Health

Messi and three other PSG players test positive for COVID-19

Seven-time Ballon d’Or winner Lionel Messi is among four players in the Paris Saint-Germain squad to have tested positive for the coronavirus ahead of the team’s French Cup game on Monday night.

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PSG added that one staff member also had COVID-19 in a statement on Saturday night. None of them were named at that point, but in a further statement on the team’s medical news Sunday the club named Messi, left back Juan Bernat, backup goalie Sergio Rico and 19-year-old midfielder Nathan Bitumazala.

PSG is playing at third-tier Vannes.

Last year’s runner-up Monaco was in action later Sunday at second-tier Quevilly-Rouen in one of 13 games scheduled for the day as sides bid to reach the last 16.

Monaco said Saturday that seven players had COVID-19 but none showed any worrying signs and are isolating.

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WHO urges China to be ‘transparent’ in sharing COVID-19 data

The World Health Organization (WHO) continues to call for China to be ‘transparent’ in sharing COVID-19 data in efforts to determine the disease’s origins, Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus reiterated on Friday in Geneva.

Health

Burundi announces first polio outbreak in more than 30 years

Health authorities in Burundi on Friday said that they had detected eight samples of polio, officially declaring the landlocked African nation’s first outbreak in more than 30 years.

Health

Cocaine trafficking surges following COVID-19-related slowdown

Routed through new hubs and expanded criminal networks, cocaine trafficking has made a dramatic comeback following an initial slowdown caused by the emergence of COVID-19, the UN Office on Drugs and Crime said on Thursday in a hard-hitting new report.