The latest on the coronavirus pandemic from around the U.S. and the world.

The NFL has “broad agreement” with the players’ union on safety protocols for conducting the 2020 season this fall, the league’s top medical expert said Tuesday, adding that the NFL will be prepared to deal with the inevitability of players, coaches or other staffers testing positive for the novel coronavirus.

“We have a task force working very diligently on that,” Allen Sills, the NFL’s chief medical officer, said during a conference call with reporters. “We fully well expect that we will have positive cases that arise because we think that this disease will remain endemic in society. And so it shouldn’t be a surprise if new positive cases arise. Our challenge is to identify them as quickly as possible and to prevent spread to any other participants. So we’re working very diligently on that, and we’ll have some detailed plans to share about that at a later time.”

Sills, who briefed team owners earlier Tuesday, did not provide a timetable for the league finalizing operational protocols with the NFL Players Association, saying the sides will have to be prepared to adjust to changing circumstances.

The protocols being developed by the league and the players’ union are expected to detail testing procedures and frequency, as well as the process to follow if a player, coach or staffer tests positive. Sills said the NFL is working with other leagues, which will face similar issues.

The players’ union did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

NFL teams were permitted to begin reopening their facilities Tuesday, without coaches and most players at this point, under protocols the league previously established. Those include temperature checks of employees and visitors, and social-distancing measures within offices. Teams are conducting their offseason programs for players remotely, with on-field practices prohibited at least through May 29.

Read the full story on the NFL’s plan for this season here.

States accused of fudging or bungling COVID-19 testing data

PROVIDENCE, R.I. — Public health officials in some states are accused of bungling coronavirus infection statistics or even using a little sleight of hand to deliberately make things look better than they are.

The risk is that politicians, business owners and ordinary Americans who are making decisions about lockdowns, reopenings and other day-to-day matters could be left with the impression that the virus is under more control than it actually is.

In Virginia, Texas and Vermont, for example, officials said they have been combining the results of viral tests, which show an active infection, with antibody tests, which show a past infection. Public health experts say that can make for impressive-looking testing totals but does not give a true picture of how the virus is spreading.

In Florida, the data scientist who developed the state’s coronavirus dashboard, Rebekah Jones, said this week that she was fired for refusing to manipulate data “to drum up support for the plan to reopen.” Calls to health officials for comment were not immediately returned Tuesday.

In Georgia, one of the earliest states to ease up on lockdowns and assure the public it was safe to go out again, the Department of Public Health published a graph around May 11 that showed new COVID-19 cases declining over time in the most severely affected counties. The daily entries, however, were not arranged in chronological order but in descending order.

For example, the May 7 totals came right before April 26, which was followed by May 3. A quick look at the graph made it appear as if the decline was smoother than it really was. The graph was taken down within about a day.

Read the full story about questionable virus statistics here.

Reopening U.S. economy will mean creating all kinds of new jobs

Thermal scanners in Utah and Maryland. Contact tracers in San Francisco. Decontamination technicians in Miami.

Meet the people needed to keep the post-COVID-19 economy running.

In the wake of a pandemic that’s put millions of Americans out of work, a new crop of jobs is emerging. Companies racing to get back to business are creating roles to keep employees and customers safe from a highly contagious virus – positions that may become even more in demand the longer time passes without a vaccine or treatment.

“There is going to be this constant experimentation with new ways of doing certain kinds of jobs,” said Guy Berger, the principal economist at job networking site LinkedIn.

These roles, of varied levels and pay grades, are unlikely to significantly offset the more than 36 million jobs that were idled in U.S. lockdowns. Still, as many furloughed employees begin to return to offices and job sites, they will encounter new coworkers with responsibilities inconceivable before the outbreak.

Nearly every industry is looking for new types of workers to prevent the virus’s spread, said Jeffrey Burnett, chief executive officer of Labor Finders, which connects industrial employers with hourly workers. He’s seeing demand for jobs such as social-distancing monitors at construction sites, entrance watchers at nursing homes and plexiglass installers for offices.

