Pandemic puts tulips, bluebells, cherry blossoms in hiding

April 20, 2021

HALLE, Belgium (AP) — There is no stopping flowers when they bloom, blossoms when they burst. Unfortunately, people have been stopped from enjoying them these days. In pandemic times, when so much goes against the grain, some beauties of nature are no longer embraced but kept at bay.

From Japan's cherry blossom trees, to the endless Keukenhof tulip fields in the Netherlands, to the riot of purple bluebells in the Hallerbos south of Brussels, everything looks its best this spring when conditions are at its worst.

“The flowers are there. Nature refuses to be stopped by anyone," said Halle mayor Marc Snoeck, who for the second year in a row needs to keep people away from the municipality's famed woods instead of inviting them in.

Across the world, authorities are seeking to stave off a new surge of COVID-19 infections to contain a death toll which already exceeds 3 million. Crowds are anathema to health. Yet at the same time, the soothing glories of nature are said to be an ideal balm against the psychological burdens of loneliness, disorientation and fear that the pandemic has wrought.

When those two concepts clash however, caution beats joy by a long stretch these days. “The weather is great and there is beauty to enjoy,” Snoeck said. “But on the other hand we have to watch it. Safety trumps everything. And even though it is good to enjoy this nice time and the beauty of the purple bluebells, we absolutely don’t want anyone to get sick.”

Normally, more than 100,000 visitors spread over three weekends come to gaze at Halle’s fields of purple. Last spring, when Europe was already grappling with the first surge of infections, Snoeck already closed off the woods as much as possible.

Since it is an open forest, a full ban is out of the question, so Snoeck has canceled special bus shuttles, and issued parking bans to discourage people from coming. “If they all had to show up in these three weekends, then there really would be too many people and safe distancing couldn't be respected. Not everyone wears a mask at a moment like this, and it is of course necessary,” Snoeck said.

Keeping the masses away is a counterintuitive reaction seen in many places. For Snoeck and the Hallerbos, it is easy, even though tourism income hurts badly. With the bluebells, nature gives and little needs to be done but enjoy.

For the Keukenhof tulip fields 300 milometers (180 miles) north of Halle though, the tulip fields are very much a man-made creation with planting starting already in September. Two years ago, 1.5 million people visit in its eight-week run, but now, it took a special anti-virus pilot scheme to allow just a few thousands in on the rescheduled opening day.

"Every year we make the most beautiful possible Keukenhof. We don’t think about visitors not coming. We always do it for visitors — if necessary. digitally — but there’s nothing better than having visitors,” Keukenhof gardening foreman Stefan Slobbe said.

Like Belgium, the Netherlands is struggling to stifle a third surge of COVID-19 and is still limiting public events, while the whole process of blooming and wilting takes no heed. It was no different in Japan when the cherry blossoms were in full bloom last month. The blossoms, known as sakura, have deeply influenced Japanese culture for centuries and regularly been used in poetry and literature with their fragility seen as a symbol of life, death and rebirth.

Yet, this year, like last year too, the pandemic had its impact. “Please refrain from gathering to enjoy the cherry blossoms," signs in Tokyo said, putting a dampener on the usually exuberant atmosphere.

Some, however, couldn't be restrained. “Last year I couldn’t come here due to the state of emergency. This year I wanted to come again, so here I am,” 21-year-old university student Miyu Obata said.

The lack of mass tourism flocking to the Hallerbos will have its beneficial side too. Any flower that gets trampled won't reshoot the year after, Snoeck said. So once the pandemic is contained, the bluebell fields might even look better.

“Fewer visitors will make nature even more beautiful," Snoeck said.

Mark Carlson and Virginia Mayo in Halle, and Mike Corder and Peter Dejong in Lisse, Netherlands, contributed to this report.

Pubs, hairdressers set to reopen as UK eases virus lockdown

April 11, 2021

LONDON (AP) — Millions of people in Britain will get their first chance in months for haircuts, casual shopping and restaurant meals on Monday, as the government takes the next step on its lockdown-lifting road map.

Nationwide restrictions have been in place in England since early January, and similar rules in the other parts of the U.K., to suppress a surge in coronavirus infections that swept the country late last year, linked to a more transmissible new variant first identified in southeast England.

