasted the democratically ruled island with rule on the mainland by the Communist Party of China, which has been accused of failing to promptly report the initial contagion and is still suspected of hiding its full extent.“I would say the most important factor is transparency and honesty,” Wu said.  “[While] we in Taiwan cannot afford to conceal or to lie, Chinese communists are institutionally incapable of telling the truth.” 
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Like tens of millions of South Africans, VOA’s Southern Africa correspondent, Anita Powell, is stuck at home through the nation’s lockdown. While her suburban street is deserted and quiet, her family is trying to bring some life to the streets —from a safe distance — with spontaneous musical performances. 
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Spring is not turning out the way Russian President Vladimir Putin might have planned it. A nationwide vote on April 22 was supposed to finalize sweeping constitutional reforms that would allow him to stay in power until 2036, if he wished. But after the coronavirus spread in Russia, that plebiscite had to be postponed — an action so abrupt that billboards promoting it already had been erected in Moscow and other big cities. Now under threat is a pomp-filled celebration of Victory Day on May 9, marking the 1945 defeat of Nazi Germany in World War II. The holiday has become the most important on Russia’s calendar, and this year is the 75th anniversary, with world leaders invited to a celebration highlighting the country’s exceptional role in history. Every year, thousands gather in Moscow, including many elderly veterans proudly wearing their medals. Military units have already rehearsed the traditional Red Square parade, drilling outside Moscow, and leaders such as France’s Emmanuel Macron and India’s Narendra Modi had promised to attend. It would seem impossible to have such a gala now, with much of Russia and the world locked down to stop the spread of the virus. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said last week no decision has been made on whether to postpone it but authorities are considering “options,” one of which is to hold it without the veterans, a group especially vulnerable to the virus. Peskov added the Kremlin would understand if foreign leaders decided not to come due to the pandemic and added the celebration would take place even if it doesn’t happen on May 9.  Initially underestimated by Russian authorities, the pandemic has posed an unexpected challenge for Putin, whose political standing now depends on whether he can contain the damage from it.  Russian President Vladimir Putin, center, wearing a protective suit enters a hall during his visit to the hospital for coronavirus patients in Kommunarka settlement, outside Moscow, Russia, March 24, 2020.On March 24, Putin was shown donning a yellow hazmat suit  to visit a hospital for infected patients.  Officials then indefinitely postponed the vote on the constitutional reforms that would have allowed Putin to serve two more six-year terms after 2024. The amendments already have been approved by lawmakers but the government wanted nationwide balloting to give the changes a democratic veneer. Campaigns promoting the vote had already kicked off in dozens of Russian regions. In preparation for the vote and Victory Day, Russia’s state news agency Tass had begun releasing parts of a three-hour interview with Putin, with the 67-year-old leader talking about what he had done for the country in the past 20 years and what more needs to be accomplished. But Tass suspended daily extracts of the interview, saying it was no longer relevant to an audience more concerned about the coronavirus.  FILE – A medical worker sets up medical equipment in the Central Clinical Hospital “Russian Railways Medicine”, redesigned to receive patients with coronavirus in Moscow, April 3, 2020.The outbreak has completely reset the Kremlin’s political agenda, said Nikolai Petrov, a senior research fellow in Chatham House’s Russia and Eurasia Program.  “Everything that was happening before [the outbreak] has basically been wiped out,” Petrov told The Associated Press. “That whole political agenda [of constitutional reform], that had been unfolding since mid-January is over.” He added that for the moment, “I think we can forget about the constitutional amendments.” The coronavirus crisis presents many difficulties for Putin,  whose approval ratings — steadily dropping in the past two years — reached 63% in March – the lowest since 2013.  It comes as the prices of oil, Russia’s main source of income, plummeted amid a price war with Saudi Arabia, causing a sharp drop in the ruble. The pandemic brought with it the prospects of more economic devastation. As much of Russia went into lockdown, which Putin sugarcoated  by describing it as “nonworking days,” many business operations came to a halt, prompting fears of a mass shutdown by companies and leaving millions unemployed.  The Chamber for Trade and Industries, a government-backed business association, predicted 3 million companies could go out of business and 8 million people — almost 11% of Russia’s working population — could end up jobless. A Russian police officer wearing a face mask to protect against coronavirus, speaks to a group of people, some of them wearing face masks, as he patrols an area at an apartment building in Moscow, April 11, 2020.A weakening economy and worsening living conditions, widely seen by analysts as the driving force behind Putin’s souring ratings, have already become the dominating fear among Russians. With the crisis still unfolding, it is likely to hurt his standing even more, said Denis Volkov, a sociologist with the independent Levada polling center. When people start fearing things getting worse “then the ratings start plummeting,” Volkov told the AP. The Kremlin’s response to the crisis has raised questions at home and abroad.  Domestically, Putin has been widely criticized for paying little attention to the epidemic at first, and then for distancing himself from it by delegating difficult decisions on lockdowns  to regional governments and the Cabinet.  Some in the West have questioned the low number of official virus cases in Russia and dismissed its widely publicized effort  to send planeloads of medical aid to Italy, the U.S., Serbia and other countries as a PR stunt. Putin sought to reassure the nation in a TV address on April 8, but part of his message comparing the coronavirus to invaders from the 10th and 11th centuries brought mockery on social media instead. “Our country went through many serious challenges. It was tormented by the Pechenegs and the Cumans, and Russia got through all of it. We will defeat this coronavirus bug, too,” Putin said. Social media users pointed out that not only did Putin use this line in 2010, he might have borrowed it from an anecdote from the 19th century.  “The risks of him [Putin] looking out of touch are very real,” Samuel Greene, director of the Russia Institute at the King’s College London, told the AP.  Putin used to be able to regain control of the political agenda by shifting the focus from domestic hardships to Russia’s geopolitical grandeur, rallying people around the 2014 annexation of Crimea or fighting what he called terrorists in Syria. But this time, as Russia is forced to confront a truly global crisis, that tactic seems much harder.  “There can be nothing that would interest people more than the hardship they are going through and will continue to go through for a long time,” said Petrov.  
