Here are the latest updates on the COVID-19 pandemic from across Europe and the world.
The number of confirmed global cases passed two million on Wednesday, after doubling in less than two weeks.
More than 130,000 people have died due to COVID-19, though the number is likely higher due to underreported cases and testing differences.
The US is the most impacted country in the world with more than 600,000 cases and 25,000 deaths.
Amid mounting criticism over his reaction to the outbreak, Donald Trump lashed out against the World Health Organisation (WHO) on Tuesday, saying it "failed in its basic duty" regarding the COVID-19 pandemic and announced plans to halt US payments.
The US is the world's largest contributor to the WHO, and cutting off payments will disproportionally impact emerging nations.
The organisation's director general said he regretted Trump's decision and defended their work.
"Our commitment to public health, science and to serving all the people of the world without fear or favour remains absolute," Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press conference.
"Our mission and mandate are to work with all nations equally, without regard to the size of their populations or economies.
Watch the WHO press conference in the video player above.
That's a wrap for our daily live blog. We will see you tomorrow at 6:00 am CET for more coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic.
At least 668 crew members of the Charles de Gaulle aircraft carrier tested positive for COVID-19
The French defence ministry announced that 668 members of the crew of the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle tested positive for coronavirus.
The carrier returned to Toulon after the outbreak started on board.
At least 1,767 naval troops have been tested, the defence ministry said. Thirty-one of them are in hospital.
Global cases of COVID-19 doubles in less than two weeks
There are now more than 2 million global cases of COVID-19 and more than 130,000 deaths from the virus, according to a count maintained by Johns Hopkins University.
Masks recommended in Germany, compulsory in Luxembourg
Germany will recommend that citizens wear masks on public transport and in stores, Chancellor Angela Merkel said on Wednesday.
Meanwhile, Luxembourg's prime minister Xavier Bettel said that wearing masks would be mandatory starting next week.
"From Monday, oral protection is mandatory whether it is a scarf or a mask," Bettel said during a press conference briefing, following advice from the government.
Death toll in France rises as more nursing home numbers reported
The total death toll in France is now 17,167, more than 1,400 more people than what was reported on Tuesday.
A reporting lag for deaths in retirement and care homes was responsible for the new high numbers.
There were also an additional 514 deaths in hospital in 24 hours.
Hospitalisations in Italy decreasing
Hospitalisations in Italy are decreasing, with 107 fewer people in intensive care than the day previously and 368 fewer hospitalised than yesterday.
There are a total of 27,643 people who are hospitalised in the country.
Meanwhile, another 578 people died in the country, ANSA reports.
Belgium extends lockdown to May 3
Belgium's prime minister announced that the country's lockdown measures to contain the coronavirus pandemic would be extended until May 3 that and no "mass event" could be organised before August 31.
Belgium recorded Wednesday 33,573 confirmed cases of Covid-19 patients, and 4,440 deaths.
New procedures in UK for families to say goodbye to loved ones dying from COVID-19
UK health minister Matt Hancock says he is introducing new procedures to help families say goodbye to loved ones who are dying from COVID-19.
He said he was moved by the story of a 13-year-old boy dying without his parents at his side.
Relatives are being kept apart from COVID-19 sufferers to slow the transmission of coronavirus.
It is unclear at this stage what the new procedures are.
World Health Organisation responds to Trump threat to pull funding
The World Health Organisation's experts reacted to US President Donald Trump's announcement that the US will halt funding while reviewing the organisation's response to COVID-19.
WHO's director of emergencies defended the organisation's reaction, stating that they alerted member states on January 5th. Dr Mike Ryan said that there are many cases of "atypical pneumonia" every year, and that the situation was "developing".
Dr Ryan added later that "this is all hands on deck" and that the organisation needed the "space" and "solidarity" to conduct its work.
Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said the WHO would be reviewing its programs to see how any funding withdrawal could impact its programs all while defending their work.
"WHO is reviewing the impact on our work of any withdrawal of U.S. funding and will work with our partners to fill any financial gaps we face and to ensure our work continues uninterrupted," he said.
"Our mission and mandate are to work with all nations equally," he added later.
Trump had criticised the organisation for being China centric and questioned the timeline of their announcements on the transmission of the virus.
There had also been criticism over Taiwan not being included in the international organisation as a member state.
Steven Solomon, the organisation's principal legal adviser, said that criticism related to Taiwan was not related to the work that the public health experts of the organisation do.
"It’s important to understand that WHO is very much part of the United Nations," Solomon said, who explained that Taiwan is not recognised by the UN. Solomon, nonetheless, outlined the different ways that Taiwanese experts had worked with WHO.
G20 countries have agreed to "support a time-bound suspension of debt service payments for the poorest countries", the group announced in a communiqué on Wednesday.