Britain has had Europe’s worst coronavirus outbreak, with more than 127,000 confirmed deaths. Infections, hospitalizations and deaths have all fallen thanks to the lockdown, and a mass vaccination program that has given at least one dose to more than 60% of the adult population.

But Prime Minister Boris Johnson and epidemiologists have urged caution, saying that many people remain unvaccinated and relaxing social distancing rules or allowing foreign holidays this summer could bring a new spike in infections.

“The situation in the U.K. is becoming clear and is stabilizing, but people have to remember that’s not the case elsewhere,” said Peter Horby, who chairs the government’s New and Emerging Respiratory Threats Advisory Group. “The pandemic is still raging globally.

“And many countries in Europe even are still seeing racing case numbers or having to reintroduce lockdowns. So it’s very hard to predict what will happen in the next couple of months,” he told Times Radio.

On Monday, nonessential shops will be allowed to reopen, along with hair salons, gyms and outdoor service at pubs and restaurants. The prime minister had promised to visit a pub for a pint to mark the occasion, but postponed the celebratory drink after the death of Prince Philip, husband of Queen Elizabeth II, on Friday.

Indoor drinking and dining won’t be allowed until May 17 at the earliest, and theaters, cinemas, nightclubs and most other venues remain closed, while indoor socializing is tightly restricted and foreign holidays remain banned.

The easing is good news for retail and hospitality businesses, which have endured several stretches of lockdown over the past year. But it’s a long way from business as usual; the British Beer and Pub Association estimates that just 40% of pubs in England have the space to reopen for outdoor service.

The rules apply in England. The other parts of the United Kingdom — Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland — are following their own, broadly similar plans.

Marchers protest Romania's virus restrictions as cases soar

April 11, 2021

BUCHAREST (AP) — Marchers took to the streets Saturday in the Romanian capital of Bucharest to protest restrictive measures to fight the spread of COVID-19 even as new daily infections and deaths rose in the European Union nation.

About 1,000 people converged on Victory Square and University Square, expressing frustration with an earlier curfew and shop closures that took effect at the end of March. Many demonstrators waved tri-color Romanian flags and chanted “Freedom!” and “Down with the government!”

“We came to fight against this state of alert that buries all our rights and freedoms,” Dumitru Balan, leader of the civic movement Action for the Nation, told The Associated Press. “We do not agree with compulsory vaccination, with wearing a mask on our faces … the quarantine of cities, online schooling, the closure of churches, playgrounds, restaurants and shops," he said.

Romania does not have compulsory vaccinations. The protest was held on the same day that Romania passed the milestone of having 1 million confirmed COVID-19 cases. Hospital intensive care units are struggling to cope with the record demand of just under 1,500 COVID-19 patients and 12,000 others are in other wards.

“There are now very severe patients admitted in our clinical ward that normally would require intensive care … we don’t have enough ICU beds available and patients are waiting with sub-optimal care,” Dragos Zaharia, a pneumologist at Marius Nasta Institute, told the AP. “We are at risk of being accused of malpractice."

The protesters halted outside Cotroceni Palace, where President Klaus Iohannis resides, and called for an early election. “I think Romania has a perfect storm of conditions that create this climate of anti-restriction protests,” Dani Sandu, a sociologist affiliated with the European University Institute, told the AP. “Romania is a society with low levels of trust in public institutions."

On Friday evening, authorities transferred patients in the middle of the night from Bucharest’s Foisor Orthopedic Hospital to other facilities as it was turned into a COVID-19 hospital. An official from the governing National Liberal Party, Ben Oni Ardelean, called the situation a “circus” and said he will urge that Health Minister Vlad Voiculescu be fired.

Romania has recorded 25,006 deaths in the pandemic.

Nicolae Dumitrache in Bucharest contributed to this report.

Bouquet-bearing public honors Philip, ignoring COVID warning

April 10, 2021

LONDON (AP) — British authorities have implored people to stay away from royal palaces as they mourn the death of Prince Philip in this time of COVID-19, but they keep coming. Not just to honor him, but to support Queen Elizabeth II, who lost her husband of 73 years.

