Rome (AFP)

"Stay at home", "close everything": the watchwords to avoid at all costs gatherings and contacts promoting the coronavirus epidemic are spreading all over the world, faced with a rapid planetary contagion and an appalling toll in Italy.

From Wuhan (China) to Bolivia, via France and New York, more than 900 million people must stay at home. Sometimes it is a recommendation, sometimes a legal obligation.

The most affected country, Italy is experiencing a scenario feared by all the others, with in some regions a contagion that seems out of control and a saturation of healthcare capacities.

On Saturday, Italian authorities counted some 53,600 cases and 4,825 deaths in total.

They were heard, Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte announcing the cessation of "any production activity in the territory that is not strictly necessary". Only essential public services and economic sectors (health, food, transport and distribution, postal and financial services) will be maintained.

These measures "are severe, I know. But we have no alternative. We must resist," said the head of government.

Conversely, US President Donald Trump, skeptical of containment measures, wants to stimulate economic activity. He urges Republicans and Democrats to agree on the content of a $ 1,000 billion stimulus package.

"We are preparing measures that no one has ever seen," he told the White House, less than eight months before the presidential election.

- The worst "to come" -

More and more federal states are moving to restrictive measures, which will slow down the world's largest economy. The two most populous, California and New York, have closed all non-essential trade and confined their populations. Illinois, New Jersey, Connecticut, Pennsylvania and Nevada have implemented severe restrictions.

Germany plans to help its companies and employees affected by the economic slowdown, with 822 billion euros. She will resort to borrowing for the first time since 2013, according to a bill of which AFP has obtained a copy.

Spain has launched an offensive to equip its health system. "The worst is yet to come," said Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez, who spoke of "a race against time".

Everywhere, the instructions are clear: stay away from each other.

"Stay at home!" Headlined the HRT television news in Croatia.

Although hard hit with more than 1,500 dead, Iran is slow to contain its population. President Hassan Rohani on Saturday called for the closure of "shopping malls where large numbers of people congregate."

In some places, however, "social distancing" is utopian. In the densely populated Gaza Strip, the coronavirus has entered, announced the Ministry of Health of the Palestinian enclave, adding however that the two patients detected on the border with Egypt had been immediately placed in quarantine .

If people are aware of the danger, the healthcare system could quickly become inadequate, with "a shortage of electricity, basic medicines and manpower", according to the representative of the World Organization for health (WHO) in the Palestinian Territories, Gerald Rockenschaub.

- Forced to turn around -

On the shores of the Gulf, the beaches are gradually emptying, as in the Emirates for example, which have decreed "the closing of beaches, parks, swimming pools, cinemas and sports halls".

The campaigns are reluctant to welcome wealthy urban people potentially contaminated. In England, the Cornwall tourist office, a sparsely populated region outside the summer season, asked visitors to "postpone their trip".

The police have been given the task of enforcing containment or the prohibition of assemblies.

In Sydney (Australia), after a busy day on Saturday on the famous Bondi Beach, access was prohibited on Sunday. "It is not something that we do because we are the police that break the mood," said New South Wales Interior Minister David Elliott.

In Jordan, 392 people were arrested on the first day of application of the measure on Saturday, "for violating the curfew".

But in Baghdad, tens of thousands of Shia Muslims defied the curfew for a pilgrimage, despite the risks. Unusually low crowds, with only Iraqis.

Borders close, and getting home from abroad becomes particularly complicated. A passenger on a flight between Amsterdam and New Delhi said that while he was hoping to return to India, the captain announced, over Russia, that he was forced to turn around. Cleared to take off, he did not have the ability to land at the intended destination.

burx-ng-sst / hh / roc

© 2020 AFP