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Muhimman proudly writes his name slowly, carefully, one letter at a time, grinning broadly as he finishes. He’s just 11 years old and was a good student who had dreams of being a doctor.School frightens him now. Earlier this year, a cleric at the religious school he faithfully attended in the southern Punjab town of Pakpattan took him into a washroom and tried to rape him.Muhimman’s aunt, Shazia, who wanted only her first name used, said she believes the abuse of young children is endemic in Pakistan’s religious schools. She said she has known the cleric, Moeed Shah, since she was a little girl and describes him as an habitual abuser who used to ask little girls to pull up their shirts.”He has done wrong with boys and also with two or three girls,” Shazia said, recalling one girl the cleric brutalized so badly he broke her back.An investigation by The Associated Press found dozens of police reports, known here as First Information Reports, alleging sexual harassment, rape and physical abuse by Islamic clerics teaching in madrassas or religious schools throughout Pakistan, where many of the country’s poorest study.The AP also documented cases of abuse through interviews with law enforcement officials, abuse victims and their parents. The alleged victims who spoke for this story did so with the understanding only their first names would be used.There are more than 22,000 registered madrassas in Pakistan, teaching more than 2 million children. But there are many more religious schools that are unregistered. They are typically started by a local cleric in a poor neighborhood, attracting students with a promise of a meal and free lodging. There is no central body of clerics that governs madrassas. Nor is there a central authority that can investigate or respond to allegations of abuse by clerics, unlike the Catholic Church, which has a clear hierarchy topped by the Vatican.The government of Prime Minister Imran Khan has promised to modernize the curriculum and make the madrassas more accountable, but there is little oversight.Police say the problem of sexual abuse of children by clerics is pervasive and the scores of police reports they have received are just the tip of the iceberg. Yet despite the dozens of reports, none have resulted in the conviction of a cleric. Religious clerics are a powerful group in Pakistan and they close ranks when allegations of abuse are brought against one of them. They have been able to hide the widespread abuse by accusing victims of blasphemy or defamation of Islam.Families in Pakistan are often coerced into “forgiving” clerics, said Deputy Police Superintendent Sadiq Baloch, speaking in his office in the country’s northwest, toward the border with Afghanistan. Overcome by shame and fear that the stigma of being sexually abused will follow a child into adulthood, families choose instead to drop the charges, he said. Most often, when a family forgives the cleric the investigation ends because the charges are dropped.”It is the hypocrisy of some of these mullahs, who wear the long beard and take on the cloak of piety only to do these horrible acts behind closed doors, while openly they criticize those who are clean shaven, who are liberal and open minded,” Baloch said. “In our society so many of these men, who say they are religious, are involved in these immoral activities.”In this Tuesday, Feb. 4, 2020 photo, Pakistani villagers gather outside the home of student Muhimman, who was allegedly abused by a cleric, in Pakpattan, Pakistan. Earlier this year, a cleric at the religious school he faithfully attended raped him…’I Want This Mullah Hanged’Police officials say they have no idea how many children are abused by religious clerics in Pakistan. The officials said clerics often target young boys who have not yet reached puberty in part because of the restrictive nature of Pakistan’s still mostly conservative society, where male interaction with girls and women is unacceptable. The clerics for the most part had access to and trust with boys, who are less likely to report a sexual assault.Eight-year-old Yaous from Pakistan’s remote northern Kohistan region is one of those boys.  
Yaous’ father was a poor laborer who had no education and spoke only the local language of his area, yet he wanted to educate his son. He had heard of a religious school in Mansehra, several hundred kilometers (miles) south of his village, where other boys from the area had gone. Too poor to even own a phone, his father went for months without speaking to his son.Yaous is small for his eight years. His features are slight. In an interview with the AP, with his uncle interpreting, Yaous’ tiny body shivered as he told of his ordeal.It was near the end of December last year — a holiday at the madrassa. Most of the students had left. Only Yaous and a handful of students had stayed behind. His village was hours away, and the cost of transportation home was too much for his parents.The other students had gone to wash their clothes and Yaous said he was alone inside the mosque with Qari Shamsuddin, the cleric. The sexual assault was unexpected and brutal. The boy said Shamsuddin grabbed his hand, dragged him into a room and locked the door.”It was so cold. I didn’t understand why he was taking my warm clothes off,” Yaous said, his voice was barely a whisper.As Yaous remembered what happened, he buried his head deeper into his jacket. The cleric grabbed a stick, he said. It was small, maybe about 12 inches. The first few sharp slaps stung.”The pain made me scream and cry, but he wouldn’t stop,” Yaous said. The boy was held prisoner for two days, raped repeatedly until he was so sick the cleric feared he would die and took him to the hospital.At the hospital, Dr. Faisal Manan Salarzai said Yaous screamed each time he tried to approach him. Yaous was so small and frail looking, Salarzai called him the “baby.””The baby was having a lot of bruises on his body — on his head, on his chest, on his legs, so many bruises on other parts of his body,” Salarzai said.Suspicious, Salarzai ordered Yaous moved to the isolation ward where he examined him, suspecting he had been sexually assaulted. The examination revealed brutal and repetitive assaults.But Solarzai said Yaous’ uncle refused to believe his nephew was sexually assaulted, instead he said the boy had fallen down. “He said the uncle finally said: ‘If news spreads in our area that he has been sexually assaulted it will be very difficult for him to survive in our area.'””He was not willing to talk about it or even think that he was sexually assaulted,” said Solarzai. But the evidence was overwhelming and the doctor contacted the police.The cleric was arrested and is now in jail. Police have matched his DNA samples to those found on Yaous. But despite the arrest, fellow clerics and worshipers at the Madrassah-e-Taleem-ul-Quran mosque located in a remote region of northwest Pakistan dispute the charges. They say Shamsuddin is innocent, the victim of anti-Islamic elements in the country. The clerics and worshippers also say the accusation is part of a conspiracy to discredit Pakistan’s religious leaders and challenge the supremacy of Islam, a rallying cry often used by right-wing religious clerics seeking to enrage mobs to assert their power.Yaous’ father, Abdul Qayyum, said he was ashamed he had not spoken to his son in more than three months before the attack happened.”I want this mullah hanged. Nothing else will do,” Qayyum said.’Forgive Me’Young boys are not the only victims of sexual abuse by religious clerics. Many young girls like Misbah, who is from a deeply conservative south Punjab village of Basti Qasi, have also been targeted by religious leaders.Her father, Mohammad Iqbal, isn’t exactly sure how old Misbah is. He thinks she is 11 because in rural Pakistan many births are not registered or are registered much later, and it is just a guess when children are born. They share their small cinderblock structures with several goats and an extended family made up it seems of mostly children who play tag and run around the dirt compound. Misbah, who struggled for words, said she was raped in the mosque next door, where she had been studying the Quran for three years.The assault happened one morning after she stayed behind to sweep the mosque. The other children had been sent home and the cleric, someone she trusted, asked Misbah to help.
