Hospital staff in the United Kingdom have been told to reuse equipment and to go without full-length protective gowns as fears mount about the nation's supplies.

Meanwhile, US President Donald Trump, who continues to be under attack from the New York Governor for his handling of the health crisis, has tipped up to 65,000 Americans will die from coronavirus.

Across the globe, there have been more than 2.1 million reported cases and more than 150,000 deaths from the virus.

This story will be updated regularly throughout Saturday. You can also stay informed with the latest episode of the Coronacast podcast.

Saturday's key moments:

Crowded accommodation driving record increase in Singapore's cases

The number of people who have become infected in Singapore more than doubled this week. ( AP: Edgar Su )

Singapore has reported a daily record of 942 infections that caused its total number of coronavirus cases to surge to 5,992.

The sharp leap in the tiny city state of nearly 6 million people is the highest seen in South-East Asia.

The number of cases more than doubled this week amid an upsurge among foreign workers staying in crowded dormitories, who constitute 60 per cent of Singapore's COVID-19 infections.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong wrote on Facebook that the vast majority of cases among migrant workers were mild as the workers are young.

Although cases in the dorms are expected to continue to rise, Mr Lee said the Government is increasing healthcare and isolation facilities to handle the load.

More than 200,000 migrant workers from Bangladesh, India and other Asian countries live in dormitories housing up to 20 people a room with shared facilities

Without intervention, 3.3 million could die in Africa

Around 56 per cent of Africa's urban population is concentrated in overcrowded slums. ( AP )

The COVID-19 pandemic will likely kill at least 300,000 Africans and risks pushing 29 million into extreme poverty, the UN Economic Commission for Africa (UNECA) has said, calling for a $US100 billion ($157 billion) safety net for the continent.

Africa now has more than 1,000 deaths from COVID-19, the Africa Centre for Disease Control and Prevention said.

Africa's 54 countries have so far reported fewer than 20,000 confirmed cases of the disease, just a fraction of the more than 2 million cases reported globally.

But the World Health Organisation warned on Thursday that Africa could see as many as 10 million cases in three to six months.

Four scenarios based on the level of preventive measures introduced by African governments have been modelled by the UNECA.

In the total absence of such interventions, the study calculated over 1.2 billion Africans would be infected and 3.3 million would die this year. Africa has a total population of around 1.3 billion.

Most of Africa, however, has already mandated social distancing measures, ranging from curfews and travel guidelines in some countries to full lockdowns in others.

The World Health Organisation noted a 51 per cent increase in cases in Africa and a 60 per cent jump in deaths in the past week.

But WHO warned that because of a shortage of testing "it's likely the real numbers are higher than reported".



Health authorities want to expand coronavirus testing

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Watch Duration: 38 seconds 38 s Health authorities flag expanded national testing protocol

Deputy Chief Medical Officer Paul Kelly has flagged another expansion of Australia's coronavirus testing regime, to include places and people who are seemingly virus-free.

Professor Kelly said Australia had now carried out more than 400,000 tests but said it was time to actively go into the community to find more cases.

He said the switch to a "sentinel surveillance" program would offer tests to at-risk groups.

Random testing is a possibility for people in close-contact jobs like supermarkets as the change in approaches aims to help authorities find cases before they spread.

New wave of infections threatens to collapse Japan's hospitals

People suffering strokes, heart attacks and injuries are being refused treatment in Japan's overstretched hospitals. ( AP: Sadayuki Goto/Kyodo News )

Hospitals in Japan are increasingly turning away sick people as the country struggles with surging coronavirus infections and its emergency medical system collapses.

In one recent case, an ambulance carrying a man with a fever and difficulty breathing was rejected by 80 hospitals and forced to search for hours for a hospital in downtown Tokyo.

Another feverish man finally reached a hospital after paramedics unsuccessfully contacted 40 clinics.

Many hospital emergency rooms are refusing to treat people including those suffering strokes, heart attacks and external injuries, according to peak medical groups.

Experts have blamed Government incompetence, a general unwillingness to embrace social distancing and a widespread shortage of hospital beds, protective gear and equipment for medical workers.

The number of confirmed cases in Japan had risen to 10,000 on Saturday, public broadcaster NHK reported.

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Nigerian president's chief of staff dies from coronavirus

The Nigerian president's chief of staff, Abba Kyari, died on Friday after contracting the new coronavirus.

