Coronavirus complicates primary process as 3 states vote

WASHINGTON (AP) — The new coronavirus kept some voters and poll workers at home and hampered efforts to open some polling sites on Tuesday as three states held Democratic presidential primary contests amid a global pandemic.

Leaders in Ohio called off their primary just hours before polls were set to open as the federal government urged Americans not to gather in groups of 10 or more and asked older people to stay home. The state's Democratic Party said it was weighing options for challenging that move, which the Republican governor had pushed.

The move was so unprecedented that the chairman of the Democratic Party, Tom Perez, urged states to expand vote-by-mail, absentee balloting and polling station hours in an effort to keep the coronavirus from further disrupting the party’s presidential nominating process. He also criticized Ohio for spreading confusion by canceling voting just hours before it was supposed to begin on Tuesday.

It was the clearest indication yet that efforts to stop the spread of the virus could threaten to bring the primary to a near standstill in coming weeks, as many states push back their elections.

“The right to vote is the foundation of our democracy, and we must do everything we can to protect and expand that right instead of bringing our democratic process to a halt,” Perez said in a statement.

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Trump's economic aid could approach $1T, senators say

WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump is asking Congress to unleash a torrent of emergency economic aid — including direct checks to Americans — in an extraordinary effort to shore up households and the economy in the coronavirus crisis.

As part of a proposed economic rescue not seen since the Great Recession in 2008, Trump wants checks sent to the public within two weeks as part of a package that officials said could approach a cost of $1 trillion. Congressional leaders vowed swift action. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin appeared on Capitol Hill to brief Senate Republicans as state and local officials acted more forcefully to restrict gatherings and mobility in the face of growing sickness.

“We want to go big," Trump said at a White House briefing. “We want to get it done and have a big infusion.”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell promised the Senate would not adjourn until the package was passed.

“Obviously, we need to act,” McConnell said after meeting White House officials at the Capitol.

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Disruption grows: Nations try to slow virus, help economies

BERLIN (AP) — Mass disruptions cascaded around the world Tuesday as governments struggled to slow the spread of the coronavirus while also trying to keep their economies afloat. The chaos stretched from Lithuania, where border traffic jams were 40 miles deep, to Detroit, where bus service came to a sudden stop when drivers didn't show up for work.

European Union leaders, meanwhile, agreed to shut down the bloc's external borders for 30 days.

Increasingly worried about the economic fallout of the global shutdown, the U.S., Britain and the Netherlands also announced rescue packages totaling hundreds of billions of dollars, while Venezuela — long a fierce critic of the International Monetary Fund — asked the institution for a $5 billion loan.

But it was everyday people who suffered most.

Miguel Aguirre, his wife and two children were the only people on a normally bustling street near San Francisco's City Hall, one day after officials in six San Francisco Bay Area counties issued a “shelter-in-place” order that requires most residents to stay inside and venture out only for food, medicine or exercise for three weeks — the most sweeping lockdown in the U.S. against the outbreak. On Tuesday morning, only two coffee shops on the street were open. Both were empty.

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US life with COVID-19: A state-by-state patchwork of rules

As the nation struggles to reconcile itself to a new and spreading peril, it also struggles with a patchwork of rules that vary dizzyingly from place to place: For now, your life and lockdown in the shadow of COVID-19 depends on where you live.

In some places, many ordinary Americans are making public health choices, searching their own conscience and deciding for themselves what risk they’re willing to endure. In others, government has made at least some of those decisions.

Ohio canceled its presidential primary to avoid crowds, but the polls opened Tuesday morning in Florida, Illinois and Arizona. Bars in some states prepared for hordes of St. Patrick’s Day revelers, while elsewhere others are stacking the stools up on tables and locking the doors.

Casinos in some states have shut down, yet others remain open, where hundreds or even thousands of people touch the same slot machines and gambling chips. Spring breakers are partying by the hundreds on some beaches, while police are sweeping others, ordering people away through loud speakers.

The federal government on Monday urged Americans not to gather in groups of 10 or more and asked older people to stay home, as the number of infections in the U.S. climbed to more than 4,500, with at least 88 deaths. But hard rules have been left up to the states, creating what New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo derided as a “hodgepodge."

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Hospitals fear shortage of ventilators for virus patients

U.S. hospitals bracing for a possible onslaught of coronavirus patients with pneumonia and other breathing difficulties could face a critical shortage of mechanical ventilators and health care workers to operate them.

The Society of Critical Care Medicine has projected that 960,000 coronavirus patients in the U.S. may need to be put on ventilators at one point or another during the outbreak.

But the nation has only about 200,000 of the machines, by the organization's estimate, and around half are older models that may not be ideal for the most critically ill patients. Also, many ventilators are already being used by other patients with severe, non-coronavirus ailments.

Hospitals are rushing to rent more ventilators from medical-equipment suppliers. And manufacturers are ramping up production. But whether they can turn out enough of the machines at a time when countries around the world are clamoring for them, too, is unclear.

“The real issue is how to rapidly increase ventilator production when your need exceeds the supply,” Dr. Lewis Kaplan, president of the critical care society, said Tuesday. “For that I don’t have a very good answer.”