The mix included children, seniors, Sikhs and the children of African immigrants. A cross-section of British society and admirers from abroad descended on Buckingham Palace and Windsor Castle on Saturday. They laid bouquets at the gates, offered prayers or just paused for a moment of reflection as they remembered a man who dedicated much of his life to public service.

Mourners talked about Philip’s work with some 780 charities and organizations, particularly his Duke of Edinburgh Award, which seeks to build confidence and resilience in young people. But they also recalled his role as the consummate royal consort, supporting the queen at thousands of public engagements and state visits.

“We had a really hard year all of us and there’s people uniting in a very special moment,'' said Carolina Przeniewska, originally from Poland, who came to Buckingham Place with her 5-year-old daughter Grace. “So I wanted her to see it and I wanted to pay respect.”

At Buckingham Palace, the queen’s London residence, well-wishers braved a chilly, gray day to line up and snake their way past the black iron gates, where tourists normally wait to watch the changing of the guard. People were allowed to approach the gates one at a time to lay their tributes as police tried to control the crowd amid Britain's coronavirus restrictions.

The crowd was smaller at Windsor Castle, west of the capital, where a steady stream of mourners quietly approached the gates to leave bright spring bouquets on a strip of lawn. People want to show their respect for both Philip and the queen, who turns 95 this month and will celebrate 70 years on the throne next year, said Nick Bullen, the co-founder and editor-in-chief of True Royalty TV.

“If the queen wasn’t already loved enough, this is just going to move it to another level now,’’ Bullen said. “This is a woman who’s going to bury her husband and then in a matter of days later be celebrating her birthday and stepping into her platinum jubilee year. … So I think people will just be rallying around the queen as much as they will the Duke of Edinburgh.”

Philip, the son of a Greek prince, and the future queen first met as teenagers. They were married in 1947 when she was 21 and he was a 26-year-old naval officer. Elizabeth became queen when her father died in 1952. At her coronation, Philip swore to be his wife’s “liege man of life and limb” and settled into a life of supporting the monarch.

Philip retired from public life in 2017. At the time, he had conducted more than 22,000 public engagements on his own, given 5,496 speeches and made 637 solo trips abroad, in addition to countless more appearances by the queen’s side.

“He was a hero to me because he was the man I could look up to,” Nurtr Omar, a 20-year-old who was born in Somalia and now lives in Britain, said outside Buckingham Palace. “He showed me what I can achieve with my life, whether you are royal or not. You need to make hard work to achieve what you want to.”

The floral tributes grew throughout the day, even after the Royal Family on Friday asked people not to visit royal residences to pay their respects due to public health concerns. Instead of flowers, the family asked people to consider making donations to charity.

But for Windsor resident Billy Dohil, the day was about history. He took his children to the castle so they could be part of it. “As they grow up, we’ll remember this,” Dohil, 39, said. “We’ll remember the royal family and (it) will be part of their life. So we wanted to come here to pay our respects. My oldest son — five years old — wanted to bring some flowers and just put it down himself.’’

Associated Press Writers James Brooks and Tom Rayner contributed.

Visitors tiptoe through the tulips in Dutch virus test

April 09, 2021

LISSE, Netherlands (AP) — Finally, after bleak winter months of a coronavirus lockdown, springtime shoots of hope emerged Friday as restrictions were relaxed at a Dutch flower garden and other public venues.

Under a government-approved pilot scheme, the world-famous Keukenhof garden opened its gates to let a few thousand people tiptoe through the 7 million tulips, hyacinths, daffodils and myriad other flowers meticulously hand-planted throughout its manicured lawns by a small army of gardeners.

A maximum of 5,000 visitors were allowed into the garden, nestled amid the pancake flat bulb fields between Amsterdam and The Hague, if they could show proof that they had just tested negative for COVID-19.

Minke Kleinen, who visited the central city of Arnhem with her friend Ilse van Egten, said it felt like their “first legal day out.” The friends took rapid tests before setting off and got their negative results by email as they drove.

“It feels strange that we can stand next to one another," said Van Egten, giving Kleinen a quick hug. "It’s nice!” The Keukenhof lost an entire season last year to the pandemic as the first deadly wave of infections swept over the Netherlands. Its scheduled March 20 opening this year never happened because of the country's strict virus lockdown.

