Paris, March 31 (AFP/APP): Harsh lockdowns aimed at halting the march of the coronavirus extended worldwide Monday as the death toll soared past 35,000 and new waves of US outbreaks pushed the nation’s containment efforts to the brink. Despite slivers of hope in stricken Italy and Spain, the tough measures that have confined some two-fifths of the globe’s population to their homes were broadened. Moscow and Lagos joined the roll call of cities around the globe with eerily empty streets, while Virginia, Maryland, and Kansas became the latest US states to announce emergency stay-at-home orders. The capital city of Washington followed suit. In a symbol of the scale of the challenge facing humanity, a US military medical ship sailed into New York to relieve the pressure on overwhelmed hospitals bracing for the peak of the pandemic. The number of confirmed COVID-19 cases around the world topped 750,000, with 413,000 of those in Europe, while most of the confirmed deaths are also from the continent, according to an AFP tally. World leaders — several of whom have been stricken or forced into isolation — are still grappling for ways to deal with a crisis that will have economic and social shockwaves … Continue reading Global lockdown tightens as virus deaths mount