'Missing AirAsia plane maybe at the bottom of the sea'

New York, May 8: An Indian-American father and daughter, both doctors in New Jersey, have died due to the COVID-19, with Governor Phil Murphy describing their demise as “particularly tough" and hailed them for dedicating their lives for others.

Satyender Dev Khanna, 78, was a surgeon who served both on staff and as the head of the surgical departments for multiple hospitals across New Jersey for decades.

Priya Khanna, 43, was a double board-certified in both internal medicine and nephrology. She was Chief of Residents at Union Hospital, now part of RWJ Barnabas Health.

"Dr Satyender Dev Khanna and Dr Priya Khanna were father and daughter. They both dedicated their lives to helping others. This is a family dedicated to health and medicine. Our words cannot amply express our condolences," New Jersey Governor Murphy tweeted on Thursday.

“Both dedicated their lives to helping others and we lost both of them to COVID-19,” Murphy said during a press conference on Thursday, saying their demise is a "particularly tough one.”

Satyender passed away at the Clara Maass Medical Center where he had worked for more than 35 years.

Murphy described him as a "pioneering doctor” who was one of the first surgeons to perform laparoscopic surgery in the state. He is being remembered by colleagues as a “gentle and caring physician."

“And for a doctor, I'm not one, but I would bet, I don't think there could be a more fitting way to be remembered, or a nurse or a healthcare worker of any kind,” Murphy said, adding that the doctor had a passion for bicycling, and he often found peace from the hustle of the hospital in biking along the Jersey Shore.

Priya did all of her medical training in New Jersey and then did her fellowship in nephrology in South Jersey with the Cooper Health System. Like her father, she too worked at Clara Maass, where she died.

She was also Medical Director at two dialysis centres in Essex County and “took pride” in teaching the next generation of doctors, Murphy said, adding that the ICU physician who cared for Priya Khanna was trained and taught by her as well.

Follow live developments on the coronavirus pandemic here

“Priya will be remembered as a caring and selfless person who put others first. And even while in the hospital, fighting her own battle, she continued to check up on her mom and dad and her family,” Murphy said.

“This is a family, by the way, dedicated to health and medicine,” he said.

The governor spoke with Satyender's wife Komlish Khanna, who is a paediatrician. The couple has two more daughters - Sugandha Khanna, an emergency medicine physician and Anisha Khanna, a paediatrician.

“Unbelievable. Our words cannot amply express our condolences nor, I am sure, can they express the pain that the Khanna family is feeling. But I hope that the fact that our entire state mourns with them is some small comfort. And we mourn everyone we have lost. We commit in their memory to saving as many lives as we can,” Murphy said.

Mar 30: Thomas Schaefer, the finance minister of Germany's Hesse state, has committed suicide apparently after becoming "deeply worried" over how to cope with the economic fallout from the coronavirus, state premier Volker Bouffier said Sunday.

Schaefer, 54, was found dead near a railway track on Saturday. The Wiesbaden prosecution's office said they believe he died by suicide.

"We are in shock, we are in disbelief and above all we are immensely sad," Bouffier said in a recorded statement.

Hesse is home to Germany's financial capital Frankfurt, where major lenders like Deutsche Bank and Commerzbank have their headquarters. The European Central Bank is also located in Frankfurt.

A visibly shaken Bouffier recalled that Schaefer, who was Hesse's finance chief for 10 years, had been working "day and night" to help companies and workers deal with the economic impact of the pandemic.

"Today we have to assume that he was deeply worried," said Bouffier, a close ally of Chancellor Angela Merkel.

"It's precisely during this difficult time that we would have needed someone like him," he added.

Popular and well-respected, Schaefer had long been touted as a possible successor to Bouffier.

Like Bouffier, Schaefer belonged to Merkel's centre-right CDU party.

He leaves behind a wife and two children.

Washington, Jul 21: Some half-a-dozen influential Republican lawmakers on Monday introduced a legislation in the Senate to allow Americans to sue China in federal court for its role in causing the coronavirus pandemic.

The Civil Justice for Victims of Covid Act gives federal courts authority to hear claims that China has caused or substantially contributed to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Introduced by senators Martha McSally, Marsha Blackburn, Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley, Mike Rounds and Thom Tillis, the bill strips China of its sovereign immunity for reckless actions that caused the pandemic and creates a cause of action. It also authorises federal courts to freeze Chinese assets.

The legislation is closely modelled after the 2016 Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act (JASTA) that gave more legal remedies to victims of terrorism, particularly the 9/11 victims.

“Americans who have been victimised by the lies and deceit of the Chinese Communist Party-to include those who lost loved ones, suffered business losses, or were personally harmed due to Covid-19-deserve the opportunity to hold China accountable and to demand just compensation,” McSally said.

As the death toll and financial losses of Covid-19 mount, China should be forced to pay the costs of these damages to the American people, he said.

Blackburn said that China's Communist Party must face consequences for concealing and now profiting off the Covid-19 pandemic they enabled.

“The costs are devastating: trillions of dollars in economic damage, millions of American jobs lost, and over a half million deaths worldwide – and counting. Business owners and families who have lost loved ones deserve justice,” he said.

By silencing doctors and journalists who tried to warn the world about the coronavirus, the Chinese Communist Party allowed the virus to spread quickly around the globe, Cotton said, adding their decision to cover up the virus led to thousands of needless deaths and untold economic harm.

Rounds said that China must be held accountable for its failure to contain Covid-19 and alleged that the country's delay in sharing the seriousness of the virus with the rest of the world isn't just negligence— it is criminal in nature.

“If China would have been transparent from the start, many more lives would have been saved in all parts of the world. Our legislation provides the tools necessary for American citizens to sue the Chinese Communist Party in federal court for financial losses incurred because of Covid-19,” he said.

Tillis alleged that the Chinese Communist Party lied to the world about Covid-19 and allowed it to become a global pandemic, causing many Americans to tragically lose their loved ones and face immense financial hardship.

“The American people deserve the right to hold the Chinese government accountable for its malicious actions, and I'm proud to join my colleagues in introducing this commonsense bill,” he said.