“I had just began to clean when he slammed shut the mosque door,” she said in her native Saraiki language. “I didn’t know why and then he suddenly grabbed me and pulled me into a nearby room. I was screaming and shouting and crying. She couldn’t say how long the assault went on. All she could remember was screaming for her father to help her but he wouldn’t stop, he wouldn’t stop, she repeated.It was her uncle, Mohammed Tanvir, who rescued her. He had been on his way to college but stopped at the mosque to use the washroom. He noticed a pair of child’s shoes outside the door.
“Then I heard screaming from inside, she was screaming for her father,” Tanvir said. He smashed the door down saw his niece sprawled and naked on the floor. “It looked as if she had fainted,” he said. Her blood-stained pants were in a corner. The cleric knelt at his feet.”‘Forgive me’ he kept saying to me,'” Tanvir recalled. The cleric was arrested but freed on bail.’Such Beasts Should Not Be Spared’In the wake of the attempted rape of Muhimman, the young boy who had proudly showed his writing skills, his aunt said there has been a concerted attempt to silence the family.  
“The village people say these are our spiritual leaders and the imams of our religious places, and refuse to kick him out,” Shazia saidAfter the attack on her nephew, she said, the villagers came to their home and pleaded with them to forgive the cleric, Moeed Shah, who had fled the area.”They all came to our home and they know we are poor and he is an imam and they said we should forgive him but we won’t,” Shazia said. She said her father, Muhimman’s grandfather, refused. Shah has yet to be arrested, even though the assault was filmed by several village boys who broke down the door to the washroom and frightened Shah away as he tried to rape Muhimman.Police say they are investigating and a charge has been filed, but Shah is a fugitive. Some of the neighbors near the mosque said police are not searching vigorously for him. They seemed angry but also resigned to the fact that he would not be jailed.Muhimman’s aunt was inconsolable.”Such a beast should not be spared at all,” Shazia said.
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It starts with a few people letting loose with some tentative yelps. Then neighbors emerge from their homes and join, forming a roiling chorus of howls and screams that pierces the twilight to end another day’s monotonous forced isolation. From California to Colorado to Georgia and New York, Americans are taking a moment each night at 8 p.m. to howl in a quickly spreading ritual that has become a wrenching response of a society cut off from one another by the coronavirus pandemic. They howl to thank the nation’s health care workers and first responders for their selfless sacrifices, much like the balcony applause and singing in Italy and Spain. Others do it to reduce their pain, isolation and frustration. Some have other reasons, such as to show support for the homeless.  In Colorado, Gov. Jared Polis has encouraged residents to participate. Children who miss their classmates and backyard dogs join in, their own yowls punctuated by the occasional fireworks, horn blowing and bell ringing. “There’s something very Western about howling that’s resonating in Colorado. The call-and-response aspect of it. Most people try it and love to hear the howl in return,” said Brice Maiurro, a poet, storyteller and activist who works at National Jewish Health. The nightly howl is a primal affirmation that provides a moment’s bright spot each evening by declaring, collectively: We shall prevail, said Dr. Scott Cypers, director of Stress and Anxiety programs at the Helen and Arthur E. Johnson Depression Center at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus. It’s a way to take back some of the control that the pandemic-forced social isolation has forced everyone to give up, Cypers said.  “The virus’ impact is very different for everyone, and this is a way to say, ‘This sucks,’ and get it out in a loud way,” Cypers said. “Just being able to scream and shout and let out pent-up grief and loss is important. Little kids, on the other hand, are really enjoying this.”FILE – In this March 9, 2020, file photo, the full moon rises behind the Statue of Liberty in New York. From California to Colorado to Georgia and New York, Americans are taking a moment each night at 8 to howl to thank the nation’s health workers.Maiurro and his partner, Shelsea Ochoa, a street activist and artist, formed the Facebook group Go Outside and Howl at 8 p.m. The group has nearly half a million members from all 50 U.S. states and 99 countries since they created it as Colorado’s shelter-in-place order went into effect last month. “We wanted to do this mostly because people are feeling isolated right now,” said Ochoa, 33, who works at the Denver Museum of Nature & Science. “I think it hit on something others needed.” Why howling?  In California, friends and family of Ochoa’s would howl at sunset; in Brazil, where she lived recently, residents would cheer at sunset. Maiurro, who also works at National Jewish Health, and fellow poets would howl at the moon during back-alley poetry readings in Boulder.  “There’s no wrong way to do it,” said Ochoa. “People can subscribe any kind of meaning they want to it.”  