UK Pledges $248 Million in Aid to WHO to Help Prevent Second Wave of COVID-19

According to the latest data update by the World Health Organisation (WHO), the exact COVID-19 count is 1,614,951, registered in 213 countries and territories.

The United Kingdom is allocating over $248 million in aid to the World Health Organisation (WHO) and charities to help developing countries fight COVID-19 and to prevent a second wave of the coronavirus infection, International Development Secretary Anne-Marie Trevelyan said on Sunday.

According to data from the UK Department of Health, the number of confirmed coronavirus cases in the country has surpassed 78,900, while the death toll from the viral disease stands at over 9,800.

https://sputniknews.com/world/202004121078924435-live-updates-uk-pledges-248-million-in-aid-to-who-to-help-prevent-second-wave-of-covid-19/

Mexican Government Confirms Journalist from Acapulco was Beheaded

Mexican authorities confirmed the murder and beheading of a journalist from the beach tourist hotspot of Acapulco who went missing last week.

Through a prepared statement, the Guerrero State Attorney General’s Office revealed that human bodyparts discovered on Wednesday in Acapulco were identified through forensic testing as belonging to journalist Victor Fernando Alvarez Chavez. The statement revealed that relatives had formally reported the victim as missing on April 2 in Acapulco.

Alvarez Chavez served as director of the local news outlet Punto por Punto and had previously been the target of several threats from the various drug cartels that operate and are fighting for control of Acapulco and other parts of Guerrero. As Breitbart Texas reported, Guerrero has been a hotspot for violence in recent years as multiple drug cartels fight for control of the region’s drug production and drug trafficking routes.

According to Mexico’s El Universal, relatives claimed that after the victim went missing, Mexican prosecutors forced them to wait 72 hours before they could file a missing person’s report.

According to Guerrero’s FGE, authorities collected the victim’s severed remains on Wednesday and submitted samples for testing. It remains unclear from their statement if the entire body was recovered or only certain body parts.

Alvarez Chavez is the fourth murdered journalist in 2020. His death comes just days after two gunmen on a motorcycle fatally shot Maria Elena Ferral in Veracruz, Breitbart Texas reported. Paramedics rushed the journalist to a local hospital where she died hours later. The governor of Veracruz mocked local news outlets at the time claiming they were using the fatal attack on Ferral to criticize his government.

https://www.breitbart.com/border/2020/04/11/mexican-government-confirmed-journalist-from-acapulco-was-beheaded/

Lockdown effect? Twitter hit by outages across parts of Americas & Europe, as users report issues with posting

Twitter has not been functioning properly for thousands of users across Europe and Americas in what appears to be yet another major outage, with many reporting troubles with the platform’s website,

Downdetector, which tracks service complaints via social media, reported that the outages have been experienced by users in Europe, as well as by those residing on the US east coast. The issue is also affecting Brazil and Argentina, where most reports are coming from São Paulo and Buenos Aires.

Most of the users that flocked to the website to report the outage have been having difficulties with the Twitter website (some 43 percent), while 37 percent reported irregularities while using Twitter on IPhone and IPad.

It appears that many of the users were still able to access the social messaging platform, but were unable to complete basic operations - such as posting new tweets or replying to DMs - with some describing the service as being “very sluggish and glitchy.”

While it’s yet unclear what is behind the latest outage, some suggested that the site, overwhelmed by messages in the times of the coronavirus-induced lockdowns, just could not handle the avalanche of users.

Problems started plaguing Twitter even before the extended Easter weekend in the US and Europe. On Thursday and Friday users reported similar issues with the platform, with the majority of them saying that the website itself was malfunctioning, according to Downdetector.

https://www.rt.com/news/485590-twitter-down-users-access/

Planned Parenthood to Ask Supreme Court to Protect Abortion Access in Texas

Planned Parenthood announced Saturday it was joining Texas abortion providers in asking the U.S. Supreme Court to restore medication abortions as its case against Gov. Greg Abbott’s executive order blocking most abortions during the pandemic proceeds.

“For almost three weeks, providers … have had to cancel appointments for hundreds of patients while Gov. Abbott continues to exploit a pandemic in order to score political points,” Planned Parenthood said in a press release.

On Friday, and for a second time, a three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fifth Circuit upheld Abbott’s ban on abortions as part of a ban on elective medical procedures in order to preserve personal protective equipment (PPE) for healthcare workers caring for victims of the coronavirus infection.

In its decision, the court reiterated Abbott’s executive order “is a concededly valid public health measure that applies to all ‘surgeries and procedures,’ does not single out abortion, and … has an exemption for serious medical conditions.”

The decision includes a very narrow exception that allows for abortions for pregnant women who are nearing Texas’s 22-week limit on the procedure.