Mr Kyari, who was in his 70s and had underlying health problems including diabetes, was the top official aide to 77-year-old President Muhammadu Buhari and one of the most powerful men in the country.

"The Presidency regrets to announce the passage of the Chief of Staff to the President, Mallam Abba Kyari," said presidency spokesman Garba Shehu in a tweet, using an honorific title for Kyari.

"The deceased had tested positive to the ravaging COVID-19, and had been receiving treatment. But he died on Friday, April 17, 2020," he said in a second post.

Mr Kyari was the highest profile death due to the disease in the West African country, which has 493 confirmed cases and 17 deaths, according to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.

There's little sign of herd immunity, WHO says

Research suggests herd immunity in the broader population is not occurring on a large scale. ( Reuters: Kim Kyung-Hoon )

The World Health Organisation is not sure whether the presence of antibodies in blood gives full protection against reinfection with the new coronavirus, the group's top emergencies expert Mike Ryan has said.

Dr Ryan also said that even if antibodies were effective there was little sign that large numbers of people had developed them and were beginning to offer so-called "herd immunity" to the broader population.

"A lot of preliminary information coming to us right now would suggest quite a low percentage of population have seroconverted (to produce antibodies)," he said.

"The expectation that … the majority in society may have developed antibodies, the general evidence is pointing against that, so it may not solve the problem of governments."

Australia's passed the worst but it's not time to relax: expert

Hand washing and maintaining good hygiene will be key to keeping the virus under control in Australia. ( ABC News: Robert Koenig-Luck )

Australia has passed the peak of the coronavirus pandemic but people will need to keep up good hand hygiene and other practices to ensure it stays that way, a senior infectious diseases expert has said.

Professor Ramon Shaban, the clinical chair of infection prevention and disease control at the University of Sydney, agreed with Chief Medical Officer Brendan Murphy that the peak in cases had passed with a sustained decline in new cases since mid-March.

"As public health orders are revised and we can go about doing other things in our lives [we need to make sure] that we don't inadvertently create new clusters or transmissions by becoming a bit lax [by] not washing our hands, not having good hand hygiene, going to work when we're unwell," he said.

The latest deaths in Australia include an 83-year-old Queensland man, who was a passenger on the Celebrity Eclipse cruise ship, a 74-year-old man, who was a patient at the North West Regional Hospital in Burnie, and a 58-year-old female in New South Wales.

Australia has more than 6,500 cases and has recorded nearly 70 deaths from the virus.

Athletes banned for doping until 2020 can compete in Tokyo

The games were postponed for a year due to the coronavirus. ( Reuters: Athit Perawongmetha )

Athletes serving out doping bans this year will be able to compete at the postponed Tokyo Olympics next year, the Athletics Integrity Unit has confirmed.

Last month, the International Olympic Committee and the Japanese Government agreed to postpone the Tokyo Games, due to start in July, to 2021 due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Athletics Integrity Unit chief Brett Clothier said stopping athletes whose bans expire this year from competing in 2021 would lead to legal complications.

"The standard penalty under the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) code for doping is a four-year ban," he said.

"And that's been designed that way to tie in with the Olympic cycle.

"But in this case, of course, it's an anomaly that the Olympics have moved so some athletes will benefit from that."

The anomaly could prove to be a double-edged sword, however, with Mr Clothier saying athletes caught after August this year would be banned for two Olympic Games — in Tokyo and Paris — since they fall within the four-year sanction range.

He said the pandemic had restricted the regular testing of athletes.

Beijing denies claims nearly half virus deaths in Wuhan uncounted

Wuhan is the capital of Hubei province and China's epicentre of the novel coronavirus disease outbreak. ( Reuters: Aly Song )

Nearly 1,300 people who died of the coronavirus in the Chinese city of Wuhan were not counted in death tolls because of lapses, Chinese state media says.

But Beijing dismissed claims that there had been any kind of cover-up.

The central city where the outbreak emerged late last year added 1,290 more fatalities to the 2,579 previously counted, reflecting incorrect reporting, delays and omissions, according to a local government taskforce in charge of controlling the coronavirus.

Reflecting the additional deaths in Wuhan, China revised its national death toll later on Friday up to 4,632.

The revision follows widespread speculation that Wuhan's death toll was significantly higher than reported.

Rumours of more victims were fuelled for weeks by pictures of long queues of family members waiting to collect ashes of cremated relatives and reports of thousands of urns stacked at a funeral home waiting to be filled.