The couple suggest different themes for the evening howls, such as a recent “The Day of I Miss You.” Health care workers are grateful for the support — and the nightly moment’s relief from the stresses of their work. Jerrod Milton, a provider and senior vice president of operations at Children’s Hospital Colorado, makes it a point to step outside at 8 p.m. each evening. “It not only inspires me with a sense of solidarity and appreciation, but it makes me laugh a little each day,” Milton said. “I cannot tell the difference between the howls coming from fellow humans and those instinctively coming alongside from our canine neighborhood companions.” In downtown Los Angeles, thousands of people yell, scream, cheer, applaud and flash lights from their apartment balconies and windows, thanks in large part to Patti Berman, president of the Downtown Los Angeles Neighborhood Council, who promotes the ritual conceived by council communications director Marcus Lovingood. “I never believed it would take off like this,” said Berman, who in her 70s is staying inside her apartment in deference to the health concerns of her family. Berman’s concerns are for the homeless on LA’s Skid Row, the struggling family-owned small businesses, the people she’s used to meeting and helping face-to-face in her 15 years on the council. “These people are my stakeholders and my job — and this is where the howl comes in — is to let them know that we haven’t disappeared. To preserve the human contact,” she said. Organizers say restoring and keeping that contact through such extreme adversity will be an achievement to look back upon when the crisis eventually passes. “When people look back on this and with so many sad stories, hopefully they’ll also remember this as one of the good things,” Ochoa said. 
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Master chocolatier Dominique Persoone stood forlorn on his huge workfloor, a faint smell of cocoa lingering amid the idle machinery — in a mere memory of better times.  Easter Sunday is normally the most important date on the chocolate makers’ calendar. But the coronavirus pandemic, with its lockdowns and social distancing, has struck a hard blow to the 5-billion-euro ($5.5-billion) industry that’s one of Belgium’s most emblematic. “It’s going to be a disaster,” Persoone told The Associated Press through a medical mask. He closed his shops as a precautionary measure weeks ago, and says “a lot” of Belgium’s hundreds of chocolate-makers, from multinationals to village outlets, will face financial ruin. For the coronavirus to hit is one thing, but to do it at Easter — when chocolate bunnies and eggs are seemingly everywhere — doubles the damage.  Yet amid the general gloom Belgians are allowing themselves some levity for the long Easter weekend. Some producers, like Persoone’s famed The Chocolate Line, offer Easter eggs or bunnies in medical masks, while the country’s top virologist has jokingly granted a lockdown pass to the “essential” furry workers traditionally supposed to bring kids their Easter eggs.  For young and old here, Easter Sunday usually means egg hunts in gardens and parks, sticky brown fingers, the satisfying crack of an amputated chocolate rabbit’s ear before it disappears into a rapt child’s mouth.  “People love their chocolates, the Easter eggs, the filled eggs, the little figures we make,” said chocolatier Marleen Van Volsem in her Praleen shop in Halle, south of Brussels. “This is really something very big for us.” The country has an annual per capita chocolate consumption of six kilograms (over 13 pounds), much of it scoffed during the peak Easter period.  “It is a really big season because if we don’t have this, then we won’t … be OK for the year,” Van Volsem said.  Persoone makes about 20% of his annual turnover in the single Easter week. This year, reduced to web sales and pick-ups out of his facility in western Belgium while his luxury shops in tourist cities Bruges and Antwerp are closed? “2% maybe, if we are lucky — not even.” Guy Gallet, chief of Belgium’s chocolate federation, expects earnings to be greatly reduced across the board this year. One of Belgium’s top chocolate producers Dominique Persoone stands in one of his production rooms with no workers, at his Chocolate Line warehouse in Bruges, Belgium, Friday, April 10, 2020.He said companies that sell mainly through supermarkets are doing relatively well but firms depending on sales in tourist locations, restaurants or airport shops “are badly hit.”  Persoone has a firm local base of customers but knows how tourists affect the books of so many chocolatiers.  “Of course, we won’t see Japanese people or Americans who come to Belgium for a holiday,” he said. “I am afraid if we do not get tourists anymore it will be a disaster, even in the future.” For most people, the coronavirus causes mild to moderate symptoms such as fever and cough. But for some, especially older adults and the infirm, it can cause pneumonia and in some cases death. The immediate challenge is to keep the Easter spirit — and the chocolatiers’ craft — alive in these trying times.  A big part is humor and the use of medical masks made of white chocolate is an obvious one. Persoone puts them on eggs.  “It is laughing with a hard thing. And on the other hand, we still have to keep fun, no? It is important to laugh in life.” Genevieve Trepant of the Cocoatree chocolate shop in Lonzee, southeast of Brussels, couldn’t agree more. And like Persoone, who donated sanitary gel no longer needed in his factory to a local hospital, Trepant also thought of the needy.  That’s how the Lapinou Solidaire and its partner the Lapinou Confine — the Caring Bunny and the Quarantined Bunny, both adorned with a white mask — were born. Customers are encouraged to gift Trepant’s 12-euro ($13) bunnies to local medical staff to show their support. Part of the proceeds go to charity.  One of the country’s top coronavirus experts also knows the medical virtues of laughter. Professor Marc Van Ranst told Belgian children that their Easter treats weren’t at risk.  Tongue well in cheek, he told public broadcaster VRT that the government had deeply pondered the issue of delivery rabbits’ movements in these dangerous times. The rabbits bring — Santa-like — eggs to the gardens of children, roving all over Belgium at a time when it is forbidden for the public at large.  “The decision was unanimous: it is an essential profession. Even the police have been informed that they should not obstruct the Easter bunny in its work,” he said.  There was a proviso, though. “Rabbits will deliver to the homes of parents, not grandparents,” who are more at risk from COVID-19, Van Ranst said. 