The limited opening — six days spread over two weeks in April — is welcome to the 40 gardeners who spend months preparing for the annual spring season. In a normal year, the garden the size of 50 soccer fields can accommodate 10 times as many visitors each day.

Park director Bart Siemerink had mixed feelings. “Of course, happy today. It's the first day of Keukenhof 2021," he said, but added that the park still felt different with such a relatively small number of visitors.

"So it’s a good feeling that we can open, but this is not Keukenhof as it’s supposed to be,” he said. In pre-pandemic years, Keukenhof's paths, park benches and cafes are crowded with visitors from around the world taking photos and selfies with one of the Netherlands' most iconic products — the tulip.

On Friday, small groups of visitors were scattered around the lawns. You could get a plate of poffertjes — a Dutch treat of tiny pancakes covered in icing sugar — without having to wait in a long line.

The Dutch government announced this week that hundreds of public venues would be allowed to reopen under strict conditions to evaluate whether rapid testing can safely help the country ease coronavirus restrictions amid rising levels of vaccinations and warmer weather.

Under the scheme, visitors to the Keukenhof — as well as museums, zoos and other venues — are allowed entry if they order a ticket online and get a negative virus test within 40 hours of their visit. All virus tests are free and a result is emailed within an hour to the tested person. That code, in turn, can be scanned at venues.

The tests come against a backdrop of stubbornly high infections that have begun edging lower in the past week after months of lockdown. Health Minister Hugo de Jonge sees the limited openings as a way of easing back toward normal life as vaccinations reach more and more people.

Visiting the Keukenhof felt like a privilege for those who got in. “This is a gift,” said blogger Berry de Nijs. “It feels great today. It is beautiful weather anyway ... but to walk through the tulips is fantastic!”.

No region in the world spared as virus cases, deaths surge

April 09, 2021

WARSAW, Poland (AP) — Hospitals in Turkey and Poland are filling up fast. Pakistan is restricting domestic travel to bring a surge in coronavirus infections under control. Even Thailand, which has weathered the coronavirus pandemic far better than many nations, is now struggling to contain a new COVID-19 surge.

Even countries where vaccine rollouts are finally getting some momentum, infections, hospitalizations and deaths are surging. And that leaves even bleaker prospects for much of the world, where largescale vaccination programs remain a more distant prospect.

The World Health Organization said Friday that it's very concerned as infection rates are rising in all of the world's regions, driven by new virus variants and too many nations and people coming out of lockdown too soon.

“We’ve seen rises (in cases) worldwide for six weeks. And now, sadly, we are seeing rises in deaths for the last three weeks," Dr. Margaret Harris, a spokeswoman for the World Health Organization, said at a briefing in Geneva.

In its latest weekly epidemiological update, WHO said new COVID-19 cases rose for a sixth consecutive week, with over 4 million reported in the last week. New deaths increased by 11% compared to last week, with over 71 000 reported.

Turkey is among the badly hit countries, with most new cases of the virus traced to a variant first found in Britain. Ismail Cinel, head of the Turkish Intensive Care Association, said said ICU units were not yet at full capacity, but that the surge was beginning to strain the nation's relatively advanced health care system.

“Every single day the number of cases is increasing. Every single day the number of deaths is increasing. The alarm bells are ringing for the intensive care units,” Cinel said. “The mutant form of the virus is causing more harm to the organs,” he said. “While two out of ten patients were dying previously, the number is now four out of 10. And if we continue this way, we will lose six.”

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan eased COVID-19 restrictions in early March, keen to minimize pain to his nation's ailing economy. Yet with this new spike, he was forced to announce renewed restrictions, such as weekend lockdowns and the closure of cafes and restaurants during Ramadan, which starts on April 13.

Turkish medical groups say the reopening in March was premature and that the new measures won’t go far enough to curb the surge. They have been calling for full lockdowns during the holy Muslim month.

In Iran, the death toll is also rising, prompting new restrictions that will take effect for 10 days in 257 cities beginning Saturday. They involve the closure of all parks, restaurants, confectionaries, beauty salons, malls and bookstores.

Authorities in Pakistan, which is in the middle of a third surge of infections, are restricting inter-city transportation on weekends starting at midnight Friday as part of measures aimed at limiting coronavirus cases and deaths.

