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Vaccine makers face biggest medical manufacturing challenge in history
SAY HIS NAME!
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EDITOR'S NOTE
Vandalism must stop!
T
hese are testing times indeed! On the one hand, nations are coming together using every weapon in their arsenal to fight the novel coronavirus, which is the biggest threat to mankind ever since the Black Death laid waste to entire towns and villages centuries ago. On the other, across the globe, many countries are facing the aftershocks of the tremor caused by the killing of a 46-year-old Afro-American man in the US state of Minnesota. Instead of ending up as just another obscure name in the list of victims of police brutality, George Floyd has become the poster boy of the global protest against racial injustice. From cities in the US, the whirlwind of protest has swept across the world. Chants of “I can’t breathe” and placards showing “Black Lives Matter” apart, the hallmark of protests is the defacing or toppling of statues, sparking a debate on colonial-era slavery. The UK was no exception, either. While protesters toppled a 17th-century slave trader’s statue in Bristol, it was the turn of the Winston Churchill
monument in London to face the ire of agitators. Agreed, racism and slavery are anathemas in a civilised society and there appears to be no reason to glorify those associated with them. But that doesn’t justify mindless vandalism of statues and violence that border on anarchy. British Herald believes that Prime Minister Boris Johnson is totally justified when he expressed indignation over the vandalising of Churchill’s statue outside Parliament in London. Defacing of Mahatma Gandhi’s statue and the campaign to remove his monuments have also invited widespread criticism. The prime minister is right to denounce vandalism of monuments as such acts damage the cause the protesters claim to represent. “They are hijacking a peaceful protest and undermining it in the eyes of many who might otherwise be sympathetic,” Johnson said in a Downing Street briefing. It is the need of the hour to exercise restraint and resort to democratic means to address issues faced by ethnic minority groups in the country. As the prime minister has stated, let us not “waste time disputing the life and opinions
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of historical personalities immortalised in bronze or stone”. Johnson has voiced the need to listen to the protesters, but with equal vigour he has warned of stern action against those who indulge in vandalism, flouting social distancing norms. Let there be healthy debates on statues of controversial figures and let us allow government authorities to decide whether or not to move them to a less conspicuous venue. After all, as the prime minister has said, one cannot rewrite or edit history. Let us leave the monuments in peace and not in pieces.
Best,
ANSIF ASHRAF Managing Editor, British Herald ansif@britishherald.com
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CONTENT
JULY-AUGUST 2020 | VOLUME 02 | ISSUE 04
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45
6 | SAY HIS NAME - George Floyd
45 | White Americans turn out for Floyd protests, but will they work for change?
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20 | British double amputee Tony Hudgell, aged five, raises 1M pounds
27 | West faces 'light Cold War' with China: Tony Blair Institute for Global Change
43 | Frustration, fear and family: lockdowns test investment bankers
18 | Cash isn't king any more: vulnerable short-changed by virus
23 | EU becoming safer, better-off and healthier - but less gender-equal
58 | As COVID-19 races up the Amazon River, health services struggle to keep up
WHERE BRITAIN MEETS THE WORLD
ISSN 2632-8836
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GEORGE FLOYD
COVER STORY
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COVER STORY
SAY HIS NAME!
George Floyd
W
hen the “spiky ball” unseen to the human eye made its presence felt deep inside a crowded, sweaty market by going for the windpipe of helpless people, little did the world know that it would soon receive a morbid foretaste of Doomsday. With the Grim Reaper claiming thousands sparing no nation on its grisly ride, economies came to a screeching halt, countless companies both big and small collapsed like a house of cards, millions went jobless in the bat of an eyelid. With novel coronavirus holding mankind to ransom igniting fears of a second wave in several countries, the world is on the cusp of a change where transcending differences,
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people are learning to cope with the life-and-death situation, slowly adapting to a new lifestyle interspersed with lockdowns, curbs and social distancing. Three months after novel coronavirus put a stranglehold on humanity it was the turn of yet another “chokehold” to shake the world violently. The brutal killing of George Floyd, an Afro-American man, in the US is forcing a rethink on issues that plague humanity.
A horror lasting 8 minutes, 46 seconds On May 25 Memorial Day, a national holiday in the US when the nation commemorates its soldiers who died in combat, a cell phone video clip
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recorded by an onlooker in Minneapolis went viral on the internet. Its gut-churning footage shocked the living daylights out of people around the world as they stared at naked brutality take its ugly form on a hapless person. It showed a handcuffed Black American pinned to the pavement near the intersection of E 38th Street and Chicago Avenue with a white police officer’s knee on his neck. As officer Derek Chauvin’s chokehold on forty-six-year old Floyd intensified, he could be seen repeatedly saying “I can’t breathe” and calling out to his mother while furious bystanders were seen demanding the police to remove the restraint. The chilling spectacle lasted eight
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minutes, 46 seconds as the New York Times reported until George appeared to be motionless. Even when the ambulance arrived, the cop’s knee was on his neck. The final part of the graphic footage showed him being placed on a stretcher and taken
As per reports, he was arrested after the employee of a corner store called the police, suspecting Floyd of buying cigarettes using counterfeit currency
into the ambulance. He was later pronounced dead at Hennepin County Medical Centre.
How it all began As reported by the Chicago Tribune, George, who was endearingly known as the “gentle giant” among friends and acquaintances for his six feet, six inches frame, grew up in a Black neighbourhood of Houston and shifted to Minneapolis in 2014 for a better future. But little did the former bouncer at a local club realise that his hopes would be snuffed out in a most violent way. As per reports, he was arrested after the employee of a corner store called the police, suspecting George of buying
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COVER STORY by a pair of white steeds to the accompaniment of a brass band. After a private ceremony, Floyd was laid to rest next to the grave of his beloved mother.
Rage spills out on the streets of the US
cigarettes using counterfeit currency.
Laid to rest alongside his beloved mom Hundreds came to pay their last respects before the open casket containing the mortal remains of ‘Big Floyd’ in Houston where he grew up on June 8. The funeral held the following
day at the Fountain of Praise Church amid eulogies and gospel music. The ceremony, which was livestreamed was watched by countless people. Democratic presidential frontrunner Joe Biden addressed the mourners through video. The hearse bearing his casket was taken to the cemetery in Pearson. On the last mile to the burial ground, the casket was borne by a carriage with glass sides drawn
The loving father of a six-year-old girl was soon seen as a martyr of racial brutality and as he breathed his last in indescribable agony, few realised that it was the beginning of a whirlwind of protests fuelled by justifiable rage against allegations of police brutality and victimisation of racial minorities not only in the country but elsewhere. The spot where Floyd was killed almost became a shrine in no time with peaceful protesters gathering in scores with placards and flowers on the day after his death. But it didn’t stop there. His last words “They’re going to kill me” echoed in the hearts of countless Minneapolis residents, stoking the embers of rage, which finally erupted in a mass protest at the Third Precinct Police Station with a chorus of “I can’t breathe” and “No Justice, No Peace”. Though Floyd was sent to prison nine times earlier for charges such as possessing drugs, theft, armed robbery and trespassing that was no justification for the killing thought many cutting across class and race. As tensions escalated, the police resorted to plastic bullets, tear gas and concussion grenades to disperse the crowd.
