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Coronavirus latest: Poland is unlikely to hold its presidential elections this weekend | News | DW | 04.05.2020 [LIVE]
►https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-latest-up-to-18-million-cases-in-germany-researchers-find/a-53320420

Poland is unlikely to hold its presidential elections this weekend, Deputy Prime Minister Jacek Sasin told Radio Zet. Previously, the government decided to hold an all-postal ballot on the 10th of May in order to minimize the risk of a coronavirus infection. However, the law allowing this procedure still has to pass through the Senate, the upper house of the parliament, which is controlled by the opposition. The rivals of the ruling Law and Justice party want the vote to be postponed until after the pandemic.

“May 10 is a difficult date to meet,” Deputy PM Sasin said on Monday. “If the law takes effect May 7, it will not be possible to get the voting procedure ready.”

Sasin said the government was considering moving the election by one or two weeks.

The incumbent Andrzej Duda is leading the polls ahead of the vote, but his main challenger Malgorzata Kidawa-Blonska has called on the voters to boycott the procedure. Opposition leader Donald Tusk, who previously served as the Polish prime miniister and the president of the EU Council, has also urged boycott.

Coronavirus latest: Italy’s mortality went up by nearly 40% this year find | News | DW | 04.05.2020 [LIVE]
►https://www.dw.com/en/coronavirus-latest-up-to-18-million-cases-in-germany-researchers-find/a-53320420

Italy’s mortality went up by nearly 40% this year, compared to recent years, national statistics agency Istat said. The numbers reveal the toll that the coronavirus epidemic has had in Europe’s hardest-hit nation. 

More than 90,000 people died from February 20 to Mar 31, a 38.7% increase from the average of approximately 65,000 during the same period, from 2015 to 2019. 

The coronoavirus was found to have caused an excess mortality of 25,000, even as only 13,710 deaths were officially linked to COVID-19. The remaining fatalities could either be undiagnosed coronavirus cases or instances where people with other conditions were not treated properly due to the health system being overwhelmed by the epidemic, Istat noted. 

More than 90% of the excess mortality was found in municipalities with high coronavirus infection rates, in the north of the country.