"In the early stage, due to limited hospital capacity and the shortage of medical staff, a few medical institutions failed to connect with local disease control and prevention systems in a timely manner, which resulted in delayed reporting of confirmed cases and some failures to count patients accurately," state media cited an unidentified Wuhan official as saying.

Suspicion that China had not been transparent about the outbreak has risen in recent days as death tolls mount in many countries.

UK death toll rises, fears hospitals will run out of equipment

Many countries have extended lockdowns as coronavirus continues to spread. ( AP Photo/Frank Augstein )

New guidelines for medical staff wearing protective equipment to treat COVID-19 have been issued as fears over supplies mount.

National Health Service (NHS) leaders have warned some hospitals in England will run out of key protective equipment for staff treating coronavirus patients.

Updated guidelines ask doctors and nurses to work without full length fluid resistance gowns and to reuse equipment where necessary.

The United Kingdom's hospital death toll from COVID-19 rose 847 to 14,576 on Friday, the Health Ministry says.

Meanwhile, the UK Government launched a new coronavirus taskforce to support efforts to make a vaccine available to the public as quickly as possible.

The Government said 21 new research projects would get funding from a 14 million pound investment pool "to rapidly progress treatments and vaccines".

A million doses of a potential COVID-19 vaccine being developed by British scientists at Oxford University are already being manufactured, even before trials prove whether the shot is effective.

"The Vaccine Taskforce is key to coordinating efforts to rapidly accelerate the development and manufacture of a potential new vaccine, so we can make sure it is widely available to patients as soon as possible," Business Minister Alok Sharma said.

New York attacks Trump over response

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Watch Duration: 1 minute 32 seconds 1 m 32 s The US President says he believes the death toll will be between 60,000 and 65,000 people.

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo launched a blistering attack on US President Donald Trump's response to the coronavirus crisis, accusing him of "passing the buck" to the states.

The Governor also accused the President of favouring the airline industry and other business cronies in a recent bailout package.

The attack came after the President suggested New York had asked for too much aid that was never fully used.

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Mr Cuomo said his requests for aid were motivated by the White House's own dire projections for the virus.

"We built more beds than we needed," Mr Cuomo said.

"Our only mistake was believing your numbers and your projections."

New York is the epicentre of the US outbreak, accounting for nearly half of the country's almost 37,000 deaths.

The daily death toll across the state has not dropped below 600 since April 5.

Mr Cuomo said the President had repeatedly refused to help states to ramp up testing because it was "too complicated".

This week New York extended the closure of businesses and schools until at least May 15.

Mr Cuomo said the phased reopening of the state would hinge on keeping hospitalisations and other key metrics on a downward trend.

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There are 17,316 people in hospital across New York because of COVID-19, down from 17,735 a day earlier and the lowest since April 5.

The President told a press briefing he expected the country's death toll to rise to 60,000 to 65,000 people.

Meanwhile, there have been protests across the country against "stay-at-home orders" issued by the states, as the White House outlined its plans to reopen the country for business.

In places like Oklahoma, Texas and Virginia, small-government groups, supporters of Mr Trump, anti-vaccine advocates, gun rights backers and supporters of right-wing causes have united behind a deep suspicion of efforts to shut down daily life to slow the spread of coronavirus.

Mr Trump egged on protesters by tweeting for supporters to "LIBERATE" three states with Democratic governors: Michigan, Minnesota and Virginia.

Space to play or pause, M to mute, left and right arrows to seek, up and down arrows for volume. Watch Duration: 34 seconds 34 s Hundreds of people have protested outside the house of the Minnesota Governor.

French navy investigates outbreak

Nearly half the personnel on the Charles de Gaulle have been infected. ( AP: Y Bisson/ Marine Nationale )

The French navy is investigating how the novel coronavirus infected more than 1,000 sailors aboard the aircraft carrier Charles de Gaulle.

The ship, France's biggest carrier and the flagship of its navy, has been undergoing a lengthy disinfection process since returning to its home base in Toulon five days ago.

One person remains in intensive care and some 20 others hospitalised, navy spokesman Commander Eric Lavault said.

Two of four US sailors serving aboard the Charles de Gaulle as part of an exchange program also tested positive, according to a US navy statement.

Commander Lavault insisted that the aircraft carrier's commander sought to increase the physical distance among the crew on the vessel.

It is "very difficult to apply social distancing measures … on a combat vessel," he said. But "security of the crew is the first concern. A combat ship, especially an aircraft carrier, is nothing without its crew".