Under the mantle of Black Lives Matter It was just a curtain raiser of what would unfold in countless American cities under the banner of “Black Lives Matter”. By May 29, protesters bearing placards and
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COVER STORY Fuelled by the frustrations of the colossal lockdown and spiralling economic crisis, agitators lay waste to upscale stores in several cities, including New York and Los Angeles. Over the days that followed, tensions cooled and the streets once again witnessed peaceful protests seeking the nation’s attention to introduce the much-needed police reforms and ban on savage modes of restraining like chokehold. The Reuters reported US citizens of all races and ages taking to the street voicing the demand for reforms. “Today's march is about 'Black Lives Matter.' It's about George Floyd and all
chanting “I can’t breathe” descended on Washington, DC, and soon the law and order situation spiralled out of control. Riots, arson, clashes with law enforcement agencies and looting became the order of the day in several US cities that curfews were clamped down on as many as 12 of them – the first since the unrest that ensued after the assassination of Civil Rights leader Martin Luther King Junior in 1968. Protesters lit fires near the White House, prompting security personnel to set up special fences. There were even reports of the president being taken to a safe location. As the situation went from bad to worse, National Guard personnel were deployed in the country’s capital and 15 states.
the young black men who lost their lives to police brutality,” Washington, DC, resident and ocean conservationist Angelo Villagomez told the news agency during a June 13 protest march in the capital. The same was echoed by Sam Goldman, a protester from Philadelphia who said, “I genuinely do want to see the end to being murdered by the police ... I want to see that there is no more police state.” Amid the protests, #BlackOut Tuesday was seen to be trending on Twitter with thousands of
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Americans, business houses and media organisations posting black screenshots showcasing their solidarity for racial equality.
Leaders offer rich tributes to Floyd Floyd did not end up as just another name in the long list of victims of police brutality. World leaders were quick to condole his death and denounce the killing. “Our nation’s deepest condolences and heartfelt sympathies to the family of George Floyd,” said President Trump. Pope Francis
While Facebook pledged to donate $10 million for groups striving for racial harmony, Warner Music Group Corporation and Comcast Corp announced major incentives for promoting racial justice, said a Reuters report. The Bank of America pledged $1billion for the same cause. Companies such as Twitter, Microsoft and Intel promised to increase the number of employees belonging to minority communities in their ranks.
Sweeping police reforms in the US Days after the incident, many US states began to introduce sweeping police reforms, which include banning neck restraints. According to a CNN report,
in a televised address to the English speaking world telecast by EWTN referred to the tragic death of Floyd, adding “one cannot tolerate or turn a blind eye towards racism”.
Corporate world wakes up to reality Ramifications of the protest could be felt in the corporate world which woke up with a clarion call for more racial inclusiveness and solidarity with minority groups.
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BRITISH HERALD as many as 20 US cities and municipalities have taken steps to ban chokeholds. On June 17, President Trump inked an executive order that introduces several police reforms, which also include the creation of a database that tracks abuses committed by officers.
The UK fares better Compared to the US, the UK has done comparatively well in tackling issues related to racism and discrimination against ethnic minorities. Its growing tolerance over the years has resulted in more members from diverse ethnic minority groups finding a place in the higher echelons of power and the Boris Johnson government has two of the four major offices of state headed by people of Indian origin. There are strict checks and measures in place to keep racism at bay
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More members from diverse ethnic minority groups have found a place in the upper echelons of power and the Boris Johnson government has two of the four major offices of state headed by people of Indian origin and the 1965 Race Relations Act was the first legislation to prohibit racial discrimination. It was introduced in the wake of UK witnessing an increasing number of immigrants from Commonwealth countries. Following complaints about its inadequacy in tackling racial discrimination in sectors
such as employment and accommodation, the 1968 Race Relations Act made discrimination within housing, advertising and employment unlawful. It is significant to note that the Conservative Party government of Theresa May was proactive to address issues related to race and ethnic minority groups. The Race Disparity Audit published by the PM in 2017 revealed the existence of inequality in education, health care, law enforcement and the court. A June 15 BBC report refers to an Ipsos Mori survey in which two-thirds of the participants said they believe the UK will become more diverse and tolerant in a decade and 84 per cent disagreed when asked if one has to be White to be classified as truly British.
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There is much more we need to do: PM Boris Johnson The current government has pledged to address issues related to discrimination based on ethnicity and a June 15 BBC report quoted Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s article in the Telegraph in which he says there is “much more that we need to do” to tackle racism. In his article, Johnson said “no one who cares about this country” can turn a blind eye to the protests sparked by Floyd’s death. “It is time for a cross-governmental commission to look at all aspects of inequality – in employment, in health outcomes, in academic and all other walks of life,” he said in the article. In a briefing at 10 Downing Street, Johnson said he was proud to lead the “most ethnically diverse government in the history of this
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COVER STORY
country, with two of the four great offices of state held by a man and a woman of Indian origin”, adding that the country has made huge strides. “We are all right, to say Black Lives Matter; and to all those who have chosen to protest peacefully and who have insisted on social distancing, I say, yes of course, I hear you, I
understand,” the prime minister said. While saluting the black community and members of ethnic minorities who were at the forefront of the struggle against novel coronavirus, Johnson said he would not support those who flout social distancing and create law and order problems. “I must say clearly that those who attack public property or the police will face the full force of the law; not just because of the hurt and damage they are causing, but because of the damage they are doing to the cause they claim to represent. They are hijacking a peaceful protest,” he said.
Sports world shows solidarity The killing of Floyd, who used to play football and basketball as a student, evoked strong,
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symbolic protests in the sports world. In fact, sports events have always been venues to show solidarity for a noble cause. Germany’s Bundesliga matches saw several players protesting against Floyd’s death. Jaydon Sancho and Achraf Hakimi of Dortmund showed undershirts emblazoned with “Justice for George Floyd”. Liverpool, Chelsea and Newcastle players took the knee during practice sessions as a mark of support for the cause. Symbolic protests by soccer players made its supreme governing body, FIFA, to come out with a directive to leagues urging them to use “common sense” in such situations. Basketball legend Michael Jordan expressed his sadness and anger over the Floyd incident. “I am deeply saddened, truly pained and deeply angry,” he said.
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Tribute in colours Pained by the inhuman act, artists spanning countries wielded the brush to pay tribute to the Black martyr and denounce racism in thought-provoking frames. Most notable, which garnered a lot of attention, was US artist Titus Kaphar’s painting that became the cover of the Time magazine. Titled “Analogous Colours” it featured an Afro-American
Jaydon Sancho and Achraf Hakimi of Dortmund showed undershirts emblazoned with “Justice for George Floyd”
mother holding the outline of her child to her bosom. In fact, the figure of the child was missing as the canvas was cut out by the artist to make the artwork more powerful. In an outpouring of sadness and resentment, Floyd's murals sprang up in cities around the globe, including those in warscarred Kabul, the Afghan capital, and Syria’s Idlib as well as in several US cities. In the German capital, a portion of the Berlin wall carried his visage while in Brussels, a Belgian-Congolese artist paid rich tributes by creating a mammoth mural, spread across two buildings near a canal on the suburbs. On June 5, a massive mural depicting “Black Lives Matter” came up in Washington, DC, spanning two blocks on 16th street near the White House.
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Statues bear the brunt of protests It goes without a doubt to say that Floyd’s death was a catalyst that intensified protests against what many see as the glorification of colonial-era slavery of Blacks and subjugation of indigenous populations, especially in North and South America and Australia. As the Black Lives Matter rallies in several countries intensified, it knocked several historical figures from their pedestals, literally, for their association with imperialism and colonial-era slavery. Mayor Muriel Bowser lost no time in declaring the place as Black Lives Matter Plaza. Like Floyd’s memorial in Minneapolis, the plaza too became a shrine of sorts for the Blacks who fell victims of police brutality. News reports said the murals, placards, photographs of victims and other memorabilia that flooded the plaza were collected to be given a place in the Smithsonian.
Beyond the shores of the United States The plea of a Black individual to be spared and be allowed to breathe rocked cities around
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the world. In London, thousands assembled on the streets on June 8 to voice their anger against the killing and racism. The German capital on June 6 was rattled by thousands of protesters who thronged Alexanderplatz to take part in a rally. A week later on June 13, close to 15,000 anti-racism agitators clashed with the police in Paris. Police had to use tear gas to disperse the protesters who were incensed with what happened in the US. A BBC report said some of the dissenters even scaled the statue of Marianne, the embodiment of the ideals of the French Republic.
