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U.S. protests

George Floyd's brother decries 'a modern-day lynching' in testimony to Congress

George Floyd’s younger brother took his grief to the U.S. Congress on Wednesday with an impassioned plea that lawmakers not let his brother’s death be in vain, lamenting that he “didn’t deserve to die over $20” in what he called a lynching.

The House of Representatives Judiciary Committee held the first congressional hearing to examine racial injustice and police brutality following George Floyd’s May 25 death after a Minneapolis policeman knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes. His death prompted a wave of protests in U.S. cities and abroad.

One of the four former Minneapolis police officers who were charged over the death of George Floyd was released on bail on Wednesday. Thomas Lane, 37, had been held on $750,000 bail and was freed from Hennepin County jail, sheriff’s office records showed.

President Donald Trump ruled out renaming U.S. military bases that are named for Confederate leaders on Wednesday even as NASCAR banned the Confederate flag from its races and Democrats sought the removal from Capitol Hill of statues of people representing the pro-slavery South in the 1860s Civil War.

A group of protesters pulled down a statue of Italian explorer Christopher Columbus in Saint Paul, Minnesota, on Thursday, the latest U.S. monument to be torn down amid nationwide demonstrations against police brutality and racial inequalities.

What you need to know about the coronavirus today

Farm work is a risky business
From apple packing houses in Washington state to farm workers in Florida and a California county known as “the world’s salad bowl,” outbreaks of the novel coronavirus are emerging at U.S. fruit and vegetable farms and packing plants.

Working side-by-side and back-to-back, factory employees face the same conditions that contributed to outbreaks at U.S. meat packing plants.

By late May, there were more than 600 cases of COVID-19 among agricultural workers in Yakima County, Washington.

Of those, 62% were workers in the apple industry and other packing operations or warehouses.

The health department in Monterrey County, California, reported 247 agricultural workers had tested positive for coronavirus as of June 5, 39% of county’s total cases.

Tracking down the duds in testing free-for-all
The market for COVID-19 antibody tests has ballooned in a matter of months as hundreds of products flood the world for people who want to find out whether they’ve already had the virus.

The problem is, some of them don’t work properly.

As a result, European authorities aim to tighten regulation of the new sector, to weed out tests that give consistently inaccurate results and crack down on companies that make false claims.


Track the spread of the virus with this state-by-state and county map.

Why do some people get sicker than others?
Diabetes, high body temperature, low oxygen saturation and pre-existing cardiac injury are some risk factors for severe COVID-19, South Korean doctors have found in a paper published by the Journal of Korean Medical Science on June 2.

The team of doctors observed 110 coronavirus patients at a hospital in Daegu, the epicenter of South Korea's outbreak, from Feb. 19 to April 15, of whom 23 developed severe COVID-19.

The patients with at least three of the four prognostic conditions developed severe conditions, said Ahn June-hong, professor of internal medicine.

Hopes for antibody cocktail
Regeneron Pharmaceuticals said it has begun human testing of its experimental antibody cocktail as a treatment for COVID-19.
The trial has an "adaptive" design and could quickly move from dozens of patients to eventually include thousands, Chief Scientific Officer George Yancopoulos told Reuters.

Love in the time of COVID
Those looking for love during the COVID-19 pandemic have had to adapt to lockdown dating, but innovations such as video “pre-dates” may end up outliving the coronavirus.
In England, from Saturday, single adult households will be allowed to form a “support bubble” with one other household and stay the night, which some newspapers took as an end to what they had dubbed a sex ban.
But some of the coronavirus customs that have taken root look set to persist.
Dating app Bumble is launching a feature where users can badge themselves about how they want to date, be it virtually or socially distanced with a mask.

From Breakingviews: Corona Capital - Soccer salaries, Stereos, Mubadala
Read concise views on the pandemic’s financial fallout from Breakingviews columnists across the globe.

Reuters reporters and editors around the world are investigating the response to the coronavirus pandemic.

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Emerging from lockdown

Georgia’s tumultuous primary elections on Tuesday offer a grim preview of what could happen in November if states move to voting by mail and polling places are sharply reduced due to concerns about the coronavirus pandemic.

A huge increase in absentee ballots overwhelmed officials and many voters did not receive requested ballots. That forced some to crowd into consolidated polling places on election day, exacerbating the hours-long waits for those voting in person.

Jobs gone, investments wasted: Africa's deserted safaris leave mounting toll. From Kenya’s Masai Mara to the Okavango Delta in Botswana, rural communities that depend on safaris for income are seeing their livelihoods and dreams shattered. Hundreds of thousands of people rely on the sector, not to mention their dependents.

'Fifty drivers fight for one order': Southeast Asia gig economy slammed by virus. Indonesian motorcycle taxi driver Aji chain-smokes and checks his smartphone constantly while waiting for orders by the roadside in downtown Jakarta on a hot June morning, but is staring at the prospect of another fruitless day.

COVID Science

Antiviral drug remdesivir protects lungs in infected monkeys. Remdesivir, the first medication shown to benefit hospitalized patients with COVID-19 in clinical trials, prevented lung disease in a new study of macaque monkeys infected with the new coronavirus, researchers said on Tuesday in the journal Nature.

Experimental vaccine from China shows promise in animals.
A coronavirus vaccine candidate being developed by Chinese researchers showed promise in animal studies, triggering antibodies and raising no safety issues, researchers said. A human trial of the vaccine with more than 1,000 participants is underway.