First coronavirus death in Ukraine
Ukraine on March 13 reported its first novel coronavirus death. Authorities said an elderly woman died after being hospitalized a day earlier in the western region of the country, prompting security officials to announce a border closure to foreigners within two days. Later, the chairman of the Verkhovna Rada said authorities would be shutting down all air traffic after March 16. Officials were also said to be shutting down most of Ukraine’s 200-plus border crossings, which could deal a blow to the 2 million or so Ukrainians who work as migrant labor elsewhere in Europe. Ukraine has announced three confirmed cases of infection by the new coronavirus. The 71-year-old woman who died of the resulting COVID-19 illness, a resident of the town of Radomyshl in the Zhytomyr region, had reportedly felt unwell after returning from Poland on March 1 but did not initially seek medical care.