Violent protests in New Mexico in the US led to the Mayor deciding to remove the controversial statue of Spanish conquistador Juan de Onate. In other US cities, scores of monuments commemorating Christopher Columbus, Spanish conquerors and Confederate personalities were either removed or defaced in the surging wave of agitations.
Exorcising the ghost of King Leopold II In Belgium, rights group rallied for removing the statue of controversial King Leopold II, who is allegedly responsible for the
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BRITISH HERALD horrible mutilation and massacre of millions of Congolese when he ruled the region like his personal fiefdom. The campaign to have his statues removed garnered more than 30,000 signatures. However, it triggered much debate when Prince Laurent, the brother of the present ruler King Philippe, exonerated his ancestor, saying he couldn’t be blamed for the abuses as he never visited Congo.
Monuments in the UK face the ire of protesters Debates about UK’s imperial past flared up in the country with demands from civil rights groups and activists to remove statues and monuments linked to its colonial past. Perhaps, the first monument to be rudely toppled by protester was the statue of
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COVER STORY 17th-century merchant and slave trader Edward Colston in the port city of Bristol. Black Lives Matter protesters pulled it down using ropes and dragged it all the way to the quayside and flipped it into the water. On June 9, the statue of 18thcentury slave trader Robert Milligan was taken down from its plinth outside a museum in the British capital. Bystanders cheered as the statue was removed by a crane. Milligan, who made a fortune in the sugar plantations of Jamaica, was instrumental in building West India docks in London. The agitations did not spare Britain’s World War Two hero PM Winston Churchill either. The iconic leader’s monument opposite the Parliament in London was vandalised during a rally on June 7 when a protester daubed it with graffiti that read
“racist”. The event prompted the authorities to board it up ahead of another Black Lives Matter rally. This evoked outrage from Prime Minister Boris Johnson, a biographer of Churchill. A BBC report on June 12 mentioned the PM coming out with tweets in which he said, “We cannot edit or censor our past.” In his Telegraph article, Johnson urged citizens to fight racism, but to leave the nation’s heritage “broadly in peace”. Referring to statues of controversial figures, he said, “If we really want to change it, there are democratic means available in this country – thanks, by the way, to Churchill.” The Indian community in Briton and elsewhere was appalled when India’s Father of the Nation Gandhi’s monument faced the ire of Floyd-inspired protests in London. The nine-foot bronze sculpture of the advocate of non-
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The “gentle giant” Born: October 14, 1973, in Fayetteville, North Carolina, US Grew up in Houston Attended Yates High School, graduated in 1993 Played basketball in school Studied in South Florida Community College & Texas A&M UniversityKingsville Dropped out Worked as automobile customiser, performed as rapper, played club basketball Sent to prison eight times between 1997 and 2005 on charges such as possessing drugs, theft and trespassing Awarded five-year prison term for armed robbery in 2009, paroled in 2013 Got associated with Church ministries and charity Shifted to Minneapolis in 2014 for better prospects Worked as bouncer and truck driver In 2020, he lost his job as a security person in a bar following COVID outbreak Has five children, including a six-year-old daughter
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violent struggle was defaced with graffiti on its pedestal, which said “racist”. The BBC reported about a campaign in Leicester to remove a Gandhi statue, receiving 5,000 signatures. It was strongly condemned by Lord Rami Ranger of the House of Peers. “I am appalled by the campaign launched for the removal of Mahatma Gandhi’s statues in the UK by a misguided and ill-informed few. The statues had been erected by public demand to recognise the immense contribution of Gandhi to the free world. As a result, this protest is unwarranted, uncalled for, unnecessary and above all, counterproductive,” he said.
Review of statues, plaques and monuments in London While acknowledging that much of the city’s and country’s wealth came from slave trade, London
Mayor Sadiq Khan said it was not something to be celebrated in public spaces. Gauging the gravity of the protests resounding in the city, calling for the removal of monuments glorifying slavery and imperialism, he ordered the review of all statues, plaques, monuments and street names in London that are in some way or the other connected to the expansion of the British empire in the 19th century. Violence, though not justifiable in any manner, can sometimes serve the purpose of forcefully awakening society from its stupor, forcing it to ponder on festering issues. Floyd’s death has made all introspect on racial inequality, barbaric laws, sparking debate on a rethink of monuments eulogising the exploits of the colonial era. However, democratic means have to be used to address such issues as suggested by Prime Minister Johnson, who has made it clear that vandalism and violence have no place in the country.
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UK
Cash isn't king any more: vulnerable short-changed by virus
G
etting groceries in the coronavirus crisis has been tricky for many people, but for Eric Jones - an 89-yearold Briton who lives alone and relies on cash - it has proved particularly perplexing. Before lockdown, a volunteer drove Jones to a supermarket near his home in southern England to pick up a weekly shop and withdraw cash to pay all the people who support him at home, be it the podiatrist or his handyman.
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This is no longer possible with social distancing, and Jones, who asked for his name to be changed, found online shopping too difficult. "I tried and got very confused and forgetful. I couldn't possibly manage with that now ... I'm way behind with technology at my age," he said via Age UK, a charity helping older people. The global shift towards paying for goods and services electronically means groups who rely on cash – from the elderly to
the homeless, young people to casual workers – can struggle to participate in the economy. Concerns that the new coronavirus can live on surfaces has meant some retailers have stopped accepting cash, while many people stuck at home have switched to buying things online. Most countries in Europe and Asia have some sort of contactless payment system, which typically involves holding a credit card or mobile phone over a device to make a payment.
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UK BUSINESS
In Britain, cash payments declined 15% in 2019, with card payments accounting for half of all payments, according to UK Finance, a bank lobbying group.
Britain's ATM network. Before the crisis hit, many cities had already introduced legislation to prevent the collapse of cash infrastructure.
The nation is now at a tipping point that could leave millions of people behind, according to a review of the online economy by Access to Cash, a group of independent finance experts, that was released in February. While UK Finance has not shared data on 2020 payments, it said the coronavirus crisis could have accelerated the shift.
Cash Is King? Over the lockdown months, Jones had his groceries delivered through a scheme run by his local council, placing an order over the phone and paying a delivery driver in cash. But he still struggles to get to an ATM to take out money. It either means walking to a corner shop to take out a small amount each day or taking a bus to one, which he said makes him feel vulnerable given the risk of catching the virus. Going cashless reduces the risk of crime, as well as being easier and faster, say advocates, but there are myriad reasons why certain groups prefer, or are forced to, stick with cash. Some people find cash helps with budgeting, especially those on lower incomes, while others do not have the skills to use digital payments or cannot access the internet. Add to that people who cannot open a bank account as they lack a fixed address or credit history. A dependence on cash can be
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In March, Britain indicated it would also legislate to protect cash, but the pandemic has made doing so even more urgent, said Neil Johnson, policy manager at Age UK. linked to the digital divide that exists in both rich and poor countries, said Mayada El-Zoghbi, managing director for the Center for Financial Inclusion (CFI), an independent US think tank. "A move to a cashless society will not benefit all groups equally. The groups that are most likely to be excluded will be women, rural communities, and the elderly," she said. COVID-19 has expedited the need for contactless transactions all around the world as governments look for ways to transfer cash to individuals and businesses quickly and efficiently. "In some countries, like the US where a large part of the lowincome segment does not have a bank account, pushing out these payments has been a challenge," she said.
Future Is Electronic
"We need to be very careful we don't inadvertently slip into a vicious circle, where less cash is used, those costs [for retailers accepting it] increase, which actually stimulates further decrease in the amount of cash that is used," he said. The trend towards cashless payments also affects homeless people who might not be able to access electronic payments and rely on loose change handouts made even trickier in lockdown. Greater Change, a British-based social enterprise, was also working to resolve the issue before the crisis hit by creating ways for people to donate directly to homeless individuals, either online or through contactless payment points. The organisation set up pay points across cities such as London and Oxford, but many were in bars and stations, meaning they have been out of action.