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The FDA commissioner says the models show the United States is close to the peak of the coronavirus outbreak, with federal social distancing guidelines due to expire at the end of April.  But exactly when the economy will be back up again is still too early to tell.  VOA’s Elizabeth Lee has more
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Strong storms pounded the Deep South on Sunday, killing at least six people in south Mississippi and damaging up to 300 homes and other buildings in northern Louisiana.Mississippi Emergency Management Agency director Greg Michel said one person killed was in Walthall County, two were killed in Lawrence County and three were killed in Jefferson Davis County. All three counties are more than an hour’s drive south of Jackson, near the Louisiana state line.The National Weather Service said strong winds were sweeping through other parts of Mississippi, and a tornado was spotted north of Meridian near the Alabama state line.Before the storms moved into Mississippi, the weather service reported multiple tornadoes and damaging winds over much of northern Louisiana. There were no immediate reports of serious injuries. Utility companies reported thousands of power outages.The mayor of Monroe, Louisiana, Jamie Mayo, told KNOE-TV that the storm damaged 200-300 homes in and around the city. Flights were canceled at Monroe Regional Airport, where siding was ripped off buildings and debris was scattered on runways. Airport director Ron Phillips told the News-Star the storm caused up to $30 million in damage to planes inside a hangar.In northwest Louisiana, officials reported damage to dozens of homes in DeSoto and Webster parishes, according to news outlets.The weather service said the greatest risk for strong Easter Sunday storms covered much of Mississippi, Alabama and western Georgia. That area was at “moderate risk” while much of the rest of the South was under at least a “marginal” risk, the weather service said.  The weather service said a broader area, from east Texas to the East Coast was under at least a “marginal” risk of storms.In Morgan County, Alabama, a church roof and steeple were damaged by lightning Sunday afternoon, Morgan County Emergency Management Agency Eddie Hicks told AL.com. Shoals Creek Baptist Church in Priceville was struck by lightning Sunday afternoon. No injuries were reported.  WBMA-TV reported that strong winds damaged buildings and snapped trees in Walker County, Alabama, north of Birmingham. 
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The spread of the coronavirus and militant attacks are significantly impacting gas production in northern Mozambique, experts warn.   The U.S. oil-and-gas company ExxonMobil, one of the largest foreign investors in the southeast African country, this week decided to delay its final decision on a major long-term investment in Mozambique’s restive Cabo Delgado region.“A final investment decision for the Rovuma liquefied natural gas (LNG) project in Mozambique, expected later this year, has been delayed,” the oil-and-gas giant said in a statement.  “ExxonMobil continues to actively work with its partners and the government to optimize development plans by improving synergies and exploring opportunities related to the current lower-cost environment,” it added.The company also announced its capital investments for 2020 to be about $23 billion, down from the previously announced $33 billion.While ExxonMobil acknowledged the impact of the coronavirus on the global economy, it didn’t indicate whether its decision on Mozambique projects was directly linked to the pandemic. Experts, however, believe COVID-19 has affected global energy prices, making it difficult for companies to raise project funding in the short term.  ExxonMobil didn’t immediately respond to a VOA request for comment.  As of Thursday, there have been 17 confirmed cases of the coronavirus in Mozambique.  Deteriorating security  Foreign companies such as Exxon, France’s Total, and Italy’s ENI are also worried by the deteriorating security around the gas-rich Cabo Delgado province and have been encouraging the Mozambique government to improve its response.“Mozambique is now under a state of emergency because of COVID-19 and this will divert resources and attention from Cabo Delgado,” said Alex Vines, director of the Africa program at Chatham House.   Cabo Delgado has been the center of a growing Islamist insurgency that began in 2017. Ever since, terror attacks carried out by Islamist militants, some of which are affiliated with the Islamic State (IS) terror group, have killed hundreds of civilians in terror attacks. 100,000 DisplacedThe violence has also displaced over 100,000 people in the impoverished province, according to the U.N.In its 2019 Human Rights in Africa report, released this week, London-based rights group Amnesty International said Cabo Delgado continued to experience armed attacks believed to be carried out by members of an extremist group, locally known as al-Shabab, the IS affiliate in Mozambique.  “The attackers invaded villages, set houses on fire, hacked villagers to death with machetes and looted their food. Although the government increased its military presence in the region, its response was inadequate,” the report said.   Increased attacks  But in recent weeks, militants have significantly increased their attacks on government forces throughout Cabo Delgado. IS has claimed responsibility for at least three of the recent attacks in the province.One of those attacks was on the town of Mocimboa de Praia, not far from several strategic LNG projects.  “Insurgent attacks should be of grave concern to the Mozambican government,” said Jasmine Opperman, an Africa analyst at the conflict monitoring group ACLED. “Following the Mocimboa de Praia attack, Total recalled all offshore vessels.”“Insurgents have demonstrated a capacity to move from acts of terror against civilians to targeting government infrastructure,” she told VOA.   