【常速英语广播5分钟】2020-04-05

VOA NEWS

April 5, 2020

This is VOA news. Reporting via remote, I'm David Byrd.

President Donald Trump on Saturday returned to the idea of opening up the country's economy as soon as possible even as he said the United States was heading into what could be its "toughest" weeks of the coronavirus outbreak.

Just days after extending tough national guidelines through the end of April and staring down historic levels of unemployment and economic standstill, the president said that the shutdown of the country cannot be allowed to go on forever.

"We don't wanna be doing this for months and months and months. We're gonna open our country again. This country wasn't meant for this. Few were. Few were. But we have to open our country again."

The president initially had suggested the country could be open by next Sunday. But he pulled back seeing projections of a staggering death toll even if restrictive measures are in place.

White House medical experts have forecast that between 100,000 and 240,000 Americans could be killed in the pandemic even if sweeping orders to stay home are followed.

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says Canada won't bring retaliatory or punitive measures in response to the Trump administration's announcement that it plans to block the export of N95 protective masks and surgical gloves that are in short supply. AP's Ben Thomas reports.

"We are not looking at retaliatory measures ...."

Prime Minister Justin Trudeau says his government is having "constructive discussions" with people at various levels of the Trump administration.

Trudeau expects to speak to President Trump in the coming days. The message: "The U.S. would be hurting itself as much as Canada will be hurting ...."

Ben Thomas, Washington.

For more on these stories and the rest of the day's news, visit our website voanews.com. This is VOA news.

Coronavirus has changed CN's Tomb-Sweeping Festival this year, above all in the city of WH. Usually millions of families travel to tend to ancestral graves, but on Saturday, cemetery workers performed those rites. Reuters' Lucy Fielder reports.

Normally millions of families go to ancestral graves to offer flowers and burn incense for the day also known as Qingming.

Prevented from traveling, this couple burned joss paper on the sidewalk within their housing compound to commemorate health workers who gave their lives in WH where the outbreak began, as well as their ancestors.

"We commemorate the white shirts, the white shirts who were fighting at the frontline. It's an honorable courtesy. There was a nurse who died and she was quite young, she was 29 years old. We should commemorate her. When we commemorate her I need to pray twice. This is what I did."

CN's authorities have told residents to watch cemetery staff perform rites via online streaming.

That's Reuters' Lucy Fielder reporting.

The spread of the new coronavirus is bringing big changes to the business and shopping environment. AP correspondent Jackie Quinn reports.

Walmart has announced new social distancing guidelines. The world's largest retailer will be setting up lines for customers to ensure there are no more than five customers for every 1,000 square for the store.

Craft store, Hobby Lobby, is bowing to pressure and closing its stores.

Several major U.S. airlines have filed for a federal relief grant. Air travel measured Thursday is 90 percent lower than the same time last year.

Even Corona Beer is being shut down by the new coronavirus. Most breweries in Mexico suspended operations. But in the U.S., gun sales are up - 85 percent higher than this time last year.

I'm Jackie Quinn.

At least 19 people have died in a shootout between suspected gangsters in the northern Mexican state of Chihuahua.

Local authorities found the bodies of 18 people on Friday at the site of the gunfight in the municipality of Madera. A wounded man picked up at the scene later died of his injuries.

Authorities say they secured 18 long firearms, two vehicles and two grenades, adding that the search for armed men and the investigation of the site was continuing.

On Friday, Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador said violence among criminal groups has persisted despite the outbreak of the new coronavirus in Mexico.

For more, visit voanews.com. Reporting via remote, I'm David Byrd, VOA news.