Large companies are evaluating ways to return to work that may bring in new jobs or reposition old ones. Amazon, for instance, plans to check the temperatures of staff members and visitors to its offices when they reopen, and is hiring lab workers for its own virus tests. JPMorgan Chase & Co. is considering adding elevator attendants to prevent too many people from pushing buttons, people familiar with the matter said last month. McDonald’s guide for its restaurants includes having an attendant manning self-serve drink stations that are open during peak hours.

Read the full story on pandemic-related jobs here.

Federal Reserve chief says new lending programs to launch by June 1

WASHINGTON — Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell said Tuesday that the Fed’s lending programs for medium-sized businesses and state and local governments would begin operating by the end of this month.

Powell said that while the Fed has received a “good deal of interest” in those programs, if not enough companies or state and local governments seek to borrow the Fed would consider changes to them. That could include expanding their eligibility.

The chairman’s comments came before the Senate Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, which held an oversight hearing on the $2 trillion federal relief package approved in late March.

Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, who also testified, came under sharp questioning from Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who charged that he wasn’t doing enough to force companies that receive aid from the joint Fed-Treasury program to keep workers on their payrolls.

“Will you require companies that receive money from this half-a-trillion-dollar slush fund to keep people on the payroll?” Warren asked the Treasury secretary.

The senator pressed Mnuchin to ensure that the loans include that requirement. When Mnuchin declined to commit to that change, Warren said, “You’re boosting your Wall Street buddies.”

Mnuchin told Warren that the legislation that provides the government aid includes restrictions on top executive pay and on company dividends and stock buybacks.

The Fed’s Main Street Lending program, announced in March, will extend up to $600 billion in loans to companies with up to 15,000 employees. The Treasury has provided $75 billion to offset any losses from the loans, drawn from $454 billion that Congress provided Treasury to support Fed loans in the relief package.

Read the full story on the Senate hearing here.

Canada, U.S. extend border closure for non-essential travel

TORONTO — Canada and the United States have agreed to extend their agreement to keep border closed to non-essential travel to June 21 during the coronavirus pandemic.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said Tuesday the border is a source of vulnerability, so the agreement will be extended by another 30 days. The restrictions were announced on March 18 and were extended in April.

Trudeau said Canada’s provincial leaders clearly wanted to continue the measures.

“This will keep people in both of our countries safe.” Trudeau said.

President Trump has said that the U.S. and Canada are doing well in handling the pandemic. But many Canadians fear a reopening. The U.S. has more confirmed cases and deaths from COVID-19 than any country in the world, though its per capita numbers are well below many other nations.

Essential cross-border workers like healthcare professionals, airline crews and truck drivers are still permitted to cross. Truck drivers are critical as they move food and medical goods in both directions. Much of Canada’s food supply comes from or via the U.S.

Americans who are returning to America and Canadians who are returning to Canada are also exempted from the border closure.

Canada sends 75 percent of its exports to the U.S. and about 18 percent of American exports go to Canada. The U.S. Canada border is world’s longest between two nations.

UK government fights after minister blames ‘wrong’ scientific advice on virus

Boris Johnson’s government became embroiled in an ugly row over the U.K.’s coronavirus response, after a minister suggested mistakes were down to the “wrong” advice from scientific advisers.

“You can only make judgments and decisions based on the information and advice that you have at the time,” Work and Pensions Secretary Therese Coffey told Sky News on Tuesday, when asked if the government accepts the crisis has been mishandled. “If the science was wrong, advice at the time was wrong, I’m not surprised if people will then think we then made a wrong decision.”

Coffey was speaking after data showed the U.K. became the first country in Europe to record more than 40,000 deaths from COVID-19. Though the death rate in the wider community is dropping rapidly, there’s still a crisis in care homes that has exacerbated tensions across government. Ministers say they have been guided throughout by “the science,” leading to accusations they’re seeking to divert blame for any missteps.