In the recent attacks, “insurgents also showed a capacity to hold territory for short periods with the intent to create ‘liberated areas’ which allows for freedom of movement and access to food supplies,” Opperman added.David Matsinhe, a researcher for southern Africa at Amnesty International, told VOA that “it appears as if the insurgents are having a free reign in those districts, roaming around and attacking as they please, posting videos on social media to woo new recruits to replenish their ranks.”Increased attacks claimed militants in recent months have led gas firms including ExxonMobil and Total to request additional security deployments in areas of operation to protect personnel and infrastructure development.  In February, several international oil-and-gas companies made a formal request to the Mozambican government to send additional security to Cabo Delgado. There are approximately 500 soldiers deployed near gas production areas with the companies seeking an additional deployment of another 300.  While foreign companies have their own security personnel, Mozambican security forces usually provide protection in the general zone where these companies operate. Challenges  Analyst Opperman says the “COVID-19 has presented additional challenges” for the Mozambican government “such as containment, rotation of personnel,” noting that Exxon, which committed to $500 million in initial investment, “has seen disruption of early works due to coronavirus travel restrictions.”Amid these challenges, rights groups are expressing concerns about the ability of Mozambican security forces to protect and maintain the rule of law. “It is hard not to see this getting worse unless the virus decimates the armed groups too,” said Adotei Akwei, deputy director for Advocacy and Government Relations at Amnesty International.This would be particularly difficult in “larger parts of Mozambique where the state is so weak as to not be present or where it is present but there is no real economic activity going on,” he told VOA.  On the investment front, some experts believe Mozambique’s recovery from the current financial crisis would be provisional.“Mozambique’s advantage is that (its) gas assets are so world class, that I expect this funding shortfall to be a short-term problem unless the insecurity situation significantly deteriorates,” Vines of Chatham House predicted.But Calton Cadeado, who teaches peace and conflict at Joaquim Chissano University in Maputo, says the interruption of foreign investment will frustrate particularly young people in Cabo Delgado, who hope that such projects would create job opportunities in their region. “The government believes that this problem may be of short duration, and that 2022 will continue to be the year of expected financial funding,” he told VOA. “But realistically, this (coronavirus) pandemic and the consequent postponement (of foreign investment) could derail that.”Amancio Vilanculos of VOA’s Portuguese Service contributed to this report from Washington. 
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Arne Wilhelmsen, a founder of Royal Caribbean Cruises who helped shape the modern cruise industry, has died. He was 90.The Miami-based company said in a statement that Wilhelmsen died Saturday in Palma, Spain. No cause of death was given.As a member of the company’s board for three decades, Wilhelmsen saw the potential for the cruise industry to become one of the fastest growing segments of the vacation industry. He helped shift the hub of the industry to warm weathered places like South Florida, instead of transportation centers like New York.He also believed in building bigger and more efficient ships. Royal Caribbean now has 61 ships, including some of the largest cruise liners in the world.”At a time when the rest of the world thought cruising was a niche use for old transatlantic liners, Arne was already seeing glimmers of the growth that was possible,” said Richard Fain, RCL’s chairman and CEO. “He had a vision of the modern cruise industry when the ‘industry’ might have been a dozen used ships, total.”Wilhelmsen was born in Oslo, Norway in 1929. After earning an MBA at Harvard University, he worked as a chartering assistant for Norway’s EB Lund & Co. and later as a shipbroker in New York. In 1954, he joined his family’s shipping concern, Anders Wilhelmsen & Co AS, and became its president in 1961.He helped establish Royal Caribbean in 1968 with his family’s company, along with two other Norwegian shipping companies. In 2003, he stepped down from the board and was succeeded by his son, Alex.No further details on survivors was listed in the company’s statement, and a company representative did not immediately respond to an email inquiry.
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Greek forces are on heightened alert as reports have surfaced that Turkey is preparing to push through a fresh wave of migrants to Europe. Officials in Athens say, they fear that refugees infected with the coronavirus may be among the new wave of asylum seekers.Greek government officials contacted by VOA say the heightened alert follows intelligence reports showing Turkish authorities moving refugee groups from remote inland areas to Turkey’s western shores, where smugglers could secretly ferry then to Greek islands less than a few kilometers away.They say Greece’s coastguard, Air Force and Navy are increasing patrols along the Aegean waterway that divides Greece and Turkey… anticipating what they call an organized attempt by Ankara to push through thousands of asylum seekers to Europe.Whether that push will include migrants infected by the coronavirus remains unclear, officials told VOA.But on Sunday, leading Greek media reported that Turkey was in fact considering such a plan… hoping to exert fresh pressure on Europe to extract added financial aid for hosting nearly 4 million Syrian refugees and sparing the continent a fresh migration crisis.Relations between Athens and Ankara have been strained since Turkish president Recep Tayyip Erdogan announced earlier this year that he would no longer block migrants and refugees from seeking entry to Europe.He rescinded that order late last month, moving tens of thousands of migrants who had amassed along the Greek-Turkish land border to secluded camps to cslow the spread of the coronavirus in his country.Turkey, though, has publicly vowed to open its border anew to migrants once it manages to contain the COVID-19 outbreak.That’s a threat officials in Athens are not underestimating. 
