The Latest: City using drones to prevent public gatherings

The Latest on the coronavirus pandemic. The new coronavirus causes mild or moderate symptoms for most people. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness or death.

TOP OF THE HOUR:

— Spain records its highest number of new deaths from virus.

— Lithuania’s capital begins using drones to monitor public places.

— Italy holds minute of silence.

— Dubai to inject equity into Emirates airlines.

___

VILNIUS, Lithuania — The Vilnius municipality says it has started a pilot initiative where drones are patrolling the skies over the Lithuanian capital as authorities try to prevent citizens from gathering in public.

IT adviser to the municipality Egle Radvilaite said that seven unmanned aerial vehicles equipped with loudspeakers were launched Monday and dozens more are expected to join this enforcement task shortly.

The drones are operating daily from 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. in parks, squares and other places where people tend to gather. Two weeks ago, Lithuania gradually imposed restrictions due to the coronavirus, banning, among others, crowds of more than five people.

___

WARSAW, Poland — Poland’s government is further restricting regulations in an effort to slow the spread of the coronavirus because too many people are failing to practice the required social distancing and the number of infections is rising.

In announcing the new measures on Tuesday, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said that too many people were seen out in public spaces on a weekend that saw warm, springlike weather. The number of infections is still lower than in western Europe but is growing, with 2,132 infections and 31 confirmed deaths as of Tuesday.

Among the new rules which take effect at midnight, people will not be allowed to walk in parks anymore, only three people will be allowed per cash register in shops at any given time and home improvement stores will be closed, leaving only food shops and pharmacies allowed to operate.

“We must further reduce social distancing,” Morawiecki said. “Let’s stay home and avoid contact with other people.”

___

ROME — Italy has observed a minute of silence and flown its flags at half-staff in a collective, nationwide gesture to honor the victims of the coronavirus and their families.

The Vatican also lowered its flags Tuesday to honor the dead in the country with the greatest toll from the virus, which stands at more than 11,500.

The noon minute of silence was observed in cities and towns around the country.

The office of Premier Giuseppe Conte said the gesture was a sign of national mourning and solidarity with the victims, their families “and as a sign of collective participation in mourning with the hardest-hit communities.”

___

BEIJING — Chinese officials say the coronavirus epidemic isn’t over in their country and that daunting challenges remain.

Foreign ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said Tuesday that authorities need to make sure that infected people arriving from abroad don’t spread the disease and start new outbreaks.

She hit back at U.S. criticism of her country’s handling of the epidemic, saying that China and the U.S. should work together to fight it.

“We also hope that some U.S. officials can follow through in the spirit of the two heads of states’ call and create more favorable conditions for the two countries to cooperate in the fight against the disease,” she said. The two leaders talked late last week.

Hua noted that some local Chinese governments and companies have provided virus-related medical supplies to the United States, even as the demand for those supplies remains high in China.

___

DUBAI, United Arab Emirates — Dubai’s government says it will inject equity into Emirates airlines as the Middle East’s largest carrier grounds nearly all of its flights due to coronavirus restrictions on travel at its hub in the world’s busiest airport for international travel.

Dubai’s Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum said in a statement Tuesday that liquidity would be given to the state-owned airline “considering its strategic importance” to Dubai and the economy of the United Arab Emirates, but he did not say how much credit would be pumped into the airline.

Emirates carried around 58 million passengers last year, helping to transform Dubai’s airport into the world’s busiest for international travel for several years running.

Also Tuesday, low-cost carrier flydubai became the latest airline to announce pay cuts of its staff of nearly 4,000, though not all staff are being affected the same.

The company told The Associated Press it was reducing salaries to between 25-50% for a three-month period starting in April.

___

MADRID — Spain recorded on Tuesday 849 new coronavirus deaths, the highest number since the pandemic hit the southern European country, according to the country’s health ministry.

With both new infections and deaths up around 11% each, to a total of 94,417 confirmed cases and 8,189 fatalities, Spain is seeing a slight rebound in the outbreak.

That’s despite an overall timid slowdown in its spread for the past week, allowing authorities to focus on avoiding the collapse of the health system. At least one third of Spain’s 17 regions were already at their limit of capacity in terms of intensive care unit usage, while new beds are being added in hotels, exhibition and sports centers across the country.

At least 14% of those infected are much needed medical personnel. Many of them lack proper protective gear.

