China’s President Xi Jinping inspects a primary school in Laoxian township on April 21.
Italy and New York laid out partial reopening plans, with France and Spain to follow suit this week, while tens of thousands of students returned to school in Shanghai and Beijing after months of closures. Virus numbers in China – where the disease first emerged late last year – have dwindled as the country begins to cautiously lift control measures, although fears remain over a potential resurgence and cases imported from abroad.More than 205,000 coronavirus deaths have been confirmed across the globe – more than a quarter in the United States.
People will have to wear masks in public and rigorously observe social distancing measures when the country’s current restrictions are eased on May 4.Britain’s leader, Boris Johnson, was to return to work on Monday after being hospitalised by Covid-19, one of nearly three million people known to have been infected worldwide.