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The top U.S. infectious disease expert, Dr. Anthony Fauci, warned Sunday there is an “extraordinary risk” of the further spread of the ravaging coronavirus if the United States is reopened to business and a sense of normalcy too quickly on May 1, as President Donald Trump is considering.Fauci told CNN, “It’s not going to be a light switch” to regenerate U.S. commerce as government recommendations for safe distancing between people end on April 30.He held out hope that “at least in some ways” the country could return to work and routine day-to-day activities next month, but said it is likely to be different in various parts of the country.That depends, he said, on the number of coronavirus cases in specific communities and whether testing has shown that large majorities of people are not infected.Even with precautions, he said, “We know people will be getting infected. That’s just reality.”The U.S. coronavirus death toll has topped 20,000, the highest total of any country, with more than 534,000 confirmed cases. Current U.S. models predict that 60,000 or more could die in the country by July.Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn speaks during a coronavirus task force briefing at the White House, April 4, 2020, in Washington.Food and Drug Administration Commissioner Stephen Hahn told ABC’s “This Week” show, “The models do show that we are very close to the peak,” but cautioned,  “This has been a really fast-moving outbreak, so we really have to take this day by day.”As for the May 1 date, Hahn said, “It is a target and obviously we’re hopeful about that target, but I think it’s just too early to be able to tell that we see light at the end of the tunnel. I think it’s just too early for us to say whether May 1 is that date.” Trump, mindful of the death toll and the fact that 17 million U.S. workers have lost their jobs in the last month, has said almost daily that he wants to reopen the country as soon as possible, with economic advisers pointing to the May 1 date as a target. But he says he will also listen to health experts on whether that is too soon.He has called the choice between two imperatives – protecting the health of Americans and restarting the world’s largest economy — the biggest decision of his life.Trump had originally called for reopening the country by Sunday, envisioning churches filled with worshipers on the Christian holy day of Easter. But he backed off as health experts, including Fauci, warned that reopening the country too quickly would lead to more coronavirus deaths.U.S. President Donald Trump speaks during a Good Friday event for Easter in the Oval Office at the White House in Washington, April 10, 2020.Trump marked the day with a Twitter video message to U.S. Christians, wishing them a Happy Easter. But he noted how different the day would be nationwide, with most state governors ordering their residents to stay at home and Trump recommending that Americans practice physical distancing from others by at least two meters through the end of April.“In many cases,” he said, “we’ll be separated physically only from our churches. We won’t be sitting near, next to each other, which we’d like to be, and soon will be again. But right now, we’re keeping separation; we’re getting rid of the plague. It’s a plague on our country like nobody’s ever seen.”“But we’re winning the battle,” Trump said. “We’re winning the war. We’ll be back together in churches right next to each other. Celebrate, bring the family together like no other. We have a lot to be thankful for. Happy Easter everybody.”Most U.S. churches kept their doors closed for Easter, but some defied state bans on large gatherings and held services.Trump in January, February and half of March minimized the severity of the coronavirus threat after the first outbreak in China before declaring a national emergency. On several occasions, he said there were few cases in the U.S. and that the disease would quickly dwindle to nothing.Workers wearing personal protective equipment bury bodies in a trench on Hart Island, Thursday, April 9, 2020, in the Bronx borough of New York, April 9, 2020.Some Trump advisers warned him of the advancing threat.Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said that “obviously” the country’s response could have been better.“It would have been better if we had a head start,” he said. “Often the recommendation (of scientists and medical experts) is taken, sometimes it is not.”He said the country’s high death toll “may have been a little bit better” if the U.S. had moved quicker toward social distancing and stay-at-home edicts.Fauci said he hopes that the U.S. voters will be able to vote in person at polling stations on Nov. 3 in the U.S. presidential election between Trump and the Democratic candidate, former Vice President Joe Biden.“I can’t guarantee it,” he said. “There’s always the possibility we could have a rebound” in a resurgence of the coronavirus.But if so, he said, “Hopefully we would respond better.” 
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Two U.S. astronauts say it’s hard to comprehend the changes on Earth that have occurred due to the coronavirus pandemic, as they prepare to return from the International Space Station.The astronauts, Andrew Morgan and Jessica Meir, have been in space for more than half a year, having left Earth before anyone had ever heard of the coronavirus, let alone gotten sick or died.Morgan said Friday from the space station that the crew has been trying to keep up with developments about the virus, but said, “It’s very hard to fathom” all that is going on.Morgan, who is an Army emergency physician, said he feels a little guilty returning to Earth when the crisis is already underway.Meir said, “We can tell you that the Earth still looks just as stunning as always from up here, so it’s difficult to believe all the changes that have taken place since both of us have been up here.”“It is quite surreal for us to see this whole situation unfolding on the planet below,” she said.Morgan said the pandemic has affected operations at NASA’s mission control, with the handover taking place “between shifts between two different rooms to minimize the contact.” He said NASA staff members are persevering through “their ingenuity and their professionalism” and said, “They’re going to return us to Earth safely, just like their predecessors did 50 years ago.”Apollo 13 anniversaryThe two U.S. astronauts, along with a Russian cosmonaut, Oleg Skripochka, will return to Earth on April 17, exactly 50 years after the U.S. Apollo 13 mission returned to Earth.That mission faced a crisis when the spacecraft’s oxygen tank ruptured two days into the trip, aborting the astronauts’ mission to the moon.“Once again, now there’s a crisis, and the crisis is on Earth,” Morgan said.Meir said she is looking forward to seeing her family and friends again, even if just virtually. She said she expects to feel more isolated on Earth than in space.“We’re so busy with so many other amazing pursuits and we have this incredible vantage point of the Earth below, that we don’t really feel as much of that isolation,” Meir said.Meir has been in space since September and Morgan since last July. They will return in a Soyuz capsule, landing in Kazakhstan.The Americans will leave three astronauts who arrived at the space station Thursday — NASA’s Chris Cassidy and Russians Anatoly Ivanishin and Ivan Vagner.The launch of a Russian Soyuz rocket carrying those astronauts was carried out under tight restrictions because of the coronavirus. Support workers wore masks and kept their distance from the crew to prevent the possibility of the virus being taken to the space station. The crew members, who routinely go into quarantine ahead of launch day, stayed in isolation longer than normal because of the virus.Cassidy said Friday from the space station, “we knew as a crew we were going to be in quarantine about nine months ago or a year ago, those exact weeks, but we didn’t know the whole rest of the world was going to join us.”Following Thursday’s launch, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine tweeted his congratulations. “No virus is stronger than the human desire to explore,” he said.The next astronauts who visit the space station will be launched by SpaceX from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center, as early as next month. It will be the first launch of astronauts to the space station from the United States since NASA’s space shuttle program ended in 2011. 