The measure is to last 12 months and G20 nations have also called on private creditors to do the same.
Amnesty International has called on the US Congress to halt the country's administration's plans to suspend funding to the WHO.
"In trying to distract from criticisms of his own administration's response, President Trump is undermining global efforts to protect people from one of the worst health crises in over a century," Erika Guevara-Rosas, Americas director at Amnesty International, said in a statement.
"The Trump administration should immediately reconsider its suspension of funding. Congress should also take immediate action to halt measures which reverse the United States' longstanding commitment to protecting international public health. History will judge harshly those who play with people's lives for their own political gain," she added.
French President Emmanuel Macron reiterated his call for the international community to step up assistance to the African continent in order to stem the spread of the deadly COVID-19.
"Effective measures to control the virus have enormous costs for health systems, economies and people. To absorb this shock, Africa will need the full support of all its partners," Macron wrote in an open letter published on Medium.
He added that "a massive package of economic support measures" worth $100 billion (€92 billion) needs to be deployed across Africa "to finance the fight against the pandemic and its indirect, economic and social effects".
Euronews' Valérie Gauriat spoke to several people from their confinement across Europe, who told her about life with the virus - and their new perspectives afterwards.
“The pain was just excruciating. My joints just felt like they were on fire! That, combined with the pounding headache and just the pure lethargy. I couldn't roll over, the pain was too much to roll," Jess Marchbank is a nurse from Devon in southwest England, told her.
The United Kingdom has recorded 761 deaths in hospitals over the previous 24 hours, bringing the total number of fatalities observed in British hospitals to 12,868.
The number of cases has risen by 4,605 to 98,476.
The Iranian Foreign Minister has joined those condemning Donald Trump for cutting off payments to the WHO.
Javad Zarif said the US' "shameful defunding of the WHO amid a pandemic will live in infamy."
The number of COVID-19 deaths rose in the Netherlands rose by 189 over the past 24 hours to reach a total of 3,134, the country's Institute for Public Health has revealed.
The country also recorded 734 new cases, bringing the total number of infections to 28,153.
France's Foreign Minister summoned the Chinese ambassador to the country on Tuesday over recent remarks he had made.
"Certain recent public stances by representatives of the Chinese Embassy in France are not in keeping with the quality of the bilateral relationship between our two countries or with the relationships of trust and friendship between the French President and President Xi Jinping and between myself and my counterpart, Mr Wang Yi," Jean-Yves Le Drian wrote in a statement released on Wednesday. "I clearly expressed to the Chinese Ambassador to France my disapproval of certain recent remarks when he was summoned to the Ministry for Europe and Foreign Affairs in the morning of Tuesday 14 April," he added. French media is reporting that the summon was over a blog post on the embassy's website which stated that some western countries "seem more concerned with slandering, stigmatising and attacking China than thinking about how to contain the epidemic at home and in the rest of the world." The blog post also said that "the nursing staff in EHPADs [French nursing homes] abandoned their posts overnight, collectively deserted, leaving their residents to die of hunger and disease".
"There is no time to waste," The head of the WHO tweeted on Wednesday as he released the organisation's latest Strategic preparedness and response plan for the new coronavirus.
"WHO's singular focus is on working to serve all people to save lives and stop the COVID-19 pandemic," he added.
The COVID-19 pandemic is likely to wipe out economic and social progress Sub Saharan countries achieved in recent years, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) warned on Wednesday.
"The health crisis has precipitated an economic crisis reflecting three large shocks: disruption of production and a sharp reduction in demand; spillovers from a sharp deterioration in global growth and tighter financial conditions; and a severe decline in commodity prices. As a result, the region’s economy is projected to contract by 1.6 percent this year—the worst-reading on record," the IMF said as it unveiled its economic outlook for the region.
The organisation called on international action to urgently take decisive measures to "limit the humanitarian and economic losses and protect the most vulnerable societies."
Asked about Washington's criticism of the WHO on Wednesday, Russian Foreign MinisterSergey Lavrov warned "everyone against any attempt to politicise the coronavirus issue."
"Basically, what the WHO has done and when is well known. The statistics are available. I believe that anyone who studies the chronology of its actions, statements and specific decisions will be convinced that the WHO was efficient," he added.
"The European Medicines Agency (EMA) estimates that it might take a year before a vaccine against COVID-19 is ready for approval and available in sufficient quantities to enable widespread and safe use," the EU's Roadmap towards lifting COVID-19 containment measures stated on Wednesday.
President of African Union Commission joins criticism of Trump
Moussa Faki Mahamat, the President of the African Union Commission, called Trump's WHO decision "deeply regrettable". He joins a chorus of world leaders and officials criticising the US President's decision to stop funding the WHO in the midst of a global pandemic.