“Scientists advise, ministers take decisions — that’s how government works,” Johnson’s spokesman, James Slack, told reporters when asked about Coffey’s comments, in an apparent attempt to diffuse the row.

Much of the criticism of Johnson’s government has focused on the early days of the outbreak, including a decision in March to halt widespread testing for COVID-19 in the community and waiting until March 23 to impose a nationwide lockdown. The roll-out of a track-and-trace program, widely regarded as essential to ensure restrictions can be eased without triggering a wave of infections, is also yet to materialize.

Yet it’s the outbreak in care homes that is arguably the most sensitive for ministers. Last week, Johnson was challenged by opposition Labour Party leader Keir Starmer over initial government advice that it was “very unlikely” coronavirus would spread in the facilities, which house elderly and vulnerable people.

Instead — along with hospitals — they became the front line of the pandemic. According to the latest data, 42% of all deaths involving COVID-19 in England and Wales took place in care homes in the week ending May 8.

Read the full story here.

European Union urges all nations to back WHO

BRUSSELS — The European Union is supporting the World Health Organization. The EU is urging all countries to back the U.N. agency after President Donald Trump threatened to permanently cut U.S. funding.

European Commission spokeswoman Virginie Battu-Henriksson says global cooperation is “the only effective and viable option to win this battle.”

She says “this is the time for solidarity. It is not the time for finger pointing or undermining multilateral cooperation.”

In a letter to WHO’s director-general, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Trump wrote the agency’s “repeated missteps” in its response to the pandemic have proven “very costly for the world.”

Trump’s threatened to cut U.S. WHO funding unless it commits to “substantive improvements” in the next 30 days.

Ramadan end will be muted in Indonesia

JAKARTA, Indonesia — This year celebration for the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan will be muted in Indonesia’s capital as authorities extended the enforceable restrictions.

Jakarta Gov. Anies Baswedan announced that a large-scale social restriction, initially slated to end Friday, will be extended to June 4.

He urged Muslims to suspend communal gathering, including religious activities in mosques, during Eid-al Fitr celebration because the risk of new waves of coronavirus remains high.

Eid-al Fitr is one of Islam’s two major religious holidays. It marks the end of Ramadan, the holiest month for Muslims, who fast from dawn to sunset. It’s expected to fall on May 24 after Islamic clerics agreed on the sighting of the moon.

Muslims usually congregate for Eid prayers in mosque and fields and share meals among communities while forgiving one another.

Jakarta has become the epicenter of the COVID-19 outbreak in Indonesia. It recorded 6,155 confirmed cases with 470 deaths as of Tuesday. Nationwide, there’s been 18,496 cases and 1,221 deaths.

Airline fires staff in Dubai

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Long-haul carrier Etihad Airways says it has fired staff because of fewer flights during the coronavirus.

The Abu Dhabi-based, state-owned carrier says in a statement “it is clear the demand for travel in the near future will be significantly reduced and as a result we must make difficult decisions to ensure Etihad will weather this storm.”

The airline offered no figures for the number of employees let go. Etihad competes with Dubai-based Emirates and Qatar Airways for long-haul flights from East to West.

Since 2016, Etihad has lost a total of $5.62 billion after its failed strategy of aggressively buying stakes in airlines from Europe to Australia.

In February, Etihad announced it would sell 38 aircraft to an investment firm and a leasing company in a deal valued at $1 billion.

Russian prime minister returns to duty

MOSCOW — Russia’s prime minister has fully resumed his duties after recovering from the coronavirus.

Mikhail Mishustin, 54, announced he was infected on April 30.

On Tuesday, Mishustin’s office says he’s checked out of the hospital and returned to his duties in the Cabinet headquarters. He’s set to take part in a video conference with President Vladimir Putin later in the day.

Several Cabinet ministers and Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov also have been infected. Peskov says he had double pneumonia caused by the virus. He noted he hadn’t met with Putin in person for more than a month.

