April 19, 2020 UPDATE

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Newsroom, 19.04.2020, 19:21

EASTER Orthodox believers, who are a majority in Romania, and
Greek-Catholics are these days celebrating Easter or the Resurrection of Jesus
Christ our Lord. The Christianity’s greatest event has this year been
celebrated in empty churches as believers were prevented from attending
religious services in order to observe social distancing rules imposed by the
Covid pandemic. All the believers watched live transmissions on various media
channels instead. The Holy light was brought on Saturday from Jerusalem after a
special religious service, which was not attended by thousands of pilgrims like
it used to in the past years. In his message to believers on this occasion,
Daniel, Patriarch of the Romanian Orthodox Church, says the resurrection of
Christ is for us a source of spiritual power to fight the disease, the fear of
death and suffering.

MESSAGES The US ambassador to Romania, Adrian
Zuckerman on Sunday conveyed a message on his behalf and on president Trump’s
to the Romanians wishing them Happy Easter. In his Easter address to the
Romanians, Prince Charles, heir of the British crown, expressed his wish to get
back to Romania as soon as the pandemic is over and to meet members of the
Romanian community in Britain. Prince Charles has also evoked the indispensable
role many Romanians are playing in the British national health service, in its
care homes and in other key roles as we address this unprecedented crisis. We owe them an immense debt of gratitude and I can hardly say
how much their remarkable efforts are appreciated by us all, Prince Charles
went on to say. In his Easter address yesterday, Romanian President Klaus
Iohannis underlined the Resurrection of Christ is a celebration of hope in a
season of rebirth. The head of the Romanian state urged the Romanians to
express their love for the others by respecting the social distancing rules.
Similar messages have been conveyed by Prime Minister Ludovic Orban and the
Senate interim president, Social-Democrat, Robert Cazanciuc and also by other
Romanian politicians.

TOLL The death toll of the pandemic in Romania has exceeded 440,
while 87 hundred infections have been confirmed. 19 hundred people have been
cured and left hospitals. Over 1000 medical workers have tested positive for
the virus, most of them in Suceava, northern Romania and in Bucharest. Health
Minister Nelu Tataru said that Romania is on an upward trend in terms of the
number of infections but with a ‘slower progression’. 60 Romanian nationals
infected with the virus died abroad. 730 Romanians have been infected abroad,
most of them in Italy and Spain.

PANDEMIC The official number of COVID infections
worldwide has exceeded 2.3 million, while the death toll stands at 160
thousand, most of them, over 100 thousand, in Europe. The USA has so far
reported 39 thousand fatalities and over 730 thousand infections confirmed. The
US authorities are starting to gradually resume economic activities against the
background of demonstrations for ending the quarantine, our correspondent in
Washington has announced. The most affected European countries are Italy and
Spain. Russia has reported a record number of infections, 6,000 in the past 24
hours, the total number exceeding 42 thousand.

QUAKE An earthquake of 3.4 Richter was felt today in the seismic region
of Vrancea in south-eastern Romania, the National Institute for Earth Physics
has today announced. 22 such small earthquakes have been reported in the area
since the beginning of the month. On March 4th, 1977 a 7.2
earthquake, the most powerful to have hit Romania, killed 1570 people mostly in
capital Bucharest causing 2 billion euros in material damage.

(translated by bill)