Global stock markets plunge as virus cases spread beyond Asia

The new virus took aim at a broadening swath of the globe on Monday, with officials in Europe and the Middle East scrambling to limit the spread of an outbreak that showed signs of stabilizing at its Chinese epicenter but posed new threats far beyond. Global equities sink as worries about the impact of the virus grew, with the number of cases jumping in Iran, Italy and South Korea.

Oil prices slumped by 4% on Monday as the rapid spread of the coronavirus in countries outside China added to investor concerns over the impact on demand for crude.

Brent crude was down $2.34, or 4%, at $56.16 barrel by 1305 GMT. US crude futures fell by $2.05, or 3.8%, to $51.33.

“The weekend’s developments provided us with a stark reminder that the coronavirus is currently an unstoppable force,” said Tamas Varga, an analyst at oil brokerage PVM.

In Italy, authorities set up roadblocks, called off soccer matches and shuttered sites including the famed La Scala opera house. Across the world, stock markets and futures dipped, with the Dow down more than 800 points in the opening minutes of trading.

The number of people sickened by the coronavirus topped 79,000 globally, and wherever it sprung up, officials rushed to try to contain it.

“The past few weeks has demonstrated just how quickly a new virus can spread around the world and cause widespread fear and disruption,” said the head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

Clusters of the virus continued to emerge, including a possible one in Qom, an Iranian city where the country’s semiofficial ILNA news agency cited a lawmaker in reporting a staggering 50 people had died of COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus. The country’s Health Ministry rejected that, insisting the death toll remained at 12.

Authorities in Iran closed schools across much of the country for a second day. Movie theaters and other venues were shuttered through at least Friday. And daily sanitizing of the metro in Tehran, which is used by some 3 million people, was begun.

Recognition grew that the virus was no longer stemming only from contact with infected people in China.

“Many different countries around the world may be sources of COVID-19 infections,” said Mark Woolhouse, a professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the University of Edinburgh. “This makes it much harder for any one country to detect and contain.” China still has the vast majority of cases, but as it records lower levels of new infections, attention has shifted to new fronts in the outbreak. Chief among them is South Korea, where President Moon Jae-in placed the country under a red alert, the highest level, allowing for “unprecedented, powerful steps” to stem the crisis.

Beyond expanding a delay to the start of the school year from the hardest-hit area of Daegu nationwide, though, it remains to be seen how far the government will go. A Chinese-style lockdown of Daegu - a city of 2.5 million people that is the country’s fourth largest - appeared unlikely, even as signs of the response to a broadening problem could be seen nearly everywhere in the nation.

More than 600 police officers in Daegu fanned out in search of hundreds of members of a church that has been identified as a source for hundreds of infections. The country’s National Assembly was temporarily closed Monday as workers sterilized its halls. At shops and food stalls in the capital of Seoul, a misty fog surrounded crews in protective suits who sprayed disinfectants.

“The changes have been dramatic,” said Daegu resident Nah Young-jo, who described an increasingly empty city of few passersby and closed restaurants.

South Korean officials recommended that courts consider postponing trials of cases not deemed urgent, while Mayor Park Won-soon of Seoul threatened tough penalties for those who defy a ban on rallies in major downtown areas. Work schedules for city employees in Seoul were staggered to reduce crowding on subways, where packed cars could become petri dishes if an infected passenger were aboard.

“If we fail to effectively prevent the spread of the virus into the local communities, there would be a large possibility (that the illness) spreads nationwide,” warned Kim Gang-lip, South Korea’s vice health minister.

Health workers said they planned to test every citizen in Daegu who showed cold-like symptoms for the coronavirus, estimating around 28,000 people would be targeted.

In Italy, where 219 people have tested positive for the virus and five have died, police manned checkpoints around a dozen quarantined northern towns as worries grew across the continent.

Austria temporarily halted rail traffic across its border with Italy. Slovenia and Croatia, popular getaways for Italians, were holding crisis meetings on the outbreak. Schools were closed, theater performances were canceled and even Carnival celebrations in Venice were called off.

It was a sign of how quickly circumstances could change in the widening COVID-19 scare. Italy had imposed more stringent measures than other European countries after the outbreak began, barring flights beginning Jan. 31 to and from China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau.

Until last week, Italy had reported just three cases of infection.

Agencies