US President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump played host Sunday to hundreds of superheroes, unicorns, skeletons and even a miniature version of themselves as part of a Halloween celebration at the White House.
From AP: In years past, the president and first lady personally handed out candy to the costume-clad kids. This year, the treats were provided separately as participants walked along a path on the South Lawn.
The kids still briefly met the president and first lady, who waved and offered words of encouragement from a safe distance about how much they liked the costumes. Trump and the first lady have both recently recovered from Covid-19.
Trump was particularly pleased with a young boy with a distinctly Trump head of hair and a partner who did her best Mrs. Trump impersonation. The president motioned for them to turn and pose for the cameras, and they happily agreed.
The spooky celebration was changed up a bit as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. Guests older than 2 were required to wear face coverings and practice social distancing. The same went for all White House personnel working the event, while any staff giving out candy also wore gloves.
Updated
China reports 161 new asymptomatic cases
China reported 20 new confirmed and 161 new asymptomatic Covid-19 cases on 25 October, the national health authority said on Monday, following a surge in symptomless infections in the northwestern Xinjiang region.
The National Health Commission said in a statement that all new confirmed cases were imported infections originating from overseas. Of the 161 new symptomless infections, which China does not classify as confirmed cases, 138 were locally transmitted. It did not clarify how many of the infections occured in Xinjiang.
Kashgar in Xinjiang region on Saturday started testing its 4.75 million people after detecting an asymptomatic patient at a garment factory. Another 137 asymptomatic cases have been reported on25 October due to the tests being conducted.
A total of 85,810 confirmed Covid-19 cases have been reported in mainland China to date, while the death toll remains unchanged at 4,634.
Updated
The global aerospace industry has endured its worst quarter ever with record low orders for new aircraft and 12,000 UK jobs already lost or at risk because of the collapse in travel caused by the coronavirus pandemic.
Aircraft manufacturers received only 13 orders in July and August, according to the aerospace and defence lobby group ADS. No orders were placed in September. That compares with 152 in the same period in 2019.
More than a 10th of the jobs in the UK’s aerospace industry could go as the plane manufacturers Airbus and Boeing and their suppliers adjust to lower demand, according to separate figures shown to the Guardian.
At least 12,000 aerospace workers are either being made redundant or are at risk of losing their jobs, according to legally required notices of possible redundancies received by the Unite union. There were 111,000 workers in the aerospace manufacturing and maintenance sectors in 2019, according to ADS:
Five aides to US Vice President Mike Pence test positive
The coronavirus pandemic continues to ravage the White House itself, with the chief of staff to Mike Pence and four others in the vice-president’s inner circle having tested positive.
Despite Pence being exposed to the disease, he planned to continue an aggressive campaign schedule in the final nine days of the race. The vice-president was scheduled to hold a rally on Sunday afternoon in Kinston, North Carolina.
Such unbroken travel plans amounted to a breach of the recommendations of the Trump administration’s own public health agency, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). They would require the vice-president to be in quarantine for 14 days and always to wear a mask around other people. Pence has frequently been seen maskless in public.
Such blatant disregard for the administration’s own health standards is doubly awkward given that Pence has led the White House coronavirus taskforce since late February. Dr Anthony Fauci, the most senior public health expert on the taskforce, said on Friday meetings had dwindled and Trump had not attended one in months.
The White House said Pence was not required to follow the quarantine rule because he is deemed “essential personnelâ€. Asked why electioneering was classed “essentialâ€, Meadows said the-vice president continued to do his official work in between campaign stops.
Saskia Popescu, an infectious disease expert at George Mason University in Virginia, called Pence’s decision to travel “grossly negligentâ€:
US sees new case highs
A day after the US set a daily record for new coronavirus infections, it came very close to doing it again.
Data published by Johns Hopkins University showed that 83,718 new cases were reported nationally on Saturday, nearly matching the 83,757 reported on Friday. Before that, the most cases reported in the US on a single day was 77,362 on 16 July.
Close to 8.6 million Americans have contracted the coronavirus since the pandemic began, and about 225,000 have died. Both statistics are the world’s highest. India has more than 7.8m infections but its daily numbers have been declining.
The new figures came as the Trump administration made the extraordinary admission that it had abandoned all pretence of trying to conquer the crisis
“We are not going to control the pandemic,†Mark Meadows, the White House chief of staff, said on CNN’s State of the Union. “We are going to control the fact that we get vaccines, therapeutics and other mitigation areasâ€:
