This is CNBC’s live blog covering all the latest news on the coronavirus outbreak. This blog will be updated throughout the day as the news breaks.
- Global cases: More than 1.97 million
- Global deaths: At least 125,678
- Most cases reported: United States (602,989), Spain (172,541), Italy (162,488), France (131,361), Germany (131,359)
The data above was compiled by Johns Hopkins University as of 7:43 a.m. Beijing time.
All times below are in Beijing time.
8:27 am: Major League Baseball will conduct the country’s largest coronavirus antibody test on employees
Major League Baseball says 27 teams will participate in an antibody testing study with Stanford University and the University of Southern California.
The test used in the study is not diagnostic and not the same test used in healthcare settings to identify the presence of the virus. Rather, it measures whether people have been exposed. The study will use rapid antibody tests, the league confirmed to CNBC. The Athletic previously reported that 10,000 employees from those teams have volunteered to participate.
The goal of the study is to get a sense of the prevalence of Covid-19 infections among the U.S. population in hopes of helping researchers figure out how many people might have been exposed but suffered no symptoms. That information could help public officials determine when it’s safe to ease up on restrictions meant to curb the spread of the pandemic. — Jennifer Elias
7:37 am: Global reported death toll over 125,600
At least 125,678 people around the world have succumbed to the coronavirus that was first reported in the Chinese city of Wuhan late last year. That’s according to the latest information from Johns Hopkins University.
A man wearing a face mask and gloves walks past a mural in the village of Bueu, northwestern Spain, on April 2, 2020 amid a national lockdown to fight the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus.
Miguel Riopa | AFP | Getty Images
Hopkins data also showed the virus has infected more than 1.97 million people. The United States has the highest number of cases, with more than 600,000 patients.
Spain, Italy, France and Germany, with at least 130,000 cases in each of the European countries. The United Kingdom also reported a high number of cases — with reported cases climbing to over 94,000 and fatalities topping 12,100. — Saheli Roy Choudhury
7:24 am: Singapore reports more than 300 cases for second consecutive day
Singapore’s health ministry said as of 14 April noon, there were 334 new confirmed cases of Covid-19. Many of them are linked to infection clusters in dormitories that house foreign workers.
The inhabitants of those dormitories are typically men from other Asian countries who carry out labor-intensive construction jobs in order to support their families back home.
The city-state reported its highest single-day jump in cases a day earlier when there were 386 additional cases.
There have been 3,252 confirmed cases since the start of the outbreak; 611 patients have been cured and discharged from hospitals and community isolation facilities and 10 people in Singapore have succumbed to the illness. — Saheli Roy Choudhury, Ted Kemp
All times below are in Eastern time.
7:08 pm: Trump says some state economies may open for business by May 1
President Donald Trump said that he believes some states will be able to lift the strict social distancing measures that have strained their economies before the end of April.
“The plans to reopen the country are close to being finalized,” Trump said at a press briefing on the virus in the Rose Garden.
“I will be speaking to all 50 governors very shortly,” Trump said, “And I will then be authorizing each individual governor of each individual state to implement a reopening and a very powerful reopening plan of their state at a time and in a manner as most appropriate.”
“The day will be very close because certain states as you know are in a much different condition and are in a much different place than other states. It’s going to be very very close. Maybe even before the date of May 1st,” he said. — Kevin Breuninger
6:34 pm: Trump calls for halt to US funding for World Health Organization amid coronavirus outbreak
President Donald Trump addresses the daily coronavirus task force briefing in the Rose Garden at the White House in Washington, April 14, 2020.
Leah Millis | Reuters
The Trump administration will halt funding to the World Health Organization as it evaluates the agency’s “role in severely mismanaging” the coronavirus pandemic, President Donald Trump announced.
“Today I’m instructing my administration to halt funding of the World Health Organization while a review is conducted to assess the World Health Organization’s role in severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of the coronavirus,” Trump said at a press conference.
Trump criticized the international agency’s response to the outbreak, saying “one of the most dangerous and costly decisions from the WHO was its disastrous decision to oppose travel restrictions from China and other nations.” — Berkeley Lovelace Jr., Noah Higgins-Dunn