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Coronavirus cases in the United States doubled this past week. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than half a million Americans have been diagnosed with COVID-19. But some say life will never be the same — even for those who will not contract the disease. VOA’s Carolyn Presutti shows us how the U.S. is ending up with two different populations.
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Mitch McConnell’s earliest childhood memory is the day he left the polio treatment center at Warm Springs, Ga., for the last time.He was just a toddler in 1944, when his father was deployed to World War II, his mother relocated the family to her sister’s home in rural Alabama and he came down with flu-like symptoms. While he eventually recovered, his left leg did not. It was paralyzed.Two long years later, after shuttling young McConnell to and from the center where then-President Franklin Roosevelt received polio care, his mother was told that day that her young son would be able walk into his life without a leg brace.She immediately took the 4-year-old shopping for a new pair of shoes.More than 70 years later, Senate Majority Leader McConnell walked into the U.S. Senate to pass a sweeping coronavirus rescue package — and shutter the chamber for the foreseeable future — as another dangerous flu-like virus fills the nation with anxiety, quarantines and unimaginable disruptions to American life.”Why does this current pandemic remind me of that? I think No. 1 is the fear,” said McConnell in an interview with The Associated Press.”And the uncertainty you have when there’s no pathway forward on either treatment or a vaccine and that was the situation largely in polio before 1954.”The two crises now bookend McConnell’s years, making the Kentucky Republican an unexpected voice of personal experience and reflection in what he calls these “eerie” times.It’s an unusual role for the famously guarded leader, who rarely says more when less will do, and relishes an image as a sly political tactician. But as more than 16,000 people in the U.S. have died from coronavirus, the echoes are all too familiar. So too is the solution, as he sees it, to care for the nation’s sick and produce treatments, and an eventual vaccine.”There’s hope that we’re going to get on top of this disease,” he said, “within a year, year and a half.”The polio epidemicPolio ignited a dreadful fear across the U.S. in those years, especially in summertime. The virus particularly struck children, forcing swift closures of schools and playgrounds and, in the sweltering heat, swimming pools. Towns shuttered, families isolated. Thousands died, others were hospitalized and some left permanently paralyzed or with post-polio syndrome. The Salk vaccine was still years away.FILE – The line of people awaiting polio shots at Evansville (Ind.) Municipal Stadium was still long, four hours after the clinic started, when this picture was taken, Aug. 9, 1959. During the eight-hour program, about 14,000 people received shots.”It was a scary virus,” said Stacey D. Stewart, president & CEO of March of Dimes, which started as FDR’s National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis but quickly took on the name that reflected the public service call for Americans to donate their dimes for a polio solution.”You didn’t understand how you got it,” she said, and because it impacted so many young people, for “so many parents, what’s worse for a parent than having your child get sick?”As a toddler, McConnell was taught to stay off his feet. His mother understood if he tried to walk too soon after the illness he might require a leg brace for the rest of his life. She began taking him on the hour drive each way to Warm Springs, where Roosevelt’s condition was a warning sign to Americans the disease spared no one. Back home, she would would run through the physical therapy with her son “like a drill sergeant,” he said.McConnell doesn’t remember much from those earliest days. Much of it he knows from his mother’s retelling and his own reading of books of the era. But he does remember what happened in the years after she bought him those saddle oxfords on their last trip home from Warm Springs. He couldn’t run as fast as the other kids. When he put on a swimsuit, his left leg had a narrower circumference, leaving him embarrassed. Even now, he says, he has trouble climbing stairs.  “I was lucky,” he said, choking up as he recalls his mother, “who was determined to see me walk again.” Of “tenacity, hard work and not giving up,” he said, “My mother instilled all that in me before I was 4 years old, and I think it’s been a guiding principle in how I lead my life.” ‘Let’s continue to pray for one another’One of the first things McConnell did when he was elected to public office in Kentucky, he writes in his memoir, was buy a new pair of shoes.  In the Senate last month, McConnell began linking past to the present “just as soon as it became clear that we were actually endangering each other to be together.” Senators were self-isolating and one, Rand Paul, announced he tested positive. With the Capitol all but shuttered, the Senate raced to approve the rescue package. The votes tallied, McConnell adjourned the Senate. “Let’s continue to pray for one another,” he said. “And for our country.” FILE – U.S. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell waves to supporters with his wife, Elaine Chao, at his midterm election night rally in Louisville, Ky., Nov. 4, 2014.Now from a quiet Capitol Hill — he is working from the second floor of his townhouse, his wife Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao on the third — the two suddenly find themselves like other Americans stumbling through the new stay-at-home normal.  “We’re soldiering all through,” he said. It’s also bringing time for reflection. A year ago, he returned to Warm Springs for the first time. At what is now a historic site, he reviewed files about his condition, his visits. He learned he sometimes received treatments when Roosevelt did, including the week the former president died. Asked how his mom afforded his own medical care, he was stumped. Were there bills? “Honestly, I don’t know the answer to that,” he said. He said he would try to find out. One memory that does stand clear is the arrival of the polio vaccine, and the relief it brought a weary populace.  As Congress considers the next aid package, he said he wants more money for health care.  “I’ve had a normal life, but I’ve been acutely aware of the disease that I had and the relief that the country had when they found the vaccine,” he said. “We’re going to get that relief.” 
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