Spain’s coronavirus deaths jumped by a record number Tuesday as the country’s medical system strained to care for its tens of thousands of infected patients, and Italy opened a 200-bed field hospital at a fairgrounds in Milan to ease the pressure on overcrowded intensive care units. Both countries struggled to avoid the collapse of their health systems, with Spain saying hospitals in at least half of its regions are at or very near their ICU bed limits.

Poland will impose further restrictions on public life, including closing parks and hotels, to curb the spread of coronavirus and avoid the fate of Italy and Spain, PM Mateusz Morawiecki said on Tuesday cited by Reuters. The army will also help police to keep people off the streets if they have no good reason to be outside.

The tally of coronavirus infections in the Czech Republic has exceeded 3,000 as the central European country ramps up testing and keeps strict measures in place to curb the outbreak. The country of 10.7 million people has seen the highest number of cases among the EU’s eastern wing but far fewer than in western neighbours like Germany and Austria.

French health authorities reported 418 new deaths from coronavirus on Monday, taking the total to 3,024 or an increase of 16%, making France the fourth country to cross the 3,000 fatalities threshold after China, Italy and Spain.

Italian nationalist opposition League leader Matteo Salvini said, amid criticism of Hungarian PM Viktor Orban getting full powers on Monday, that it had been a democratic choice by the Hungarian parliament, ANSA reported.

Italy decided on Monday to extend an economically crippling lockdown until "at least" mid-April to stem coronavirus infections that have claimed a world-leading 11,591 lives. Business closures and a ban on public gatherings were to have expired on 3 April.

The parliament in Budapest, where ruling Fidesz party has a comfortable two-thirds majority, voted on Monday a law granting the government with sweeping emergency powers, giving PM Viktor Orban the possibility to rule indefinitely. According to Orban himself, they are necessary to fight the coronavirus pandemic. His critics claim that he is simply using the pandemic to grab more power.

France evacuated 36 more coronavirus patients from the hard-hit east to western areas, hoping to free up intensive care units as hospitals brace for even more serious cases in the coming days. Two high-speed trains carried patients from Mulhouse and Nancy toward hospitals along France’s western coast, where the outbreak has been limited so far.

Compared to the West, Eastern Europe so far stays well in the coronavirus pandemic. The highest numbers of infections are in the Czech Republic and Poland, with 2,866 cases and 1,905 cases respectively, still a fraction of the numbers in most western European countries. Partly this is due to the lockdown measures introduced at an early stage in the outbreak, but also to a much lower testing rate than in the West, news wires reported.

The Greece’s government on Monday announced a comprehensive package of measures for the support of businesses and employees affected by the coronavirus pandemic, Ekathimerini reported. Among the measures unveiled by Finance Minister Christos Staikouras is the extension of a €800m handout to a total of 1.7 million workers along with an extension of a moratorium of their debts to the state for 4 months.