NPR's Steve Inskeep talks to David Unger, who teaches foreign policy at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies in Italy, about being ordered to stay at home.
Container ship operators say the coronavirus outbreak is their biggest crisis since 2009. Dozens of sailings have been canceled and vessels are being idled at a record pace.
China makes millions of masks. But ramping up production is tricky. "Making masks is not as easy as you imagine," a pharmaceutical executive in China says.
Israel's challenger to Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu now gets another chance to form a new government after a third close election and a year of political uncertainty.
Europe is seeing rapid increases in the number of patients infected with coronavirus, with Spain particularly badly hit. French President Emmanuel Macron has ordered a complete shutdown.
"It is a very, very sad thing when my son says to me, 'Mum, I don't want to die,'" says Etab Hadithi, a 41-year-old mother of two. "We are all suffering ... from a dangerous life."
Life in Rome is turned upside down, writes NPR's Sylvia Poggioli: "Even for someone who has reported from war zones, it's unnerving ... like being suspended between the Dark Ages and a sci-fi future."
Italy remains the hardest-hit country in Europe — though other nations are seeing rising numbers of coronavirus cases and are moving to shut down place where groups of people gather.