As a result of the pandemic, cash withdrawals from ATMs are understood to be down "dramatically", by more than 50 percent in many European countries, said research firm McKinsey.
Jonathan Tan, chief operating officer, said there has been an uptick in web donations, but does not have figures to share on the impact to donations caused by the coronavirus.
In Britain they were down 60% in April, against the previous year, according to Link, which runs
"It has sped up the demand (for cashless donations)," he said. "We need to ramp up our capacity to handle that."
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BUSINESS UK
British double amputee Tony Hudgell, aged five, raises 1M pounds with 10-km walk on prosthetic legs "We took him home (...) he was broken, shutdown, a tiny, tiny underweight little boy." Hudgell and her husband adopted Tony in 2016. "We didn't want him to go anywhere else, he was our little boy by then," she said. Consultant Michail Kokkinakis said Tony's determination and the support of his family had helped him cope with multiple operations. "I have seen him thriving, I have seen him becoming this very confident and bright young boy he is today," he said.
"He's a huge inspiration to us all."
F
ive-year-old Tony Hudgell has raised more than 1 million pounds for the London hospital that saved his life by walking 10 km on his new prosthetic legs after being inspired by Captain Tom's record-breaking challenge.
The challenge had been "really fun", Tony said, and although hard to begin with, it had got easier day by day. He said he felt "really good" to have achieved his goal of walking 10 km (6.2 miles) in June with days to spare.
Tony took on his challenge after seeing Tom Moore, 95 years his senior, walking 100 laps of his garden using a walking frame, raising 33 million pounds. His initial target of 500 pounds had now passed an "absolutely incredible" 1 million, his mum said.
Tony suffered near-fatal abuse from his birth parents when he was a baby that resulted in the amputation of his legs.
Hudgell said Tony was fighting for his life when she first met him in Evelina London Children's Hospital when he was four months old.
She said Tony's was now fast and confident on his new legs. "(It) is incredible to think just three and half weeks ago he could barely take a few steps."
His adoptive mother Paula Hudgell said he received a set of new limbs in February, and from walking barely a step a month ago he could now power through hundreds of metres every day.
"He'd had all his limbs broken, he'd had blood trauma to the face, sepsis, multi-organ failure, and they never expected him to survive," she said at the family's home in Kent, southeast England.
Deciding on his next challenge was a "hard question" Tony said, but longer term he is set on becoming a policeman. "I want to handcuff bad people and robbers," he said.
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Toppling of statues prompts reflection in Russia, Ukraine over Soviet monuments
communist regime dismantled. "I think the toppling of the Dzerzhinsky monument was one of the most important things to happen to our country," said Alexandra Polivanova, a researcher at the Memorial human rights centre.
"INCOMPLETE" But with the tomb of Soviet state founder Lenin still retaining pride of place on Moscow's Red Square, and with thousands of Lenin statues still standing across Russia, she believes the process did not go far enough. "The events of 1991 turned out to be incomplete," Polivanova said. "Unfortunately, crimes have not been properly denounced either at state level nor at the level of society. Decommunisation has not happened."
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he targeting of colonialera monuments in some Western nations has prompted activists in Russia and Ukraine to reflect on how their own countries dealt with Soviet-era statues and, in some cases, to ask whether it was good enough.
Soviet Union in 1991 because of large-scale human rights abuses committed during decades of Communist rule.
Protesters have toppled or vandalised statues in the United States, Britain, Belgium and elsewhere in recent weeks in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement against racism and police brutality.
Among those relocated are a statue of Stalin, who sent millions of people to the Gulag, and one of Felix Dzerzhinsky, founder of the Soviet secret police.
Statues to Soviet leaders such as Vladimir Lenin and Josef Stalin became controversial for many after the collapse of the
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Russia decided to keep many Soviet-era statues in place, while relocating the most contentious to a riverside park in Moscow.
Arranged in the park next to neat wooden walkways, the statues were collected from across Moscow after 1991, a period when many streets were renamed and symbols of the
Ukraine has torn down many more Soviet statues than Russia, especially since 2014, when mass street protests in Kyiv drove President Viktor Yanukovich from power. Remaining Soviet monuments were then targeted for their association with Yanukovich, who had tried to rebuild closer ties with Moscow, recalled Volodymyr Viatrovych, Chairman of Ukraine's Institute of National Remembrance. "People started to discuss the communist past, the crimes of the communist regime and why they should never be repeated," he said. "Especially during the winter of 2014, hundreds of Lenin monuments were toppled as symbols of everything Sovietrelated." A law was later passed banning communist symbols in Ukraine.
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EU travel recommendations may impede Americans and Russians Based on the latest update by the bloc's European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), the proposed methodology could rule out travellers from the United States and Mexico, most of South America, South Africa, Russia, Iran, Saudi Arabia and Afghanistan, among others. The United States, where President Donald Trump banned European visitors at the start of the crisis, has by far the highest number of deaths and cases in the world. EU diplomats stressed, however, that the travel criteria could still change and that the recommendations will be nonbinding.
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he European Union (EU) hopes to reopen borders for outsiders from July, but will review individual nations' COVID-19 situation fortnightly, according to diplomats and a document laying out criteria that could keep Americans and Russians out. The 27-nation bloc is eager to restart tourism, which has taken a massive hit during the coronavirus pandemic, but fears of second spikes have so far only allowed for partial and patchy reopening of borders with multiple health and security curbs. Draft recommendations from
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the EU's current presidency Croatia, suggest allowing non-EU nationals in from countries with stable or decreasing infections, and those with a "comparable or better epidemiological situation" than Europe. That epidemiological criteria is defined as between 16-20 new cases of infection reported over 14 days per 100,000 people. Nations would also be assessed for their records on testing, contact-tracing and treatment, reliability of data, and reciprocal travel arrangements for EU residents, according to the document, to be debated by envoys in Brussels.
"It seems there is a lot of wishful thinking in these recommendations. They are also causing much controversy. July 1 may slip and many countries may go their own way in any case," a diplomat said of the proposal by the European Commission. The proposal, aimed at promoting a coordinated approach, would cover Europe's Schengen zone of normallyinvisible borders that brings together most EU states as well as Iceland, Norway, Switzerland and Lichtenstein. A major achievement of postWorld War Two European integration, it has suffered a major setback in recent months as countries brought back border controls to contain the virus.
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EU becoming safer, better-off and healthier - but less gender-equal
EUROPE More people were able to meet their basic needs, including medical care and adequate housing. Fewer were smoking or suffering from noise or air pollution, and life expectancy was up. The gender gap has widened, however. While women's hourly earnings are slowly catching up with men's, and the number of women in parliaments and occupying senior management positions in major companies has grown considerably, Eurostat said the overall balance was negative. Inequalities in education and the labour market had risen and many more women than men were still economically inactive because they were caring for children or the elderly. Eurostat marked the advance in "Climate action" as neutral, saying progress towards fighting climate change by reducing greenhouse gas emissions had been mixed over the five years.
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rime, violence, poverty, ill health and air pollution have all declined in the European Union over the last five years - but gender inequality has worsened and efforts to fight climate change have achieved little. A report from the EU statistics office, Eurostat, measured progress towards 17 "Sustainable Development Goals" between 2014 and 2019. On most, there was progress across the 27 member states. Deaths due to homicide or assault, and the perceived amount of crime, violence and vandalism, were all down. Governments spent more on courts, increasing confidence on the independence of the justice system.
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European Commission joins LGBT+ stars as fears of COVID-19 fuel inequality
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he European Commission (EC) has joined forces with singer Elton John, tennis legend Billie Jean King and actor Sir Ian McKellen, to call for support for the LGBT+ community, warning that inequalities have been exacerbated by the coronavirus crisis.
Dalli, who was appointed as the first equality commissioner in December last year.