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Dear Corona Diary: German patient gives updates on Twitter

BERLIN (AP) — On the fifth day after she fell ill with COVID-19 respiratory disease, Karoline Preisler could breathe again without wincing through severe pain in her chest.

But the 48-year-old from a small town in northeastern Germany was still sick and very weak. She had slept only three hours the night before in a hospital isolation ward. She worried constantly about her husband and three children.

“I miss my children so badly. They miss me, and we all miss that we can’t hug each other anymore,” Preisler said in a phone interview on Monday.

Preisler, who practices law and is a local politician in the Baltic Sea town of Barth, started experiencing symptoms a few hours after she tested positive for the new coronavirus last week. Her husband, a federal lawmaker, had tested positive earlier and been told to remain isolated in Berlin, a 299-kilometer drive (186 miles) away,

The couple's 9-year-old twins and 11-year-old tested negative, but health authorities ordered the children quarantined at home with their mother. When Preisler's symptoms worsened and she needed to be hospitalized on Saturday, her husband was permitted to go back to Barth to care for the children.

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Ex-California Rep. Duncan Hunter gets 11 months in prison

SAN DIEGO (AP) — Former California Republican Rep. Duncan Hunter was sentenced Tuesday to 11 months in prison after pleading guilty to stealing campaign funds and spending the money on everything from outings with friends to his daughter's birthday party.

The ex-Marine's attorneys had asked for most or part of his sentence be spent in home confinement, citing his military service fighting the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and his nearly six terms in Congress. Hunter, 43, resigned from Congress in January after representing one of Southern California's last solidly Republican districts.

But U.S. District Court Judge Thomas J. Whelan said given the amount of money Hunter misspent and the number of years he carried out the pilfering, home confinement was not an option.

Prosecutors ahead of Tuesday's sentencing submitted 87 pages to the judge that showed a corrupt congressman who intentionally and repeatedly stole from his campaign funds for a decade.

“Today's sentence reinforces the notion that the truth still matters, that facts still matter,” Assistant U.S. Attorney Phil Halpern said after the hearing.

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When Irish eyes are absent: Virus subdues St. Patrick's Day

BOSTON (AP) — St. Patrick's Day revelers across the world tried to salvage the holiday with makeshift celebrations after parades and parties were scrapped and residents were urged to hunker down at home to slow the spread of the new coronavirus.

It was the first St. Patrick's Day in more than 250 years without a large parade in New York City, but a small group of organizers marched the rain-soaked streets early Tuesday anyway — observing "social distancing," they said — to keep the tradition alive.

Led by police cars with flashing lights, people in uniforms and sashes marched up Fifth Avenue before dawn with a banner and flags as bagpipe music played. The brief march wasn't advertised, and the sidewalks were largely empty.

In Savannah, Georgia, which canceled its hugely popular parade for the first time in 99 years, there were no bagpipers, no cheering crowds — just two men in green blazers carrying a large Irish flag as they trudged along largely abandoned sidewalks.

“It's really strange,” said Bill Bradley, carrying the flag on its long wooden pole. “It's almost like a dream, like living in some kind of nightmare.” Bradley and his friend John Lowenthal, members of one of Savannah's Irish social societies, opted to walk the parade route on their own.

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Spreading birthday card love in the time of coronavirus

NEW YORK (AP) — Mona Helgeland was sad for her children. Their birthdays were coming up but they were self-quarantined because of the coronavirus and going to miss celebrating with friends and family.

So, the Norwegian single mother of two went on Facebook groups and asked people to send greeting cards. She said she has been “blown away by the kindness.” In just a few days since that first post, she has received dozens of cards from across the world - from Alaska to South Africa.

"It's beautiful. I started crying," Helgeland, 37, said about the cards that some have posted with drawings of her son's favorite Japanese cartoon characters, or cows, zebras and hearts, as well as photos from the studio where they make the Harry Potter films that her children love.

To Helgeland, who has a painful spinal joint disorder called ankylosing spondylitis, the message during these uncertain times is clear: “It’s important to stay positive and take care of each other and spread love, not just the virus.”

Tens of millions of people were hunkered down Tuesday. Countries across the globe shut their borders, and cities locked down, closing schools and businesses to try to curb the spread of the virus, which has infected more than 190,000 people and killed more than 7,500.

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Brady leaving Patriots, says 'football journey' is elsewhere

For two decades, Tom Brady was the face of the Patriots, and even of the NFL. When he turns 43 in August, his home address no longer will be in New England.

The six-time Super Bowl champion plans to keep playing. But the centerpiece of the Patriots’ dynasty, the most successful quarterback in league history, says he is leaving the only pro team he has ever known.

Brady posted Tuesday on social media “my football journey will take place elsewhere.”

The comments were the first to indicate the Patriots icon would leave New England. Statements later by team owner Robert Kraft and coach Bill Belichick made it clear that Brady's remarkable stint there is over.

In a two-part message, Brady thanked the Patriots and the fans and said “FOREVER A PATRIOT.”