2 Amazon workers infected with COVID-19, Twitter restricts travel

Amazon spokesperson Drew Herdener said that the company was "supporting the affected employees, who were in Milan and are now in quarantine", a New York Times report said on Sunday, which confirmed the two cases.

The tech giant has also cancelled its `Global News Initiative` summit in northern California in April, Photo: Reuters

Amazon has confirmed that two of its employees have been infected with the new coronavirus (COVID-19) in Italy. Amazon spokesperson Drew Herdener said that the company was "supporting the affected employees, who were in Milan and are now in quarantine", a New York Times report said on Sunday, which confirmed the two cases.

A Google employee in Switzerland was tested positive for COVID-19 last week at its office in Zurich, Switzerland.

Google has not shut down its Zurich office but has restricted employees to travel to Iran, Italy and China and was set to expand the curb to Japan and South Korea.

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The tech giant has also cancelled its `Global News Initiative` summit in northern California in April.

Amazon has already halted all non-essential travel, including trips within the US. The company also told employees to refrain from scheduling meetings that required flights until at least the end of April.

Also on Sunday, Twitter said that it would also restrict all nonessential business travel for its employees and partners.

"We have continued to monitor the situation closely and are adjusting our internal policies to respond to this rapidly-evolving situation. On February 29, we informed our people and started notifying partners that we are suspending all non-critical business travel and events," the micro-blogging platform said in a statement.

"Our goal is to reduce the risk that anyone at Twitter might contract or inadvertently spread the virus. It is important that we take these proactive steps to protect ourselves and others and minimize the spread of COVID-19," it added.

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There have been more than 87,000 people infected and nearly 3,000 deaths globally since the virus emerged in the Chinese city of Wuhan last December.

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