In an opinion piece published simultaneously in Le Monde and the Guardian, the authors, who also included US singer Frank Ocean and Vogue magazine editor Edward Enninful, stressed that "no society has yet achieved LGBTI+ equality".
Many transgender people have also seen access to treatment curtailed under lockdown rules or seen surgeries deemed nonessential and postponed.
"Much still needs to be done," Helena Dalli, European Commissioner for Equality, said.
As Pride marches around the world have been cancelled due to coronavirus, the signatories to the opinion piece, who also included British singer Skin, called for "strategies for diversity and inclusion".
"The pandemic (has) exacerbated the realities, the discrimination, the inequalities of LGBTI+ people," she said. The EC has also joined advocacy group Global Citizen in an initiative called "Global Goal: Unite For Our Future", which aims to raise billions of dollars to help lessen the impact of the pandemic on marginalised communities. As part of the initiative, international music and film stars ranging from Miley Cyrus to Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson will headline a globally televised and streamed virtual fundraising concert. The European Commission will publish its first LGBTI+ Equality
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"Young people are being confined in households with homophobic persons," she said, adding this has led to increased homelessness due to the "aggravation they are getting at home".
"This is life-threatening for them," Dalli said.
Strategy later this year as the body ramps up its focus on rights in the face of the coronavirus pandemic and a populist-led backlash in parts of central and eastern Europe. Last year, European lawmakers condemned "LGBTI-free zones" in Poland, and, in April, further criticised a move by the Hungarian parliament to ban transgender people from changing their sex on certain official documents. Reports of young LGBT+ people facing homophobia or transphobia from family members under lockdown have also increased dramatically, said
"The adoption of equality and anti-discrimination laws, national action strategies for diversity and inclusion, and the creation of safe spaces are critical and cannot be delayed," the authors wrote. "Support programmes for parents of LGBTI+ youth should also be introduced." The EU is increasingly taking a role as a champion of global cooperation in efforts to control and end the pandemic of COVID-19 caused by the novel coronavirus, while the United States and China are focused more on national initiatives.
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Spain pushes clean energy decree to speed renewable rollout
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pain's cabinet approved a decree aimed at smoothing the rollout of renewable energy generation, with measures to combat speculation in the market, cut red tape and overhaul an outdated auction system to reassure investors and lower prices. Spain wants to make use of rich natural resources including prodigious sunlight both to reduce pollution and create jobs, in response to the devastation the coronavirus has wrought on an economy that relies heavily on tourism and cars. It follows plans being developed by the European Union (EU) to use low-carbon investments to battle the downturn. Spain
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is working on joining a handful of wealthy nations embedding targeted emissions reductions into law. One area the decree aims to address is control over permits to pump power into the grid, which renewable developers complain are being hoarded for profit, pushing up the cost of establishing new solar plants or wind farms. Responding to the fact that around 60% of outstanding requests for these permits appear to be purely speculative, the Energy and Environment Ministry said it would oblige holders to prove they were building plants or risk losing a deposit.
Power auctions will now be based on the price of energy, a structure the ministry said would allow developers to better plan investments and revenue, and reduce the eventual price of electricity for consumers. Simplifying other permitting processes should help generate jobs across the supply chain, the ministry said, adding 90% of the components of a wind turbine and 65% of a solar plant can be produced in Spain. The measures were presented as an urgent decree, meaning they are likely to be approved unchanged by parliament in the coming days.
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Cities across Italy see bicycle boom after COVID-19 lockdown
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taly has seen a surge in bicycle sales since the government ended its coronavirus lockdown as people steer clear of public transport and respond to government incentives to help the environment. Some 540,000 bikes have been sold nationwide since shops across the country reopened in early May, according to sector lobby Ancma, a 60% increase in the first month compared to the same period in 2019. To keep people off metros and buses and avoid road congestion, the government has offered to contribute up to 500 euros ($562.70) for city-dwellers who buy traditional or "pedal-assisted" electrical bicycles.
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The subsidy, which kicked in on May 4 and runs to the end of the year, has accelerated a trend in place even in small centres where it is not available. "May has been an extraordinary month for the e-bike market," Gian Franco Nanni, chief executive of Italian electric vehicle producer Askoll EVA said. "We have seen triple-digit growth in orders compared with a year ago." With more than 34,600 deaths, Italy has the world's fourth highest COVID-19 toll and authorities have warned the risk of infection is still high in crowded places. The government has set aside 120 million euros for its incentive
plan, and has said it will make more funds available if needed. Bicycle use has been traditionally popular in the flat northern cities of the Po Valley such as Bologna and Parma, but is now also becoming more frequent in cities further south. "We have sold more than 50 bikes since we reopened," said Simone Lazzaretti, who runs the "Lazzaretti" bike shop in the hilly capital Rome, where bicycles had never really caught on as a means to get around town. "We've sold out of all the less expensive pedal-assisted models and only have top-of-the-range ones left, which cost around 2,500 euros," he said.
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West faces 'light Cold War' with China: Tony Blair Institute for Global Change investment and introducing market reforms it has become the world's second-largest economy. It is now the global leader in a range of 21st Century technologies such as artificial intelligence, regenerative medicine and conductive polymers. Blair said China's leadership had moved to a much more combative posture globally while consolidating power in the hands of the Communist Party at home.
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ormer British Prime Minister Tony Blair's institute said that China's newfound global clout means the West faces a "light Cold War" or at least big power rivalry with the People's Republic. US President Donald Trump has repeatedly confronted China over trade and its handling of the coronavirus outbreak, though Beijing has cast Washington's fears over its clout as anti-Chinese hysteria. The Tony Blair Institute for Global Change said polling showed that China is considered to be a force for bad in the world by more than half of people in the United States, Britain and France, Blair's institute said.
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China's economic and military rise over the past 40 years is considered to be one of the most significant geopolitical events of recent times, alongside the 1991 fall of the Soviet Union which ended the Cold War. "We are now dealing not with a rising China but a risen China and this rise is both inevitable and right," Blair, who served as prime minister from 1997 to 2007, said in the research. "Given the deep economic links between China and the West, Cold War analogies are misleading and dangerous," said Blair who will speak at a virtual Reuters Newsmaker event. China in 1979 had an economy that was smaller than Italy's, but after opening to foreign
The United States is likely to try to contain China's rise, for example by countering it in the South China Sea, or there could even be global or Asian geopolitical contest, his institute said. Less likely, it said, were cooperation, a full Cold War or a military conflict. To cope with the "risen China", the West should seek to cooperate, compete and, when necessary, confront Beijing. "The USA, Europe and our Asian allies should stand together so that any partnership with China comes from a position of strength," Blair said. "We will have to live with the reality that we will in some areas have to be prepared to confront China where its actions conflict with the reasonable interests and values of the wider international community," he said.
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Roma across Europe seen as police target during lockdown
for refugees fleeing war and poverty. Roma communities were targeted in seven countries across the European Union, including France, Greece and Hungary, according to the report. It found instances of racially motivated police discrimination and excessive use of force across Europe, with different ethnic minorities targeted in different countries. Cernusakova said the communities targeted by police were often the largest minority and that the pandemic had deepened existing racial biases. "The interesting thing about it is that these cases are new but also old," she said.
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oma communities across Europe have become a police target in lockdown, a report found, amid a sharpening global focus on racial equality and law enforcement.
families and are not disciplined,'" Cernusakova. They came up with the idea that the Roma were somehow a source of infection ... Those things show very, very clearly that there is a very, very strong bias."
The report by Amnesty International, a human rights organisation, said Roma communities had faced tougher quarantines than citizens who posed a greater health risk.
Many Roma live on the fringes of society and struggle for work - with those in small settlements facing legal problems when it comes to land ownership, human rights experts say.
People returning from places with high rates of the new coronavirus - such as Italy - were not targeted by authorities with the same stringent measures as Roma communities, who were quarantined en masse in whole apartment blocks or streets, Amnesty researcher Barbora Cernusakova said.