The government also wants to cushion the social effects of a major economic slowdown. Spain is officially “hibernating,” with new measures halting all but essential economic activity coming into full force on Tuesday.

Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez’s left-wing Cabinet is expected to add a new 700-million-euro aid package, including zero interest loans, as well as suspend evictions for families who can’t afford to pay their home rent.

___

LONDON — More people with the new coronavirus have died in Britain than previously announced, according to newly published figures that include deaths both in and out of hospitals.

The Office for National Statistics says that 210 deaths recorded England and Wales up to March 20 mentioned COVID-19 on the death certificate. That is 40 more than the 170 deaths among people with the virus reported by the Department of Health for the same period.

The two sets of figures use different reporting methods and timing. The Department of Health statistics record hospital deaths. Tuesday’s higher figure includes people who died in nursing homes and other settings. Some of those are people who were not tested for the virus but were suspected of having it.

___

BERLIN — German zoos are asking the government for a 100 million-euro ($110 million) aid package to help cover costs as their revenue has fallen away due to the coronavirus crisis.

Germany has largely shut down public life and introduced a ban over a week ago on gatherings of more than two people in public. The restrictions are expected to remain in place until after Easter. An association representing 56 zoos wrote to Chancellor Angela Merkel, her finance and economy ministers as well as state governors on Tuesday.

The group’s chairman, Leipzig zoo director Joerg Junhold, said that “unlike other facilities, we cannot simply shut down our operations – our animals still have to be fed and cared for.”

With zoos closed to visitors, he said that “at the moment we are working without revenues but with expenses at a consistently high level.” He said that a big zoo currently has a weekly revenue shortfall of about 500,000 euros.

___

BRUSSELS — Belgian authorities say a 12-year-old girl has died of the coronavirus, by far the youngest person among the more than 700 victims in the country.

Announcing the news Tuesday, national crisis-center coronavirus spokesman Emmanuel Andre said it is “an emotionally difficult moment, because it involves a child, and it has also upset the medical and scientific community.”

“We are thinking of her family and friends. It is an event that is very rare, but one which upsets us greatly,” Andre said. No details about the girl were provided.

He said that 98 people had died from the disease over the last 24 hours, bringing the total toll to 705 in a country of around 11.5 million people. More than 12,705 cases have been confirmed in total so far.

Andre said that Belgian authorities expect the spread of the disease to reach its peak in coming days, and that “we will arrive at a point where we’re close to saturation point at our hospitals.”

___

MOSCOW — Russia registered 500 confirmed cases of the new coronavirus on Tuesday in the biggest spike since the beginning of the outbreak that brought the country’s total to 2,337 cases.

The report comes as Russia edges closer to declaring a state of emergency, with many regions and cities ordering lockdowns and sweeping self-isolation protocols.

Moscow, the country’s capital, has been on lockdown since Monday, with most businesses closed and residents not allowed to leave their apartments except for grocery shopping, buying medicines, taking out trash or walking their dogs. Similar regimes are in place in more than 30 Russian regions.

Human rights advocates and lawyers in Russia argue that, in accordance with the Russian legislation, such lockdowns can’t be legally enforced until the state of emergency is declared by the president. The Kremlin has so far said that Moscow authorities have been within their rights to impose a lockdown.

On Tuesday, the State Duma, Russia’s lower parliament house, hastily adopted a law allowing the Cabinet to declare the state of emergency, rubber-stamping it through all three required readings in one day.

___

BEIJING — China will delay the national college entrance exam by a month to ensure the health of students and allow more time for them to prepare, the education ministry announced Tuesday.

Amid sharply declining numbers of virus cases, the hugely important exam will now be held on July 7 and 8. However, the capital Beijing and hardest-hit Hubei Province “can put forward their proposals on the exam dates for their regions” and publish the schedule after gaining approval from the ministry, the announcement said.

More than 10 million students plan to take the exam this year. Schools in some regions have begun to reopen, although ministry officials say the restart of classes will happen gradually, under tight hygienic conditions and only in areas where the threat of the virus is lowest.

China “has passed through the most dangerous, most critical stage of the crisis,” but can’t afford to let its guard down, Ma Xiaowei, director of the National Health Commission, told reporters at a separate news conference Tuesday.

___

Follow AP news coverage of the coronavirus pandemic at https://apnews.com/VirusOutbreak and https://apnews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak