€8 billion in aid for French automobile industry

Minister resigns over top adviser Cummings' lockdown breach

Most German, Italian and French people believe the COVID-19 pandemic has weakened the arguments in favour of the European Union and think the bloc has not done nearly enough to support their country during the crisis.

A survey commissioned by Euronews has revealed that Italians are the harshest critic of the EU with 61% of respondents from the country saying the pandemic has weakened the case for the bloc, compared to 40% in Germany and 47% in France.

The poll, carried out by Redfield & Wilton Strategies, involved 1,500 participants from each of the three EU countries.

Seventy per cent of Italian respondents also said the EU has not done enough to help their country during the crisis — higher than the 60% and 57% observed in Germany and France respectively.

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EU countries split over size and conditions for coronavirus recovery

The EU Commission is set to unveil a new EU budget and recovery fund to help European countries bounce back from the pandemic.

Battle lines are being drawn between national capitals over how to finance the recovery. In particular, how to raise credit and what strings are attached for repayment. The conflict pits a Franco-German plan laid out by Germany's Merkel and France's Macron against an alternative approach from the group of nations known as The Frugal Four.

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The UK government's move to begin reopening schools in England from Monday (June 1) has sparked fierce debate in the country with teachers' unions warning it may not be safe and parents refusing to send their children back.

Only pupils aged five, six and 10 are scheduled to return to their classes on this date, while about a quarter of 14 and 16-year-olds should make their way back to school on June 15.

Lucille Whiting told Euronews her children "won't be going back" but Firgas Esack told us her son will return to his class. 

HERE'S WHY.

Britain’s medicines agency has authorized the use of the experimental drug Remdesivir for COVID-19 patients, in a move that may shorten the time some patients spend in the hospital.

Clinical trials testing the antiviral to determine whether or not it is effective are still underway globally, but initial results have suggested it can speed up the recovery time for people infected with the new coronavirus.

Remdesivir will be provided to patients free of charge by Gilead and will be for patients with “high, unmet medical need” under a doctor’s supervision.

A study last month of more than 1,000 people severely sickened by the coronavirus found those who got the drug were discharged from the hospital several days earlier than those who got a placebo.

Global shares up as recovery hopes overshadow virus worries

Global shares rose Tuesday as hopes for economic recovery overshadowed worries over the coronavirus pandemic.

Investors are shifting their focus to how various nations are adapting to getting back to business, while striving to keep new COVID-19 cases in check.

France's CAC 40 jumped 1.4% in early trading to 4,605.07, while Germany's DAX gained 0.7% to 11,474.88. The FTSE 100 in Britain, which was closed for trading Monday, surged 1.9% to 6,107.96.

“As is the financial market’s wont these days ... even the slimmest of positive news on the COVID-19 front triggers a bullish immune response and another wave of the peak-virus trade," Jeffrey Halley of Oanda said in a commentary.

Sweden registers more than 4,000 deaths due to COVID-19

4029 people have died in Sweden after contracting the coronavirus, health offices reported. This rate is several times higher than that of Norway or Germany. In contrast to many other countries, Sweden did not close schools but instead asked its citizens to keep their distance and wash their hands. 

Out of 100,000 citizens, 40 have died of COVID-19 on average in Swede, as compared to 4.4 in Norway and roughly ten in Germany. 

Sweden’s top epidemiologist Anders Tegnelll says there have been positive developments. The number of infections and deaths in care homes is decreasing, he noted. 

The Russian government has reported a record daily spike of 174 deaths on Tuesday, which brought the country’s death toll to 3,807. Russia currently is ranked third in the number of cases worldwide. 

Russia’s coronavirus caseload surpassed 360,000 on Tuesday, with almost 9,000 new infections registered in the past 24 hours. Experts have raised questions about the country's relatively low mortality rates and some have suggested the government may be tampering with the numbers - an accusation that Russian officials deny vehemently. Instead, they attribute the numbers to the effectiveness of the measures taken. 

On the same day, India has reported its biggest jump in new cases, just a day after re-starting domestic air travel. The health ministry reported 145,380 new infections. That is more than 6,500 more cases than the day before. 4,167 people have died so far. 

India’s virus caseload has been climbing as lockdown restrictions have eased. 

Spain’s Foreign Minister says that European Union members should agree to a common approach to open borders, reestablish freedom of travel in the Schengen Area and define which countries outside it should be considered safe to travel from and to.

Arancha González Laya told Cadena SER radio that restarting cross-border travel should be decided collectively even if countries in the EU are phasing out lockdowns at different dates.

“We have to start working with our European partners to retake the freedom of movement in European territories,” González Laya said on Tuesday, adding that she would like to see a European definition of which countries should be deemed as safe.

The minister said that Spain is eager to welcome tourists to shore up an industry that amounts to 12% of the country’s GDP but that it plans to do it with “health, sustainability and safety.”

Japan has lifted the state of emergency status for the entire country. The last areas to change their status were Hokkaido and Tokyo’s greater area. 

Originally, the state of emergency was meant to last until May 31. However, no hard lockdown restrictions such as those in Europe were imposed. The government had asked citizens to stay home if possible and thereby limited the spread of the virus. 

Japan registered 17,300 coronavirus cases. 850 people had died of COVID-19. 

The German government may lift the global travel warning for tourists starting June 15 for 31 European countries, provided the development of the pandemic allows so. 

All 26 member states are included in these preliminary plans, as well as the UK and the four Schengen countries that are not part of the EU: Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Liechtenstein. DPA received a draft plan titled “Criteria for the facilitation of inner-European tourism.” The cabinet will likely decide on these plans this Wednesday. 

Germany wants to replace the global travel warning with individual travel guidelines, which will list the risks for each and every country. In order to ensure the best protection against the coronavirus as possible for tourists, the Federal government wants to advocate for a list of common criteria within the EU. 

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Spain corrects its official death toll 

In a surprise announcement on Monday, Spain corrected its official death toll from COVID-19, saying that almost 2,000 fewer people had died than previously thought.

The Health Ministry said the amended death toll stood at 26,834 - down from the figure of 28,752 published a day earlier.

Fernando Simón, the director of Spain's health alerts and emergency centre, explained the discrepancy was detected as officials sifted through data and corrected it.

Officials deleted deaths counted twice and people whose deaths were not confirmed as having been caused by the virus.

The quality of data being gathered had improved considerably, Simon said, adding that automated data collection had introduced errors.

However, the figures do not include the thousands of people who are believed to have died, especially in nursing homes, with symptoms attributable to the coronavirus, though unconfirmed.