Sweeping lockdown measures have exacerbated social and economic difficulties faced by Roma communities and increased dependence on credit, with many quarantined and without work for weeks.
"With Roma, the explanation always was a mixture that 'they congregate and live in bigger
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Roma communities were largely targeted in Bulgaria and Slovakia home to some of Europe’s largest Roma minorities - while migrants were targeted in cities such as Calais in France, a common stopoff
Bulgarian officials have said the Roma are not following social distancing rules and their poor living conditions make it harder to uphold good hygiene, justifying the extra measures. In May, United Nations human rights experts urged Bulgaria to change tack, saying: “We are deeply concerned at the discriminatory limitations imposed on Roma on an ethnic basis that are overtly supported by Bulgarian State officials as part of the broader measures to prevent the spread of COVID-19.” Police officials worldwide have faced growing questions over the use of force and racial bias since the death of George Floyd, an unarmed Black man who died in US police custody. Amnesty International found last year that the rights of Roma had been violated in more than half of all European countries, with impunity for unlawful use of force by law enforcement in 13 of the 35 countries in Europe.
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Siberian heat wave is a 'warning cry' from the Arctic, climate scientists say "It's one of many vicious circles that we see in the Arctic that exacerbate climate change." Satellite records for the region starting in 2003 suggest there has been a dramatic jump in emissions from Arctic fires during just the last two summers, with the combined emissions released in June 2019 and June 2020 greater than during all of the June months in 2003-2018 put together, Smith said.
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ine trees are bursting into flames. Boggy peatlands are tinderbox dry. And towns in northern Russia are sweltering under conditions more typical of the tropics. Reports of record-breaking Arctic heat – registered at more than 100 Fahrenheit (38 Celsius) in the Siberian town of Verkhoyansk - are still being verified by the World Meteorological Organization. But even without that confirmation, experts at the global weather agency are worried by satellite images showing that much of the Russian Arctic is in the red.
to come, with more frequent wildfires releasing stores of carbon from peatland and forests that will increase the amount of planet-warming greenhouse gases in the air. "This is what this heat wave is doing: It makes much more fuel available to burn, not just vegetation, but the soil as well," said Thomas Smith, an environmental geographer at the London School of Economics.
Atmospheric records dating back more than a century show Arctic air temperatures also reaching new highs in recent years. That leads Smith to believe the scale of the fires could be unprecedented as well. "What we're seeing happening right now is the consequence of the past" industrial emissions, Smith says. "What will happen in 40 years' time is already locked in. We can't do anything about that. That's why we should be concerned; it can only get worse." Although peatland covers only
That extreme heat is fanning the unusual extent of wildfires across the remote, boreal forest and tundra that blankets northern Russia. Those blazes have in turn ignited normally waterlogged peatlands. Scientists fear the blazes are early signs of drier conditions
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EUROPE heat thawing Arctic permafrost faster than expected, which is liable to produce far larger quantities of carbon dioxide and methane than are being released by the fires. Guido Grosse, head of the Permafrost Research Unit at the Alfred Wegener Institute Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research in Germany, said the fires were stripping away peat and vegetation that normally would form a protective blanket over the permafrost.
3% of the Earth's land surface, those deposits contain twice as much carbon as all the world's forests together. A NEW NORMAL Scientists have known climate change is causing the Arctic to warm twice as quickly as the rest of the world, and the Siberian heat wave, which began in May, is typical of that trend. "It becomes like an oven," said Walt Meier, a senior research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado who specialises in sea ice. "You are doing that on top of the longerterm warming trend, so you are getting the oven nicely baking a pie to scorching it."
"Warning Cry" The peat fires make the need to cut man-made emissions all the more urgent, say scientists, who warn that wider changes in the Arctic could trigger bigger impacts on the global climate system. "It's a huge warning cry that's going off, but it's not the only systemic problem that's happening in the Arctic related to climate change," said Gail Whiteman, incoming professor of sustainability at Britain's University of Exeter and founder of the Arctic Basecamp group of scientists advocating for rapid climate action. Whiteman and other researchers are also worried about the rising
"If you take this away the heat from the summer penetrates directly into the ground and warms the permafrost, and it starts thawing," he said. "You see this effect usually a few years after the fires." The warming temperatures also appear to be making the Arctic wildfire season longer, said Jessica McCarty, an assistant professor of geography at Miami University in Ohio. Typically, the Arctic fire season runs from July to August, plus or minus a couple of weeks. This year, fires were detected in May. And "as the peat burns … its neighbor next door gets warmer, and their neighbors get warmer," McCarty said. "We're burning up these ancient pools of carbon."
"What used to be extreme is becoming normal. Warmer temperatures are now relatively frequent," Meier said. And as temperatures warm, and polar snow and ice melt, more Arctic area is left darker and absorbs heat faster, which contributes to more warming. The Arctic sea ice has lost 70% of its summer volume since the 1970s, with the area also shrinking to the point that last year saw one of the lowest ice covers on record.
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Hit by coronavirus and wild weather, Italy now battles locusts farmers leaving land unplanted because they can no longer sell their harvest at a profit, Arbau said. The locust invasion adds to Italy's woes. The country was the first in Europe to be badly hit by the coronavirus and it is still recovering from the pandemic, which has killed more than 34,000 people - the fourth highest death rate in the world and infected nearly 240,000. During a nationwide lockdown in March and April, Italian farmers also had to grapple with a shortage of farm workers and a cold snap that destroyed vast swathes of fruit.
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warms of locusts have stripped thousands of hectares of pasture and cropland in Sardinia, devastating farmers already struggling from the coronavirus pandemic, farming groups said. Their numbers fuelled by rising temperatures, the pests have damaged nearly 15,000 hectares (37,000 acres) of grazing land in the central province of Nuoro, said Michele Arbau, of the Sardinia branch of Italian agricultural association Coldiretti. "Farmers have lost the summer pasture and partly the fodder for autumn and winter… and the very few people who grew barley had to give that up too," he said. During the summer months, locusts are a common phenomenon on the Mediterranean island of Sardinia known for its idyllic beaches and exclusive resorts - but this year's outbreak has been much larger than normal.
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Last year, the pests destroyed about 2,500 hectares in what was then described as the worst outbreak since the end of World War Two. More extreme weather driven by climate change can affect the development and spread of insect infestations, including locusts, according to Ignazio Floris, a professor of entomology at the University of Sassari in northwest Sardinia. Rising temperatures can cause longer dry periods, leading soils to become arid and unplanted, which creates ideal conditions for insects that like laying their eggs in dry, untilled soil, he said. More frequent extreme weather swings - including drought in 2017, too much rain in 2018 and both extremes last year in Sardinia - also seem to be spurring bigger locust invasions, said Coldiretti's Arbau. More idle farmland on the island also is a factor, with more
The latest threat comes from Moroccan locusts, a species native to southern Europe including Sardinia. The pests are different from the desert locusts wreaking havoc in East Africa. Key to limiting their destruction is early monitoring, with eggs laid in the soil "easily eliminated by surface tillage where possible", said entomologist Floris. Once the insects reached adult stage, however - as at present - there is very little that can be done to control them, said Alexandre Latchininsky, a locust expert with the United Nations' Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO). But farmers can prepare for next year by applying an ecologicallysafe, fungus-based pesticide, he said. "I suggest farmers' organisations consider this biocontrol option for next year, when they will undoubtedly face the Moroccan locust problem again," he said.
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Most EU countries not doing enough to tackle air pollution: Commission
The report is based on countries' emissions projections submitted to the Commission last year. Europe's air pollution crisis has been thrown into harsher light by the new coronavirus pandemic, with researchers noting that prolonged exposure to dirty air can cause diabetes, lung disease and cancer – all conditions that increase the risk of death for COVID-19 patients. Air pollution levels plummeted across Europe in March, when coronavirus lockdowns curbed road transport and slowed output at gas-emitting factories. But research from the Helsinkibased Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air showed levels of nitrogen dioxide are rebounding strongly in cities including Paris, Oslo and Budapest, as economies reopen and concerns over the virus prompt people to use cars rather than public transport. The EU sets national emission reduction goals covering five air pollutants responsible for damage to human health and the environment - sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, nonmethane volatile organic compounds, ammonia and fine particulate matter.
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ost European Union countries are at risk of missing their targets for reducing health-damaging air pollution for both 2020 and 2030, the European Commission said. In its first report on countries' progress towards EU air pollution goals, the Commission said member states needed to step
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up efforts to tackle the estimated 400,000 premature deaths a year caused in the EU by exposure to polluted air. Based on current policies, 10 of the EU's 27 member states will meet their 2020 targets to reduce air pollution, while only four Croatia, Cyprus, the Netherlands and Finland - would meet their 2030 goals, the Commission said.
The worst pollutant for noncompliance was ammonia, most of which is emitted by the agriculture sector through manure spreading and fertiliser use. Plans proposed by the Commission to cut EU fertiliser use by 20% by 2030 could help steer countries towards cutting ammonia emissions - but tougher national measures are also needed, it said.
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Italy's artisans anxious as luxury brands haggle to bridge luxury gap Hugo Boss has also asked for payments to be delayed to 120 days after delivery, from 10 days in normal times, one of the group's Italian suppliers, said. "We want to exceed the existing payment terms, keeping the actual discount condition to 120 days, this has to be seen in the context of our "Supplier Financing Program". This programme allows suppliers to convert receivables into cash in a fast and cost efficient way," Hugo Boss said in its statement.
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ith unsold luxury handbags and clothing gathering dust in their workshops, Italy's artisans fear for their future as brands cut orders and in some cases demand discounts and payment delays. Italy accounts for around 40% of global luxury goods manufacturing and has been hit hard by a dramatic drop in demand triggered by the coronavirus crisis, with several artisans saying they have no new orders beyond the summer. German fashion group Hugo Boss and Italian company Max Mara both wrote in May seeking price reductions on existing orders of 8% and 7% respectively, suppliers said, which also saw emails detailing the requests.
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Production cuts and price negotiations now threaten the survival of thousands of small and medium artisan workshops tanning leather, sewing handbags and shoes and weaving fabrics. This illustrates how some midsize luxury brands are attempting to protect their margins to make up for sales lost during weeks of lockdowns. Hugo Boss said in a statement that it has "close and longstanding relationships" with its suppliers and "is working together with them to find solutions based on partnership that are appropriate to this situation". "We are in discussions with our suppliers to see what contribution they can make, but there is no Group policy on a specific discount level," it added. Half a dozen Italian artisans supplying top luxury brands said they had seen a cut in orders of between 20% and 50% in May and June compared with last year.
"If things don't go back to normal in the next couple of months, the worry is that from September onwards the situation will deteriorate further and that many luxury suppliers, particularly the smaller ones, will go bust," David Rulli, head of fashion at business lobby Confindustria in Florence, said. Luxury brands shut shops and idled manufacturing sites as the coronavirus first emerged in China, a key market for the sector, and then spread to the rest of the world. With major economies facing recession, demand for highend clothes and accessories is expected to fall by up to 35% this year and revenues may take until 2022-23 to return to an estimated 2019 level of 280 billion euros
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(£253 billion), according to consultancy Bain. Labels are grappling with piles of unsold stock and in most cases the prospect of widespread markdowns. Top brands from Chanel to LVMH's Louis Vuitton and Kering's Gucci have raised prices of some of their most coveted products in a bet they can still lure the wealthy.
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be presenting my fabrics for next year's fall and winter collections but no one is thinking about that now. Plus you can't show fabrics by video, people have to touch it," he said. Two US clients had cancelled orders because they could not pay and others had asked for payment delays, Baldazzi added.
Supplier Support
However some houses, including Gucci and Michael Kors, are scrapping or delaying new collections and say luxury should stop mimicking fast fashion's hectic delivery cycles.
While Italy's government has earmarked more than 20 billion euros to help fund temporary layoffs, many small businesses say they have yet to receive the money.
"We have enough orders to keep going until July but I am very concerned about the second part of the year which for us is crucial," Filippo Baldazzi, CEO of silk manufacturer Serica 1870 which works with Brunello Cucinelli, Kering and French rival LVMH, said.
Some luxury labels say they are juggling their own goal to reduce production and keep a lid on costs with the needs of struggling suppliers who they cannot afford to lose.
"At this time of the year I would
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Chanel has scaled back orders "while trying to maintain a minimum level of activity with suppliers in France and Italy
to make sure they don't go bankrupt," its finance chief Philippe Blondiaux said. Italy and France are between them by far the two main producers of European luxury goods. Dior, one of the LVMH conglomerate's biggest labels, also pointed to the need to support suppliers as it said it was sticking with its 2020 fashion show programme. Some executives in the industry, which in Italy alone employs 400,000 people, say the crisis could accelerate a trend where big brands snap up artisan workshops to tighten their grip on the supply chain and ensure prized manufacturing skills do not vanish. "Real luxury is in the small details. I think many groups, including foreign ones, have realised that once those artisans are forced to close, that kind of sophisticated work ends with them," Baldazzi said.
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Bulgaria's empty Black Sea resorts brace for tough summer travel to most countries in Europe since early June. Still, the pandemic has cut planned charter flights to Bulgaria's Black Sea gateways at Varna and Burgas for the season by 35% compared to 2019. A similar drop is expected for regular flights, Tourism Minister Nikolina Angelkova said. Over 9 million foreign tourists visited Bulgaria last year and Angelkova had been planning for 10% growth in 2020.
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unny Beach, Bulgaria's largest Black Sea resort known for its vibrant night life and packed coastline, is like a ghost
town.
After the coronavirus pandemic closed borders, grounded flights and forced people to stay home, just a handful of holiday makers sunbathe among hundreds of unopened umbrellas and untouched sunbeds on its 5 km stretch of golden sand. "I do not remember anything like that," said Rumen Monchev, owner of a seafront hotel. "If we break even this year, then we will be super good." Monchev has cut his prices, invested in screens to separate tables in the dining area and employed a "COVID-19 sheriff" to
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"We were expecting the best summer yet. Unfortunately, this is no longer on the agenda," she said. "Let's hope we can kick-start the season from July, spin the wheel and build on that." ensure his hotel is a safe place amid the coronavirus pandemic. Still, out of 160 Hungarians he was expecting last week, only 33 came. Tourism accounts for about 12% of Bulgaria's economic output and provides a lifeline for thousands of people in the European Union's poorest member state. To salvage something from the summer holiday season, the government has offered subsidies for charter flights and slashed concession fees so beach operators can offer cheaper sunbeds while keeping the coasts safe and disinfected. Bulgaria, which has a relatively low number of coronavirus cases, has opened its borders for leisure
The country registered 128 new cases of the coronavirus, bringing the total to 4,242, including 209 deaths. For now, about 60-70% of the hotels in the two main Black Sea resorts -- Sunny Beach and Golden Sands -- plan to open in the coming days, betting on the resumption of charter flights from the Netherlands and Germany. "I have long stopped even looking at the bookings ... We are all on standby," said Teodor Pastarmadzhiev, managing member of the Union of hotel owners in Sunny Beach. He hopes leisure travel restrictions will be lifted for key markets like Britain, Russia and Ukraine next month and holiday makers will start arriving en masse in August.
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BUSINESS
Russia takes a leaf out of the US shale oil playbook
freezing all activity, so they can finish off the wells and quickly boost production when demand picks up. A geologist advising Russian oil firms said the new wells would add at least 200,000 barrels per day to output based on average flow rates but if their assumptions about large reserves pan out the wells could boost output by 2 million barrels. While Energy Minister Alexander Novak said last week how much would be invested in the drilling programme, details of how the scheme will work, the number of wells and by how much oil output could increase have not been disclosed.