A similar outbreak on the USS Theodore Roosevelt and a dispute about how the at-sea health crisis was handled led to the firing of its captain and the resignation this month of the acting US Navy secretary.

Defence Minister Florence Parly told MPs that 1,081 of the 2,300 people aboard the Charles de Gaulle and its escort vessels have tested positive so far — nearly half the overall personnel.

Spain's death rate rises as Government seeks to harmonise data

Spain has been among the worst-hit countries. ( Reuters: Susana Vera )

Spain's death toll from coronavirus rose by 565 on Saturday — down from a rise of 585 on Friday — the Health Ministry said, bringing the total to 20,043 deaths in one of the world's hardest hit countries.

The number of overall coronavirus cases rose to 191,726 from 188,068.

The Government has said it would seek to harmonise how it collects data from Spain's 17 autonomous regions after Catalonia started including suspected deaths from coronavirus on Wednesday (local time), greatly increasing its tally.

Spain's regions collated their own figures until a state of alarm was declared in response to the coronavirus outbreak on March 14 and the Government centralised the collection of data.

Spanish health emergency chief Fernando Simon said the country is following World Health Organisation guidelines by just including people proven to have contracted the coronavirus in the nationwide death toll.

Spain has begun to ease a strict lockdown imposed on March 14, opening up some sectors of the economy, including manufacturing, this week.

Brazil replaces sacked health minister

Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro concedes he will be blamed if the COVID-19 infection rate rises. ( AP: Eraldo Peres )

Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has conceded he may be blamed if the new coronavirus outbreak worsens as a result of reopening the country's borders.

He fired his health minister on Thursday after clashing with him over lockdown measures, which the President argued were damaging to the economy.

Mr Bolsonaro, a right-wing populist, conceded determining social distancing measures was the responsibility of governors and mayors after a Supreme Court ruling.

The borders, however, are in his control.

"Opening trade is a risk that I take, because if [the outbreak] gets worse, it will fall on my lap," Mr Bolsonaro said at the inauguration event for his new health minister, Nelson Teich.

To slow the spread of the virus, Brazil closed its borders last month to non-resident foreigners, with some exceptions including cargo shipments.

Brazil has 33,682 confirmed cases, with some 200 fatalities a day in the past four consecutive days, bringing the death toll to 2,141 as of Friday, according to Health Ministry data.

Sao Paulo Governor Joao Doria extended the social isolation order in the state to May 10.

There have been signs in recent weeks that lockdowns could be getting more lax, with a Sao Paulo government analysis of mobile phone data finding that as of Thursday only 49 per cent of people were in social isolation.

Lockdown tightened in Greece during Orthodox Easter

The Good Friday Epitaph processions were conducted in empty churches across Greece. ( Reuters: Goran Tomasevic )

Priests in Greece have performed a sombre Good Friday Epitaph service alone inside their churches due to a lockdown across the country.

The ritual symbolises Christ being taken down from the cross after his crucifixion and placed in a tomb — a four poster wooden bier decorated with flowers.

The bier is usually carried through the streets in a grand procession by priests, hundreds of faithful holding candles, and musical bands.

This year, however, the pews were empty as priests took down the wooden icon representing the body of Christ from the cross and in place of the procession the priests circled the interior of the church.

Authorities have tightened the lockdown across Greece during the Easter holiday, which culminates on Sunday with Orthodox Easter.

People are restricted from attending Easter services, or travelling to friends, family, or summer homes, as is custom during the holiday, the most important on the Greek calendar.

The Government and the Church have appealed to the public to respect the lockdown, fearing the progress the country has made in battling the virus will be undone.

Dubai extends 24-hour coronavirus curfew by one week

The United Arab Emirates has reported 5,825 cases of coronavirus with 35 deaths. ( Reuters: Christopher Pike )

Dubai — the United Arab Emirates' business hub — has extended by one week a 24-hour curfew imposed as part of a sterilisation drive to control the spread of the new coronavirus.

The UAE has imposed a nationwide nightly curfew since March 26 for the disinfection campaign, but Dubai on April 4 expanded it within the emirate to a 24-hour lockdown for two weeks.

The UAE reported 460 new cases and two more deaths from the virus, taking its tally to 5,825 with 35 deaths.

It does not give a breakdown for each of the seven emirates.

It has the second-highest infection count after its much larger neighbour Saudi Arabia among the six Gulf Arab states, where the total infection count has surpassed 22,000 with more than 140 deaths.