Tour de France to take place between August 29 and September 20
The Tour de France has been delayed until August 29 due to the outbreak. The Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI) confirmed it will be delayed by two months, finishing on September 20.
Meanwhile the Giro d'Italia will take place in October, after which the Vuelta a España will be held.
Germany is to extend its restriction measures brought in to battle the spread of coronavirus until 3 May, according to state government sources.
Editor of British medical journal calls Trump's WHO decision "crime against humanity"
The editor of a well respected medical journal in the UK has branded Dondald Trump's decision to stop funding the WHO a "crime against humanity".
Richard Horton, who edits the peer-reviewed Lancet, said every scientists, health worker and citizen should rebel against "this appalling betrayal of global solidarity".
The number of COVID-19 cases in the world has risen to more than two million, according to a tally by Worldometers.
The death toll has reached 127,592.
Heiko Maas, Germany's Foreign Minister, also took aim at Trump this morning, writing on Twitter that "the virus knows no border".
"Strengthening the U.N., in particular the underfunded WHO, is a better investment, for example to develop and distribute tests and vaccines," he added.
The Republic of Ireland's Foreign Minister has, like Borell, condemned Trump's decision to withdraw funding from the WHO. as "indefensible".
"So many vulnerable populations rely on the WHO - deliberately undermining funding and trust now is shocking," he added.
103 fatalities were recorded in hospitals, but the majority were observed in nursing homes and were suspected cases.
The country's total death toll now stands at 4,440.
The European Union's top diplomat Josep Borrell said that he "deeply" regrets the US's decision to suspend funding for the WHO.
"There is no reason justifying this move at a moment when their efforts are needed more than ever to help contain & mitigate the #coronavirus pandemic," he wrote on Twitter.
The Spanish health ministry has released its daily COVID-19 figures. In the past 24 hours, the country has recorded 4,978 new cases of the virus, bringing the total number of infections in the country to 177,633.
The death toll has risen by 523 to 18,579.
Council President Charles Michel said the pandemic outlined "the absolute necessity to develop a massive investment strategy" which should be reflected in the next EU budget for the 2021-2027 period.
He also said the pandemic has reminded the bloc not to forget its "external responsibility" and its ambition "to play a stronger role at the international level".
He mentioned in particular "the importance of a partnership with Africa" and how the bloc could assist the African continent's healthcare systems and reduce its debt burden.
Commission President Ursula von der Leyen spoke first. She stressed that the exit from lockdowns should be "coordinated" between member states.
The Commission recommends that three pre-conditions must be met before confinement measures are lifted:
there should be a significant decrease in the spread of the virus over a sustained period of time;
there should be sufficient health system capacity;
Adequate surveillance and monitoring capacity is needed "in the form of large scale testing".
"The virus knows no border," she said, adding: "the key element is to cooperate and improve our pandemic preparedness and this includes how to accelerate the work on diagnostics, on treatments and on the development of a vaccine."
The EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and the EU Council president Charles Michel are about to present the bloc's proposed lockdown exit strategy.
The island of Ireland offers an interesting case study on the different strategies deployed against the COVID-19 pandemic.
Northern Ireland, which is covered by the UK's National Health Service, is advising people to self-isolate if they suspect they're infected. But testing kits are largely reserved to patients in hospital and health service workers.
Meanwhile, south of the border, the Republic of Ireland is testing people much more widely across the community and tracking coronavirus cases well beyond hospitals.
“It’s pretty crazy,” Gabriel Scally, President of Epidemiology and public health at the Royal Society of Medicine, told Euronews. He’s calling for an “all-island strategy” to be set up.
Thailand has extended its ban on international passenger flights landing in the country to April 30.
State or military planes, emergency landings, technical landings without disembarkation, humanitarian, medical or relief flights, repatriation flights and cargo flights are exempted from the ban.
All people entering the country are subjected to a 14-day quarantine.
The COVID-19 death toll in Russia increased by 28 over the past 24 hours to 198, the country's Coronavirus Crisis Centre has said.
New cases tallied 3,388 -- a record daily rise for the third day in a row -- bringing the total to 24,490.
Arsonists in the United Kingdom have attacked 20 Vodafone phone masts endangering the response against the COVID-19 pandemic, the head of the company said on LinkedIn.
Nick Jeffrey wrote that one of the sites attacked over the weekend provides mobile connectivity to the Nightingale hospital in Birmingham.
"Burning down masts means damaging important national infrastructure. In practice, this means families not being able to say a final goodbye to their loved ones; hard-working doctors, nurses, and police officers not being able to phone their kids, partners or parents for a comforting chat," he added.
He also reiterated that " there is absolutely no link between 5G and coronavirus."
