New Security Law Threatens Hong Kong's Autonomy

Last week  at China’s National People’s Congress (NPC), spokesman Zhang Yesui confirmed that the NPC will propose a national security law for Hong Kong. China’s parliament will draft the legislation directly into Hong Kong’s mini-constitution (Basic Law) bypassing the territory’s Legislative Council (LegCo).

• More than 100,000 people have died from COVID-19 in the United States. New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Michigan, Pennsylvania, and Illinois top the list of total deaths. 
   
  

• According to the Department of Labor, 2.4 million people filed for new unemployment claims last week, bringing the pandemic-driven total to nearly 39 million over the last several months. Economists warn that the recovery may not be as quick as hoped.
   

Over the course of a week, the Global Guardian Asset Security team performed five apprehensions for one client at various construction and facility sites.

• As of today, all 50 states have begun to reopen on some level. Health officials are closely monitoring for spikes in new cases, but these may not be seen for 10-15 days after reopening.
   

The drugmaker Moderna out of Cambridge, Massachusetts announced that their coronavirus vaccine appears to be safe and able to stimulate an immune response against the COVID-19 virus. The initial results are from testing performed on eight volunteers. The second phase involving 600 people will begin soon and is on an accelerated timeline. 

New York governor Andrew Cuomo announced a two-week extension of stay-at-home orders for parts of the state, including NYC, that do not meet certain criteria laid out by the state. Five regions of New York were cleared to reopen some non-essential businesses; the Finger Lakes, including Rochester; Central New York, a five-county area including Syracuse; the Southern Tier, which borders Pennsylvania; the Mohawk Valley, west of Albany; and the rural North County, which includes the Adirondack Mountains.

The number of daily new cases recorded in the U.S. has been slowly trending down over the last four days, largely due to significant declines in new cases in New York City, Detroit, and New Orleans. 

The death toll from COVID-19 passed 80,000 in the U.S. on 11 May. There are more than 1,000,000 active cases in the U.S. 

As we navigate what the new normal looks like, Global Guardian continues to provide support when it comes to COVID-19, including regular intelligence reporting, employee trainings, protocols on returning to work safely, how we need to think about the future of travel, and more.