Planned Parenthood acting president Alexis McGill Johnson said in a statement the situation over the past few weeks has been “untenable for Texans in need of time-sensitive abortion procedures”:

Gov. Abbott has blocked abortion access for mothers who have lost their jobs because of COVID-19, people quarantined with abusive partners, and patients with fatal fetal diagnoses. Now is the time to be making abortion more accessible, not less.

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton told CBS News Wednesday he will defend Abbott’s executive order banning most abortions during the coronavirus crisis to the Supreme Court, if necessary.

“My guess is it’ll go to the Supreme Court either way,” the attorney general said. “We’ll either appeal it or Planned Parenthood will appeal it, so my guess is that’s where it ends up.”

Planned Parenthood said the organization fears the situation will force some women to not have access to abortion at all.

https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/04/11/planned-parenthood-to-ask-supreme-court-to-protect-abortion-access-in-texas/

And There It Is… Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer Bans Buying US Flags During Lockdown

Crazed Democrat Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer prohibited big box retailers from in-person sale of seeds because according to her, food is non-essential.

‘Crisis gardens’ or ‘victory gardens’ were always encouraged during a time of war or a time of crisis to supplement rations and boost morale.

But the tyrannical governor of Michigan barred grocery stores and brick-and-mortar retailers from selling vegetable seeds.

In late March Michigan Democrat Governor Gretchen Whitmer limited access of doctors from prescribing the lifesaving drugs hydroxychloroquine and Z-Paks to save senior citizens in the state from Coronavirus.

Hydroxychloroquine and Z-Paks have are widely used by doctors the world over to treat the Coronavirus.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/04/michigan-governor-gretchen-whitmer-bans-buying-us-flags-lockdown/

Deranged WaPo Writer: ‘Biden Needs To Accuse Trump Of Willingness To Kill People’

The 2016 election caused some people in media to truly lose their minds.

Perhaps no one more so than the Washington Post’s supposedly conservative writer Jennifer Rubin.

She has used her position at the Post to bash Trump for three years and has even reversed her opinions on certain policy issues just so she can criticize him.

She is of course backing Joe Biden and recently gave him some advice on Twitter.

Townhall breaks it down:

Washington Post’s ‘Conservative’ Writer Is Now Just Beyond Parody After Her Last Tweet About Trump

I mean, this is now just parody. If not, it’s now confirmed as one of the worst cases of Trump Derangement Syndrome thus far. This was a long time coming, but The Washington Post’s so-called “conservative” writer, Jennifer Rubin, is back at it again, blaming Trump for the death toll from the Wuhan coronavirus.

“Biden must say it: Trump will get more people killed” is the headline of her column. It’s just absurd. First, no one will ever convince me that the only way to save the Republican Party or conservatism is to vote for a Democrat, especially one that’s called Joe Biden.

For those who are opposed to ‘destroying the village to save it’ logic, this is it in its most pure form. What the hell are people thinking? And this goes double for the Republicans who voted for Hillary Clinton, the ultimate traitors to the cause.

Now, granted, I will give some latitude here; Rubin does make a good point that going back to normal too soon will lead to a resurgence in infections, but it’s also true that some major companies and scores of small businesses cannot survive a lockdown for another 4-6 weeks.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2020/04/deranged-wapo-writer-biden-needs-accuse-trump-willingness-kill-people/

Australian MSM

Julian Assange fathered two children while living in embassy

The partner of Julian Assange has revealed she conceived two of his children while he was living inside the Ecuadorian embassy in London, in a statement pleading for him to be released from a UK prison.

The lawyer for the Australian WikiLeaks founder, Stella Moris-Smith Robertson, said there were now genuine fears for the health of Mr Assange due to the spread of coronavirus and his isolation in prison, Britain's Press Association news agency reports.

The report also revealed an unexpected personal connection: citing court documents, the agency reported that Ms Moris-Smith Robertson said she and Mr Assange have been in a relationship since 2015 and have two children, three-year-old Gabriel and one-year-old Max.

She says she met Mr Assange in 2011 when she was a legal researcher and he was living at the Ecuadorian embassy, and the two developed a strong bond.

Mr Assange has been held in Belmarsh prison in London since he left the Ecuadorian embassy a year ago.

He is waiting for an extradition hearing on May 18 on behalf of the US, where he is wanted for questioning over WikiLeaks' activities.

Mr Assange's lawyers argue that the 48-year-old is at risk of coronavirus infection because it is "endemic" in prisons, and he is more vulnerable because of physical and mental health issues.

https://www.9news.com.au/national/julian-assange-partner-of-wikileaks-founder-reveals-they-had-children/98d3496b-e29f-4d0d-b738-072c6b240e0a