NPR

More than 1,200 people have now died of the coronavirus in New York, but the worst of the outbreak has yet to arrive, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said on Monday.

Cuomo said the coronavirus is overtaxing the state's health care workers. He asked for the assistance of medical volunteers from other parts of the country as the pandemic continues to devastate New York, the epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak in the United States.

Denmark's Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen is expressing cautious optimism that her country will be able to begin a gradual reopening after Easter. "The Danish way of doing things is working," she said at a press conference on Monday.

Amid the coronavirus outbreak, Denmark was one of the first European countries to announce a full closure of public schools and institutions and to impose strict limits on social gatherings. It was also one of the first nations to close its borders, which it did on March 14.

Over the years, the federal government has spent trillions of dollars more than it brings in, wracking up big deficits even in good times, when it ought to be paring debt down.

Now, as it struggles to repair the damage from the coronavirus epidemic, it's getting ready to spend trillions more, pushing up this year's deficit above $3 trillion.

"It's mind-boggling. I never contemplated this," says Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the American Action Forum, who headed the Congressional Budget Office under President George W. Bush.

Last week, when the Internet Archive announced its "National Emergency Library," expanding access to more than a million digitized works, the group explained the move as a goodwill gesture in the time of coronavirus.