Europe: coronavirus islands
23 Apr 2020
Saaremaa island, off the coast of Estonia, has been labelled by locals as ‘corona island’ after becoming a hotspot for the virus and being placed into strict quarantine. The first Covid-19 cases on Saaremaa began in March, after a sports event was held there with a team from Italy. Now health officials estimate that half of the island's population have contracted the virus. An overcrowded refugee camp on Chios had reports of an Iraqi asylum seeker dying after being cleared of having coronavirus. This caused riots and widespread damage by fire, leaving hundreds of people homeless. Many still believe she died of Covid-19. Sicily’s health services are stretched because of coronavirus, and 156 migrants on a German rescue ship were refused entry to its western coast. They had to be transferred to another vessel and quarantined.
EU summit: members’ solidarity tested
23 Apr 2020
EU leaders met electronically on 23 April to begin tentatively to unlock the nations’ businesses as the immediate health crisis eases. Restarting Europe’s economy has led to divisive debates over grants: ultimately, how should the wealthier north help out the harder-hit south? The argument over solidarity has become a bitter one, with some favouring ‘coronabonds’ or ‘Eurobonds’ and others preferring grants or a 1.5 trillion recovery fund. Let us pray that all decisions made will successfully help those most in need. May the next steps include a huge increase in the EU budget, so that every member state overcomes the crisis together, leaving no nation behind carrying heavy unmanageable debts. Observers note that EU institutions have struggled to get leaders to put aside their national interests.
UNICEF response to pandemic
23 Apr 2020
The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on children goes far beyond any health risks. Across Europe and Central Asia, everyday services essential for their safety and well-being - from ante-natal care and home visits for new parents, to child protection and education - are grinding to a halt as entire populations go into lockdown. For millions of children and their families, this is a time of anxiety and uncertainty. For those children who were vulnerable before this crisis, the pandemic heightens the risks they already face, particularly children from the poorest families, children with disabilities, those from ethnic minorities and refugee and migrant children - especially unaccompanied children, separated from their families. Now that schools are closed and home-based quarantine has become the ‘new normal’, parents have become frontline responders to the pandemic, needing comprehensive support to safeguard their children’s health, wellbeing and development.
G20 response to pandemic
23 Apr 2020
G20 health ministers had a virtual meeting on 19 April. They agreed that lifting lockdown restrictions is not the end of the epidemic; it is just the beginning of the next phase, and countries must educate, engage, and empower their people to prevent any resurgence. They must have the capacity to detect, test, isolate and care for every case and trace every contact. Health systems must have the capacity to absorb any increase in cases. There is deep concern that the virus is gathering pace in countries that lack the capabilities of G20 countries. Urgent support is needed as they respond to the pandemic, while ensuring that other essential health services can continue. One of the biggest challenges which G20 and WHO face in Africa (and other countries) is the critical shortage of supplies, and the lack of ability to deliver them because of weak supply chains.
Ramadan (24 April to 23 May)
23 Apr 2020
‘God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.’ Many of us have Muslim friends, and we long to see them understand and believe John 3:16. During Ramadan (however modified), let us pray and ask God to anoint us for Spirit-led conversations with them. As they practise self-restraint, fast and pray to become closer to Allah, we can pray that the Holy Spirit will open their spiritual eyes to know the Father who loves them. When they sacrifice and give alms, we can ask God in heaven to show them the sacrifice that Jesus made when he was crucified for the sins of the world. May He give His Church love for Muslims across the world. May we have compassion for those who are like sheep without a shepherd (Mark 6:34). For a ‘30daysprayer’ resource click the ‘More’ button, or go to
Persecution and other dangers amid coronavirus
23 Apr 2020
During the coronavirus lockdown, Nigerian Fulani militants have murdered a five-year-old child they snatched from a pregnant mother, another nine Christians including two children, and a second pregnant woman In Egypt, seven Islamist terrorists, suspected of plotting to attack Christians under cover of the nightly coronavirus curfew, were shot dead. In West Africa, Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau declared coronavirus a ‘product of evil’ while he mocked health measures and stepped up attacks. In East Africa the arrival of a second invasion of ravenous young locusts, spawned in Ethiopia, is feared to be twenty times more severe than the plague that devastated crops in January. Iran is facing major challenges. Its slow response to the pandemic, lack of transparency, and absence of an exit strategy, together with the US sanctions and the fall of oil prices, have compromised its healthcare system, its economic situation, and the daily lives of its people.
Japan: stay home in ‘Golden Week’
23 Apr 2020
The Golden Week will fall between 2 and 6 May. Families usually take advantage of this holiday period to go on long trips. Despite early signs that the number of new coronavirus cases may be slowing, the government has warned that everyone must continue to stay home and avoid non-essential travel, even during the Golden Week holidays. The economic minister Yasutoshi Nishimura, who spearheads the government’s coronavirus measures, said, ‘I am alarmed that efforts to decrease the number of new patients have been insufficient’. Recently doctors warned that the medical system could collapse. Emergency rooms cannot treat seriously ill patients due to extra virus cases. One ambulance carrying a coronavirus patient was turned away by eighty hospitals before he could be seen. Japan now has tens of thousands of confirmed cases: it did not prepare well for coronavirus, despite being the second country outside China to record infection. See
Global: the human cost of censorship
23 Apr 2020
Reporters Without Borders (RSF) stated recently, ‘Some of the most active centres of Covid-19 infection, such as China and Iran, are countries where the media have been unable to fulfil their role of informing the public. There is an urgent need to render an exhaustive and honest account of the obstacles to press freedom and the attempts to manipulate information during this unprecedented epidemic. And we must offer solutions that enable journalists now and tomorrow to provide reliable information and combat rumours.’ With this in mind, RSF has launched Tracker-19 to monitor and evaluate the impacts of the coronavirus pandemic on journalism, and to offer recommendations on how to defend the right to information. The tool will monitor not only coronavirus but any unprecedented global crisis. It will document state censorship and deliberate disinformation, and their impact on the right to reliable news and information. It will also make recommendations on how to defend journalism.