In a test of faith, Christians mark Good Friday in isolation

By JOSEPH KRAUSS

2 hours ago

"JERUSALEM (AP) — Christians are commemorating Jesus’ crucifixion without the solemn church services or emotional processions of past years, marking Good Friday in a world locked down by the coronavirus pandemic.

A small group of clerics are to hold a closed-door service in the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem, built on the site where Christians believe Jesus was crucified, buried and rose from the dead. They will then walk the Via Dolorosa, the ancient route where he is believed to have carried the cross before his execution at the hands of the Romans.

In ordinary times, tens of thousands of pilgrims from around the world retrace Jesus’ steps in the Holy Week leading up to Easter. But this year, flights are grounded and religious sites in the Holy Land are closed as authorities try to prevent the spread of the virus.

The new virus causes mild to moderate symptoms in most patients, who recover within a few weeks. But it is highly contagious and can be spread by those showing no symptoms. It can cause severe illness and death in some patients, particularly the old and infirm.

In Rome, the torch-lit Way of the Cross procession at the Colosseum is a highlight of Holy Week, drawing large crowds of pilgrims, tourists and locals. It’s been cancelled this year, along with all other public gatherings in Italy, which is battling one of the worst outbreaks.

The virus has killed nearly 18,000 people in Italy and over 88,000 worldwide.

Instead of presiding over the Way of the Cross procession, Pope Francis will lead a Good Friday ceremony in St. Peter’s Square without the public.

Ten people — five from the Vatican’s health office and five from a prison in Padua, in northern Italy, where infections are particularly widespread — will participate in the procession, which will circle several times around the obelisk in St. Peter’s Square.

On display in the square will be a wooden crucifix, famed for being carried in a procession during the plague that ravaged Rome in the early 16th century.

The Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, nearly destroyed by fire a year ago, is holding a special Good Friday ceremony in the charred, gutted interior of the medieval landmark. But the event is closed to the public for two reasons: France’s strict virus confinement measures forbid religious or any other gatherings, and the cathedral remains too structurally unstable to let parishioners inside.

“We wanted to send a message of hope” through the ceremony, Paris Archbishop Michel Aupetit told reporters this week."

moar:

https://apnews.com/98dd007d4c24dbba96386e2a3eb42444

Nobody knows anything: West doesn't trust China's

Covid-19 figures, but are its own numbers any more

==meaningful?

10 Apr, 2020 06:56

"Whatever the eventual impact of the coronavirus, one thing has become apparent: when governments are the gatekeepers of data-gathering, there is no reliable source of information on the scale of the pandemic.

It did not take long for a war of information to break out over the true extent of Covid-19. Every morning, we wake up to the freshest figures for our own country. Another few hundred or thousand new cases, depending on where you live, and a fraction as many deaths. Every day, the colour-coded curves corresponding to the cases in various countries creep one day further into the future, like breakers approaching a beach.

But there is no way of comparing different countries’ statistics, based as they are on processes so riddled with holes and flaws that they may as well be guesswork. Obviously, comparing Italy and Belarus is comparing apples with oranges – the populations and the timelines of the pandemics in these countries are wildly different, so inferring results from their response plans is pointless.

In the same way, though, comparing Italy to a more superficially similar country, like Spain, is just as meaningless. Because their testing systems and data reporting vary, there is no way to glean any useful information, for example, about whether their lockdown measures have helped. The Mail on Sunday columnist Peter Hitchens has been terrier-like in his assertion that there is no known causal relationship between lockdown measures and fewer deaths, which has not made him any friends in the mainstream media.

Furthermore, there are too many unknowns about the virus itself and, as a brand new strain previously unknown to humans, attempts to understand it have come from a standing start. Every new piece of research seems to raise more questions than it answers. Are most people asymptomatic carriers? How long are people contagious for? Are there many strains or just one? And how deadly is it in comparison to the flu? It is likely to be a year or more before we know – such is the nature of scientific research. Until then, we will have to embrace our ignorance."

moar:

https://www.rt.com/op-ed/485425-west-china-covid-19-figures/

PM in 'early phase of his recovery' as Britons told lockdown

must continue

As the PM leaves intensive care, Britons are warned that respecting lockdown measures over the Easter weekend is

vital.

Friday 10 April 2020 08:33, UK

"Boris Johnson appears to be out of danger at the start of an Easter weekend that ministers claim will be critical in the battle against coronavirus.

After three nights in intensive care, the prime minister is now back in a hospital ward after a gradual improvement in his condition that has left him in "extremely good spirits".

Downing Street announced Mr Johnson's move out of intensive care shortly after his stand-in, Dominic Raab, told the nation it is too early to lift the coronavirus lockdown."

moar:

https://news.sky.com/story/coronavirus-pm-out-of-intensive-care-as-britons-warned-staying-at-home-over-easter-is-crucial-11971370