And elsewhere in Asia, authorities in Thailand on Friday ordered new restrictions in an effort to contain a growing coronavirus outbreak just days before the country’s traditional Songkran New Year’s holiday, when millions of people travel.

Japan, meanwhile, announced tougher measures ahead of the Summer Olympics. The only exceptions to the deteriorating situation are those countries that have advanced vaccination programs, mostly notably Israel and Britain. Even the U.S., which is a vaccination leader globally, is seeing a small uptick in new cases.

In Germany, Poland and other countries in the 27-member European Union, vaccination programs are finally ramping up after a very slow start in the first three months of the year due to delivery shortages.

In Germany, thousands of doctors’ practices joined the vaccination campaign this week. That helped Germany reach its second consecutive daily record on Thursday of 719,927 doses administered -- meaning that 14.7% of the population has now received at least one dose and 5.8% have received both shots.

Yet German health officials are warning of a steep rise in intensive care patients and are calling for stronger action to contain coronavirus infections. Lothar Wieler, the head of Germany’s disease control center, the Robert Koch Institute, said Friday that “intensive care units are filling up fast” across the country. He said nearly 4,500 COVID-19 patients are receiving intensive care, with the number increasing by 700 over the past week — a 20% rise.

Neighboring Poland is also seeing a dramatic spike in deaths, and hospitals have been forced to turn away cancer and other patients as ICU and other hospital beds are taken by COVID-19 patients. Hospitalizations of virus patients there have jumped 20% in the past two weeks.

Harris, from the WHO, says the world knows how to fight these surges. She said good news was coming out of the U.K. — which saw new coronavirus cases drop 60% in March amid a strong vaccination program — “that indeed the vaccination programs have averted very large numbers of deaths. But we have to do it all.”

“We have to keep on social distancing. We have to avoid indoor crowded settings. We have to keep wearing the masks, even if vaccinated," she said. “People are misunderstanding, seeming to think that vaccination will stop transmission. That is not the case. We need to bring down the transmission while giving the vaccination the chance to stop the severe disease.”

Associated Press writers from around the world contributed to this report.

Czechs partially ease lockdown; kids to return to school

April 06, 2021

PRAGUE (AP) — The Czech government on Tuesday approved the first easing of its tight lockdown in one of the European Union's hardest-hit countries, allowing at least some children to return to school.

“It’s not a full relaxation,” Health Minister Jan Blatny said. “The situation hasn't been ideal yet." Starting Monday, people in the Czech Republic will be allowed again to travel to other counties and the night-time curfew will end. The measures took effect at the beginning of March as the Central European nation was desperate to slow down the spread of a highly contagious virus variant first found in Britain.

With numbers of hospitalized COVID-19 patients on the decline, the Czechs have offered to treat patients from other European countries where infections have been on the rise, Blatny said, offering up to 50 beds.

The number of COVID-19 patients in Czech hospitals dropped to 5,700 on Monday, down from 9,500 a month ago. A month ago, European countries — including Germany, Switzerland, Austria, Poland and Hungary — offered similar help to the then-struggling Czech health system.

Despite the recent decline, the Czech Republic still has the highest number of cumulative deaths (252.7) per 100,000 people in the world and the third-highest number of cumulative cases (14,509.5) again per 100,000, according to Johns Hopkins University.

The nation of 10.7 million has 1.56 million confirmed cases with over 27,000 deaths. Education Minister Robert Plaga said the children up to the fifth grade will be back at schools on Monday under strict conditions “to make their return safe and permanent.”

All will have to wear face masks and will be tested twice a week, Plaga said. To start, students will return on a rotating basis, in school one week and distance learning the next. Stores selling children's clothes and shoes, laundries, outdoor farmers' markets, zoos, botanical gardens and some other stores will be allowed to reopen Monday.

An advisory group of scientists at the Health Ministry cautiously agreed with the careful school reopening but said the situation still “hasn’t been good despite the gradual decline (of infections).” But it was not consulted on many other easing measures.

Epidemiologist Rastislav Madar, a member of the group, told the Czech public radio that the relaxed measures pose a risk because “the numbers (of infections) are still too high.”