August 3 coronavirus news

At a press briefing in Geneva on Monday, the World Health Organization’s technical lead for coronavirus response, Maria Van Kerkhove, spoke about the impact that Covid-19 can have on the future, and how it provides an opportunity for improvement.

“I hope we will never see something like this again,” she said. “But we also must use this as an opportunity to build back stronger, to build back better.”

Van Kerkhove said that Covid-19 should be used as an opportunity to enhance public health infrastructure, and to build it up in many places. That means having surveillance in place, having a public health workforce in place, having trained health workers – who have the right equipment and personal protective equipment – and ensuring that there is the supplies that protect frontline workers, who in turn protect everyone else.

“Again, we need to use this as an opportunity to build back better,” she said. “And so, if this does happen again, that we are in a much better position to be able to tackle it.”

Nancy Shively, an Oklahoma teacher, voted for Trump in 2016. Now, amid a heated debate on reopening schools and watching the President’s response to the pandemic, she says she fears for her life.

Teachers will “literally be risking their lives” if they are forced to return to work when schools reopen, she added.

“It's a cascading failure from the President down to Oklahoma's governor, down to school boards, till it gets to the two groups of people who can't pass the buck, and that's teachers and children,” she told CNN’s Jim Sciutto.

The pandemic will fundamentally change the way teachers provide instructions, whether it’s in-person or online, Shively says. 

“I feel that we're conducting this vast experiment at the cost of probably health and lives of teachers and children.”

President Trump also threatened to cut off education funding for schools if they don’t reopen. Shively calls the pressure “cruel.”

WATCH:

Governors nationwide are urging the Trump administration to extend National Guard deployments to assist with the coronavirus response ahead of another deadline. 

In late May, President Trump extended federal funding for National Guard deployments until mid-August, saying at the time the extension would help "states succeed in their response and recovery efforts."

But in order to meet Covid-19 safety requirements, Air and Army Guard supporting personnel will need to demobilize no later than Friday, according to a Defense official. That’s raising alarm among governors who are preparing for the possibility that an extension is not granted.  

“Governors strongly urge the President to authorize an extension of Title 32 today. Unnecessary delays in extending Title 32 create significant challenges for states and territories, which are amplified in the middle of a crisis," the statement said.

Title 32 status provides federal funding for the National Guard deployments across the country while allowing those forces to remain under the control of state governors as they help with staffing community-based testing sites, building test kits, among other activities. 

CNN reported Friday that the Trump administration is weighing an extension. A Defense official told CNN that the Defense Department is expecting an extension, but it’s sitting at the White House.

Deputies with the New York City Sheriff's Office intercepted a party boat at Manhattan's Pier 36 Saturday night and made arrests following an alleged illegal party, the Sheriff's Office announced in a tweet. 

The office did not announce the number of arrests, but alleged that the boat's operators had violated social distancing restrictions, as well as emergency orders enacted by both Mayor Bill de Blasio and Gov. Andrew Cuomo.

The Sheriff's Office also alleged the boat was operating an unlicensed bar.

The boat, the Liberty Belle, is a four-level riverboat chartered through NYPartyCruise. According to the company's website, the boat seats 300 passengers and has a maximum capacity of 600. 

The Sheriff's Office has not provided details as to how many people were on the boat when it was intercepted.

CNN has reached out to NYPartyCruise for comment. CNN has also reached out to the NYC Sheriff’s office for more information.

Read the tweet:

Stimulus negotiations will resume this afternoon, although the $600 unemployment benefit lapsed at the end of last week.

White House Chief of Staff Meadows, Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer will meet this afternoon at 1:00 p.m. ET, an aide tells CNN.

The meeting comes as the two sides remain miles apart on many key issues.

Iraq recorded 66 deaths and 2,735 cases of coronavirus on Monday, the Health Ministry said in a statement with the country approaching 5,000 deaths as the pandemic continues to spread. 

The surge in infections over the months of June and July have brought the total cases in Iraq to 131,886 with 4,934 deaths, according to the Iraqi Health Ministry. 

Last week a curfew was reimposed in the country for the ongoing Eid Al Adha between July 30 and August 9, while 3,346 cases, their highest daily numbers yet, were recorded last week, according to Health Ministry. 

Over 800 cases were recorded in the capital Baghdad alone on Monday, the Health Ministry said.

Current and former CEOs of some of the biggest US companies are urging Congress to swiftly provide more aid to small businesses.

Top executives, spearheaded by former Starbucks CEOs Howard Schultz, and including the current heads of Disney, Walmart and IBM, said in a letter on Monday that small businesses need support “beyond the next two and three months.” 

Allowing small businesses to fail, they argue, could be "catastrophic" to the US economy.

The executives, who addressed the letter to Congressional leadership on both sides of the aisle, call for access to federal guaranteed loans with favorable terms for small businesses.

They also argue businesses need more flexibility on how the funds are used and that the hardest hit ones should qualify for forgiveness.

Click here to read the latest on stimulus negotiations.

After dipping in July, traffic at the nation’s airports climbed to new pandemic-era highs this weekend.   

The Transportation Security Administration said it screened nearly 800,000 people on Sunday. The 799,861 people it screened that day was the most since air travel cratered in mid-April.  

Friday was the second-busiest day. The next busiest days were over the July 4 holiday weekend.  

This weekend’s numbers are just below 30% of the traffic TSA screened last year. The screening numbers include airline crew members and some airport employees.  

The air carrier industry group Airlines for America said the average flight is now about 45% full.   

Wall Street kicked off the month of August higher, with all three major stock indexes climbing at the opening bell.

Investors' hopes for more stimulus — from both Congress and the Federal Reserve — have propped up the market in recent months.

Although stocks are ticking higher Monday morning, investors will closely watch negotiations for the next stimulus package in Washington. If those talks go south, the market could take a beating.

Here's where things stood at opening: