Latest On Coronavirus

MOSCOW (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 11th March, 2020) The impact of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) is becoming increasingly apparent as more and more international events are being canceled or rescheduled.

The Democratic Republic of the Congo has registered its first case of the coronavirus disease, the country's Health Minister Eteni Longondo said on Tuesday, specifying that the infected is a Belgian citizen.

Morocco has registered the first death caused by the coronavirus disease on its soil, the Health Ministry said on Tuesday.

The coronavirus infection tally in France rose by 194 overnight to 1,606 cases, the Health Ministry was cited as saying by BFMTV on Tuesday.

Sweden reported on 60 new cases of coronavirus in the Stockholm region, with the total number of confirmed cases reaching 326. �

According to the Johns Hopkins University's interactive dashboard, there have been 118,100 cases of COVID-10 confirmed globally, of which 80,757 are in China, 10,149 in Italy, 8,042 in Iran, 7,513 in South Korea.

Crowds are viewed as potential infection hotbeds. Moscow authorities are canceling all events with more than 5,000 participants until April 10.� In Spain, all sporting events at both the professional and amateur level, will carry on without spectators, El Periodico newspaper reported.

The North Macedonian government on Tuesday announced the temporary closure of the country's kindergartens, schools, and universities, as well as the postponement of all public gatherings of over 1,000 people for 14 days. Romania is shutting down schools and kindergartens from March 11-22.

Italy, which has the most confirmed cases in Europe, has toughened up anti-coronavirus measures. Schools and universities are suspended until April 3, gyms closed, sporting events � including Serie A � stopped.

The authorities have asked all Italians to stay at home and avoid travel, unless necessary for work or medical reasons.

Several countries are taking steps to limit exposure to the virus from Italy as a number of cases were confirmed in people who had traveled there. The United Kingdom is advising its citizens to avoid non-essential travel to the country. Spain is suspending direct flights until March 25. Kazakhstan has banned entry for all the people arriving from Italy, except Kazakh citizens, the country's chief sanitary doctor, Zhandarbek Bekshin, said on Tuesday.

The World Trade Organization said it was suspending all meetings from March 11-20 because a staff member was confirmed to have COVID-19.

Some events, however, are proceeding as planned. The United States has no plans to cancel the Defender Europe 20 exercise, Joint Staff vice director William Byrne said at a press briefing on Tuesday.

Russian paralympians are continuing their preparations for 2020 games in Tokyo despite the global spread of COVID-19, the first vice-president of the Russian Paralympic Committee,� Pavel Rozhkov, told Sputnik.

On Monday, coronavirus and OPEC+ failure to agree on a deal extension sent global markets into a tailspin. However, on Tuesday, major European stock indexes closed down 0.3-1.5 percent after dropping around 8 percent the previous day.

The outbreak is taking significant toll on the German economy and will noticeably affect the national industry's supply chains in the coming weeks, the minister for economic affairs and energy, Peter Altmaier, said on Tuesday. The German parliament will give the government up to 1 billion Euros ($1.1 billion) in emergency funds to tackle the� outbreak, the governing conservative faction said Tuesday.