Putin has limited public appearances and held most of his meetings online during the virus pandemic.

Shakespeare’s Globe theater in financial distress

LONDON — Shakespeare’s Globe theater, one of London’s major tourist attractions, says it could be forced to close because of the coronavirus pandemic.

All of Britain’s theaters have been shut since March, when the government imposed a nationwide lockdown to slow the spread of the virus.

While some venues receive government subsidy, the Globe gets 95% of its revenue from ticket sales. The theater says the blow from the pandemic “has been financially devastating and could even be terminal.”

Parliament’s culture committee told the government that the Globe was “part of our national identity.” It says, “for this national treasure to succumb to COVID-19 would be a tragedy.”

The Globe is a reconstructed Elizabethan playhouse beside the River Thames modeled on the theater where many of Shakespeare’s plays were first performed. It opened in 1997 and draws hundreds of thousands of people a year to its open-air productions.

Serbian police arrest nursing home manager

BELGRADE, Serbia — Serbia’s state television says police have arrested the manager of a nursing home in eastern Serbia following an outbreak of the new coronavirus at the institution.

The outbreak at the Radost, or Joy, nursing home in the eastern town of Negotin last month killed six people and infected 49, including the manager herself.

She is suspected of failure to implement measures against the new coronavirus to protect the nursing home, the RTS report says.

Last month, police also arrested the head of a nursing home in the southern city of Nis after 139 people were infected with the coronavirus at the institution.

Serbia has reported nearly 11,000 cases while over 200 people have died.

Czech Republic, Austria aim to reopen border

PRAGUE — The Czech Republic’s foreign minister says his country and Austria are aiming at reopening their common border that was closed due to the coronavirus pandemic in the middle of June.

Foreign Minister Tomas Petricek says the Czech citizens will be allowed to travel to Austria and back without presenting a negative test on the coronavirus.

Petricek said Tuesday the plan depends still on the development of the outbreak in the two countries.

Austria is the first neighboring country that has such an agreement with the Czech Republic. Petricek said the Czechs hope that another neighbor, Slovakia will join the two countries and reopen the borders with them by the same date.

More talks with Slovakia and with other neighboring countries, including Germany and Poland on the issue are yet to be held.

Polish airline continues ban on international flights

WARSAW, Poland — Poland’s national carrier PLL LOT says it is extending its ban on international flights for two more weeks, until June 14, but is resuming some domestic flights June 1.

The airline says on Twitter the ”current pandemic situation and the continuing lockdown of borders in many countries” was behind the decision to ground international flights for 14 more days.

Domestic daily flights will resume June 1 between cities with a “stable epidemiology situation,” and will link Warsaw with Gdansk, Krakow, Wroclaw, Poznan, Szczecin Rzeszow and Zielona Gora. There will also be a daily flight between Krakow and Gdansk.

LOT says for security reasons, the passengers will be obliged to wear masks during the flight, the crew will be wearing masks and gloves, and snacks will be served in individual packages. The aircraft have been equipped with High Efficiency Particulate-Air filters and will be disinfected on a regular basis.

In line with recommendations from international flight authorities, passengers will have their temperature taken upon entering terminals and will be obliged to keep social distancing in the terminal and during boarding. Shops and boutiques will remain closed. Online check-in is expected to be made obligatory.

China says it supports probe of global response, eventually

BEIJING — China supports an eventual review of the global response to the coronavirus pandemic, but not an immediate probe as Australia and others have proposed.

China had long rejected the idea of an investigation into the origins and response to the pandemic but its attitude appeared to soften at the World Health Assembly on Monday.

On Tuesday, foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian says Chinese would agree to a probe “after the global epidemic is under control, summing up experience and making up for deficiencies.” The U.N.’s World Health Association should lead that work with a “scientific and professional attitude … in the principle of objectivity and fairness.”

He rejected Australia’s call for an independent body to launch the inquiry following complaints the WHO has shown favoritism toward China.

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