5G is a wireless mobile network that was deployed in the UK in 2019 to improve telecommunications and mobile connectivity beyond existing 3G and 4G networks.
In a rare move, two of the world’s largest vaccine makers have teamed up to develop a COVID-19 vaccine and produce it on a massive scale.
Britain’s GlaxoSmithKline and France’s Sanofi expect to begin clinical trials on their vaccine in the second half of this year, and if these are successful, they hope to make their product widely available by the second half of 2021.
As the world faces this unprecedented global health crisis, it is clear that no one company can go it alone,” Sanofi Chief Executive Officer Paul Hudson said in a statement.
Students in preschool classes up to the fifth grade returned to school in Denmark on Wednesday but older pupils must continue to study at home.
Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen said on Tuesday that the country could re-open "much faster" than anticipated but that it would have to be done following "advice from health professionals" and in "a controlled and responsible fashion".
According to Tuesday's situation update from the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control, Denmark has recorded 6,318 cases of COVID-19 and 285 deaths.
The COVID-19 pandemic can cause "havoc" in countries with "already fragile humanitarian, economic, security and political environments", a new report from the International Rescue Committee has warned.
The organisation stressed that nearly half (46%) of the people in South Sudan, Syria, Venezuela and Yemen, lack access to basic health services.
South Sudan counts just 24 ICU beds and four ventilators while in Yemen only half of the hospitals are still fully functional.
In Venezuela, which has 84 ICU beds, 9 out of 10 hospitals to face shortages of medicine and critical supplies
The Parisian skyline was scarred exactly a year ago when a devastating blaze engulfed the 850-year-old Notre Dame Cathedral and took down its spire.
France's President, Emmanuel Macron, wants the monument to reopen to the public in times for the Paris Olympics in 2024 but restoration has been slow-going and the COVID-19 pandemic has halted all work.
About 1,000 migrants from camps on Greek islands including Lesbos "who are vulnerable to COVID-19" are to be moved to nearby hotels, the EU Commissioner for Home Affairs, Ylva Johansson, announced on Tuesday.
Some 20,000 people are currently living in camp Moria on Lesbos, despite the camp having a capacity fo 3,000.
The leader of the United Kingdom's main opposition Labour party, Keir Starmer, has written to the government to demand it releases its lockdown exit strategy.
"Overcoming this crisis requires taking the British public with you. Millions of people have played their part and exceeded Government assumption about their willingness to make sacrifices and to stay at home in the national interest," he wrote.
"In return, the Government needs to be open and transparent with the public about how it believes the lockdown will ease and eventually end, how this decision will be informed and what measures are being put in place to plan for this eventuality," he added.
In case you missed it, US President Donald Trump accused the World Health Organisation on Tuesday of "severely mismanaging and covering up" the COVID-19 pandemic and cut off US payments.
He argued the UN agency was too lenient on China and that it "pushed China's misinformation about the virus...and there was no need for travel bans".
The US is the world's largest contributor to the WHO and withholding payments could disproportionally impact developing countries.
The US Treasury also revealed on Tuesday that checks of coronavirus relief payments will bear the inscription "President Donald J. Trump" on them.
According to the Washington Post, the decision to add Trump's name to the paper checks could delay their delivery by several days.
Jonathan David, 35, became the first person in Australia to be jailed for repeatedly breaching quarantine orders.
He was sentenced to six months and two weeks in prison on Wednesday but is likely to spend just a month behind bars. He has also been fined 2,000 Australian dollars (€1,160).
David flew home to Perth on March 28 and was sent to a hotel for a mandatory two-week quarantine but he continually snuck out and took public transport to visit his girlfriend.
Japan's health ministry reported 457 new cases on Wednesday, bringing the total to 8,800, while 231 people have died.
China reported 46 new cases, 36 from overseas. The country has officially reported 3,342 deaths.
Parliamentary elections went ahead on Wednesday in South Korea despite calls for the ballot to be postponed due to the pandemic.
Voters wore masks and authorities introduced preventative measures including using duct tape or stickers to mark a metre of social distancing and temperature checks.
Separate arrangements have also been made for people in self-isolation.
Workers wearing face masks and goggles spray disinfectant to help stop the spread of the new coronavirus ahead of the voting for the general elections at a local polling station in Seoul, South Korea, Tuesday, April 14, 2020. AP Photo/Lee Jin-man
A further 2,486 new cases were recorded in Germany over the previous 24 hours, the Robert Kock Institute announced on Wednesday morning, bringing the total number of infected people to 127,584.
The death toll has risen by risen 285 to 3,254.
Good morning! I'm Alice Tidey and I'll be taking you all the latest COVID-19 news from across Europe and the world this morning.
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