AP News in Brief at 6:04 p.m. EDT

Virus deaths slow in places, British PM's condition worsens

NEW YORK (AP) — The steep rise in coronavirus deaths appeared to be leveling off Monday in hard-hit New York, echoing a trend underway in Italy and Spain, while the crisis escalated alarmingly in Britain, where Prime Minister Boris Johnson was moved to intensive care after his condition deteriorated.

Johnson, 55, was conscious and did not immediately need to be put on a ventilator, his office said. The prime minister is the world's first known head of government to fall ill with the virus.

In New York, Gov. Andrew Cuomo announced the first, faint signs that the outbreak there might be at or near its peak, while warning that this is no time to relax the restrictions aimed at keeping people from getting too close to one another. He ordered bigger fines against violators.

“The numbers look like it may be turning. `Yay, it’s over!’ No, it’s not. And other places have made that mistake,” he said as deaths in the U.S. climbed past 10,000, with around 350,000 confirmed infections.

Stocks rallied on Wall Street and around the world on the news out of the U.S. and places like Italy and Spain. The Dow Jones Industrial Average gained more than 1,600 points on the day, or nearly 8%.

___

What you need to know today about the virus outbreak

There are faint glimmers of hope as deaths from the new coronavirus in New York appear to be leveling off.

New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo warned that it's too early to relax restrictions on social distancing but said the apparent slowdown in deaths is a possible sign that social distancing is working in the most lethal hot spot in the U.S., a trend that seems to be taking hold as well in hard-hit Italy and Spain.

New York City remains the epicenter of the pandemic in the U.S., and New Orleans and Detroit still face worrying days ahead even as President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence are striking optimistic tones, insisting the hard weeks to come will ultimately give way to the nation turning a corner.

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was moved to the intensive care unit of a London hospital after his coronavirus symptoms worsened Monday, just a day after he was admitted for what were said to be routine tests.

Here are some of AP’s top stories Monday on the world’s coronavirus pandemic. Follow APNews.com/VirusOutbreak for updates through the day and APNews.com/UnderstandingtheOutbreak for stories explaining some of its complexities.

___

British Prime Minister Boris Johnson moved to intensive care

LONDON (AP) — British Prime Minister Boris Johnson was moved to the intensive care unit of a London hospital after his coronavirus symptoms dramatically worsened Monday, just a day after he was admitted for what were said to be routine tests.

Johnson was admitted to St. Thomas’ Hospital late Sunday, 10 days after he was diagnosed with COVID-19, the first major world leader to be confirmed to have the virus.

The 55-year-old Conservative was conscious and did not require ventilation, but he was moved into intensive care in case he needs it later, his office said in a statement.

Britain has no official post of deputy prime minister, but Foreign Secretary Dominic Raab has been designated to take over should Johnson become incapacitated.

A grave-looking Raab said Johnson was “in safe hands” at the hospital, which is treating many virus patients.

___

Navy leader calls fired carrier captain 'naive' or 'stupid'

WASHINGTON (AP) — In an extraordinary broadside punctuated with profanity, the Navy’s top leader accused the fired commander of the COVID-stricken USS Theodore Roosevelt of being “too naive or too stupid” to be in charge of an aircraft carrier. He delivered the criticism to sailors who had cheered the departing skipper last week.

Acting Navy Secretary Thomas Modly harshly criticized Capt. Brett E. Crozier — and by implication those among the crew who had vocally supported him — in a lengthy and passionate speech aboard the ship, which is pier-side at Guam. Crew members are being taken off the ship to be tested for the coronavirus. At least 173 sailors aboard the ship have tested positive, as of Monday, and about 2,000 of the 4,865 crew members had been taken off. The Navy has offered no estimate of when the ship might return to duty.

While skewering Crozier, Modly also admonished the crew. He suggested that by cheering Crozier when he departed the carrier last week, they were overlooking their most basic duty to defend U.S. interests.

“So think about that when you cheer the man off the ship who exposed you to that,” he said. “I understand you love the guy. It's good that you love him. But you're not required to love him.”

Modly urged the crew to stop complaining about their predicament, which he said made the Navy look weak. He suggested that some aboard the Roosevelt, including Crozier, had forgotten what matters most.

___

The Last Responder: A day with an NYC funeral director

NEW YORK (AP) — Tom Cheeseman's phone rang at 3 a.m. Friday, soon after returning home from one of the worst days he's seen in 30 years as a Brooklyn funeral director.

He just chauffeured the deceased for 12 hours — some coronavirus victims, some not — between houses, hospitals and funeral homes. But the call came: Another death. Another pick up. And so out he went, determined to help another person reach their final resting place with as much dignity as the situation would allow.

“We took a sworn oath to protect the dead, this is what we do,” he said. “We’re the last responders. Our job is just as important as the first responders."

He pulled into Daniel J. Schaefer funeral home around 8:20 a.m. on about three hours of sleep. His first act, he thought, would be to resolve unfinished business from the day before.

Twice on Thursday, he had been called to hospitals, only to be told by staff that the remains he sought couldn’t be found in the refrigerated trailers serving as makeshift morgues — that's in addition to the 10 bodies he did pick up. The coronavirus pandemic has crunched New York City’s medical system, and that has left a mighty weight on the 52-year-old’s broad shoulders.

___

Rate of deaths, illness among black residents alarms cities

CHICAGO (AP) — Chicago's mayor pledged an aggressive public health campaign aimed at the city's black and brown communities Monday amid alarm that an overwhelming number of African American residents were among the people to die of COVID-19 in early data.

Black residents accounted for 72% of deaths from COVID-19 complications in the city and 52% of positive tests for the coronavirus, despite making up only 30% of the city's population, according to the city's public health agency.

Public health experts in Chicago said the trend was unsurprising to anyone familiar with decades-old barriers to health care in the geographically divided city; residents of the city’s South and West sides historically have poorer access to health care, higher poverty rates and jobs that require them to keep showing up while others are able to work from home.

Similar conditions mark other large cities with large black populations that are considered hot spots for the coronavirus, including New York, Detroit, Milwaukee and New Orleans. Figures released Monday by Michigan’s Department of Health and Human Services showed African Americans, who make up 14% of the state population, make up about 33% of cases statewide and 41% of deaths.

Still, Mayor Lori Lightfoot said the disparities in Chicago “take your breath away" and required an immediate response from the city, community activists and healthcare providers.

___

California to lend 500 ventilators to national stockpile

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — California Gov. Gavin Newsom announced Monday the state would lend 500 ventilators to the national stockpile for use by New York and other states experiencing a crush of coronavirus-related hospitalizations, even as he said the nation's most populous state needs to find more ventilators of its own.

The loan comes after California's hospitals added more than 3,000 ventilators to their supplies through refurbishing old or broken ones and buying some new. In total, California hospitals have more than 11,000 ventilators, a boost that Newsom said made the state comfortable to share its supply.

“We’re very proud to be able to extend a hand of support with those 500 ventilators and send them back east,” Newsom said during a news conference. But he said the state is “not naive" to its own needs.

“We need to continue to procure more ventilators,” he said.

Newsom's decision follows Oregon and Washington committing to transfer ventilators to New York. Washington Gov. Jay Inslee said the state will return more than 400 ventilators of the 500 it got from the federal government. Inslee, a Democrat, said his statewide stay-at-home order and weeks of social distancing led to slower rates of infections and deaths in Washington, which saw the first serious coronavirus outbreak in the country.

___

Top Wisconsin court blocks governor’s move to delay election

MADISON, Wis. (AP) — The Wisconsin Supreme Court on Monday ruled that Democratic Gov. Tony Evers could not postpone the state’s presidential primary, striking down his order to move the election to June over coronavirus outbreak fears.

The court ruled 4-2 that Evers lacked the authority to move the election on his own — meaning the election will occur as originally scheduled on Tuesday. Conservatives control the court 5-2, but one of the conservative justices is up for reelection Tuesday and didn’t participate in the ruling.

Evers had previously opposed moving the election and said he didn’t have the authority to shift the timing unilaterally. But he changed course Monday, ordering a delay of in-person voting to June 9, as poll sites closed because nervous volunteers were unwilling to staff them and as criticism about holding the election grew.

The Wisconsin election is being viewed as a national test case in a broader fight over voter access in the age of the coronavirus with major implications for the presidential primary contests ahead — and, possibly, the November general election. Many other states pushed their primaries back as the coronavirus swept across the nation.

Meanwhile, Republicans have also asked the U.S. Supreme Court to throw out a lower court’s order extending absentee voting to April 13. There was no indication on when the top court would rule.

___

Sportsbooks are dark and odds are long in Las Vegas

LAS VEGAS (AP) — Nobody would have given odds on this.

Inside the glittering casinos that line the Las Vegas Strip, the slot machines were turned off and the sportsbooks were dark. On what would have been the biggest Monday of the year for bookies, not a dollar changed hands.

No big national championship game bets, no wagers on Tiger Woods to win the Masters. No sports means no action, even for the most hardcore gamblers.

About the only thing degenerate sports bettors could do was go online and find a Russian table tennis match to put their money on.

“Russian pingpong has stolen the show,” said Nick Bogdanovich of the William Hill betting chain. “You can’t even find it streaming anywhere to watch, but people are betting on it.”

___

Beloved 'Schitt's Creek' ending at its peak

LOS ANGELES (AP) — After five years on TV, it seemed like “Schitt’s Creek” was just starting to hit its stride.

The critically acclaimed comedy — about a shallow, filthy rich family who lose their fortune and are forced to live in a small town they bought as a joke — debuted in Canada in 2015, and soon after on Pop TV in the United States.

Its popularity exploded when it became widely available on Netflix in 2017, and it received its first Emmy nominations last year, including one for best comedy series. Now it's firmly fixed in TV culture and its success is at its peak.

Yet co-creator Dan Levy decided it was time for it to come to an end, just as everything was truly coming up roses for “Schitt's Creek.” The last episode of the show's six seasons airs Tuesday night on Pop TV.

“It was important for me that this show remains something that people cherish and that people go back to and revisit year after year or put on when they’re feeling blue,” Levy said. “And in order to do that, you really need to be aware of when is the right time to say goodbye.”