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ussia is taking a leaf out of the US shale playbook so it can ramp up oil production quickly and hang on to its share of the global market when demand finally recovers after the coronavirus pandemic.
Novak's deputy Pavel Sorokin, a former oil and gas analyst at US bank Morgan Stanley and one of the architects of the plan, declined to comment on the number of wells or their expected output. US shale producers tend to drill but not complete wells when oil prices are low, rather than
Russia pumped an average of 11.3 million (bpd) from 180,000 wells last year, according to the energy
At least two state-owned banks, Sberbank and VEB, plan to lend oil firms some 400 billion roubles ($6 billion) at effectively almost zero interest rates to drill about 3,000 unfinished wells, officials involved in the scheme. Once oil prices recover, the wells can be finished off faster than starting from scratch so Russia can get its output back to levels reached before it agreed along with other leading producers to cut supply because of the fallout from COVID-19.
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BUSINESS be enough to drill about 3,000 production wells of varying types, according to Klubkov at Vygon, which does research for Russia's energy and natural resources ministries. The drilling plan, which has yet to be finalised by the energy and finance ministries, would involve bank loans, as well as tax breaks and preferential interest rates, according to a banker and a draft document.
ministry. Since the OPEC+ deal to curb global crude supplies, its output has fallen by 2 million bpd, Novak said . Russia has mainly shut down old or less-productive wells that won't necessarily be revived when the supply deal expires in April 2022, so the government is helping oil companies to ensure lost output can be replaced quickly. "Such support ... would allow us to create an essential number of unfinished wells, ready to be launched when we will need to increase production," Sorokin said. Russia has outlined various stimulus measures to cope with the fallout from COVID-19 and spending over the next two years is expected to reach 5 trillion roubles. It was not clear if the planned support for oil companies would come from these funds.
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Cheap Loans And Tax Breaks Saudi Arabia and the United States are able to resume halted oil production faster than Russia, analysts say, and Moscow is wary about losing out as and when the market returns to normal. Cold weather is the main reason it is more expensive and takes longer to restart wells in Russia than in Saudi Arabia, said Daria Surova, an analyst at consultancy Rystad Energy. Russian oil tends to be deeper in the ground and in thicker layers, while heavy drilling equipment needs to be moved to Siberian fields during winter when swamps and rivers are frozen, said Sergei Klubkov, a research director at Vygon Consulting. The level of investment announced by Moscow would
Sorokin said the ministries were finalising an idea that would mean oil companies only pay the interest on loans over and above the central bank's main lending rate, which is at 4.5%, so the loans would probably be almost interest free. Anatoly Popov, deputy chairman of the executive board at Russia's biggest lender Sberbank, said it was in talks with the energy ministry about the scheme and details had yet to be finalised. State development bank VEB confirmed that it was involved in talks over its possible role in Moscow's broader coronavirus stimulus package, without elaborating on details. According to a draft plan for Russia's post-pandemic recovery strategy to the end of 2021, the oil companies may also get tax breaks on the loans. One Russian oil industry insider, however, questioned whether global oil demand would ever recover enough to justify the new wells: "Will we ever need them?"
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BUSINESS
Global housing markets ensnared by pandemic's high unemployment
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he outlook for major global housing markets looks subdued, with high unemployment from the coronavirus pandemic and lockdowns and low immigration the biggest hurdles over the coming year, according to analysts. The coronavirus has killed more than 480,000 people worldwide, infected about 9.3 million and left many millions jobless. It has also pushed the global economy into a deep recession with the rebound expected to be slow and long as the pandemic still spreads in stages. That comes despite an unprecedented amount of fiscal
38 July-August 2020
and monetary stimulus, sparking a rally in stock markets from lateMarch troughs, along with steady re-openings of many economies from lockdown. While average home prices in a few countries polled were forecast to rise this year or next or both, fears of a prolonged drop in activity increased in the June 9-24 global poll of more than 100 property market experts compared with just three months ago. With several risks still at play, house prices in Australia, India, Dubai, Britain, Canada and the United States were forecast to fall this year and next under a worst-case scenario.
"Our general view is that prices across most major markets will fall, probably around 5%... and in some it could be more significant," said Liam Bailey, global head of research at Knight Frank in London. "The risks are to the downside. The big thing that we don't know is the potential for a second outbreak and lockdown. And if we get another significant lockdown, then there is every chance that prices would fall again." The US housing market, at the epicenter of the previous financial crisis that led to a global recession, was expected to remain a bright spot and defy the economic downturn, supported by record low mortgage rates and limited supply. While the availability of affordable homes has been a chronic problem there for several years, the main risk
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BUSINESS of a second wave of infections has dampened chances for a sustainable rebound in China. British home prices were forecast to fall this year. In Canada, they were expected to rise at a much slower pace than predicted three months ago and fall next year, with high household debt a real challenge. "Supply (of homes) will increase when public emergency payments end as certain households will face higher debt payments as a result of mortgage payment deferrals," said Marc Pinsonneault, senior economist at National Bank of Canada in Montreal, noting an additional risk to outright job losses.
is unemployment, which has jumped from record lows to record highs within a couple of months and is expected to remain well above pre-COVID levels until at least 2022. High joblessness is the biggest hurdle housing markets will face over the coming year, according to two-thirds of more than 100 analysts across the countries surveyed. More than 10% said lower immigration will dampen housing markets. "Rising unemployment and the risk of redundancies is likely to have a negative impact on the
housing market over the coming months. Many people will choose to put off any major financial decisions, including buying or selling a house, until they are clearer on their income security and the economic outlook has improved," said Jamie Durham, economist at PwC in London. "The impact on the housing market is likely to be felt disproportionately in areas with large hospitality and tourism sectors, which have been most affected by the virus." More than 80% of nearly 100 respondents said the recovery to pre-COVID-19 levels would be "gradual," or "slow and long." The rest said it will be quick or it already has. Indian and Australian house prices were forecast to fall this year and next on higher unemployment, while weak consumer confidence and fears
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"Add to that those who used to list houses on the Airbnb platform and could not rent them because of international travel restrictions. Some might also (just) want to sell." Migration to the suburbs from city centers as more people accustomed to working from home and who can seek space and gardens might ease some housing shortage in major urban areas. Just over half of 72 analysts who answered an additional question predicted a move out of major cities in the medium- to longterm. "It will be fine-tuning rather than mass-exodus," said Miles Shipside, director at UK property website Rightmove. "Cities are convenient as the commute is shorter, but access to outside space and space internally are bigger factors. That might mean finding that in cities, or moving further out."
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BUSINESS
German economy to shrink by 6.5% this year due to coronavirus, warn economic advisors recovery in the second half of the year, with gross domestic product (GDP) forecast to grow by 4.9% next year.
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he German economy will shrink by 6.5% this year due to the coronavirus pandemic, the government's council of economic advisors said, adding that the slump will be prolonged if the number of new infections jumps.
The bleak outlook came after the premier of Germany's most populous state, North Rhine-Westphalia, put the Guetersloh region back into lockdown until June 30 following a coronavirus outbreak at a meatpacking plant there. "The coronavirus pandemic is expected to cause the largest slump of the German economy since the founding of the Federal Republic. But we expect the recovery to start in the summer," council head Lars Feld said. Adjusted for calendar effects, the German economy is seen shrinking by 6.9% this year. The council said it expects a slow
"This means GDP probably won't get back to its prepandemic level until 2022 at the earliest," the council said in a statement, adding that the government's stimulus measures were likely to support the recovery. The government should continue its expansive fiscal policies next year and avoid a debate about a consolidation of public finances before 2022, Feld said. Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet passed an extra budget to finance its bumper stimulus package, pushing up overall new borrowing to a record 218.5 billion euros (£198 billion) this year. Feld said he was confident another lockdown and a second economic slump could be avoided as authorities and citizens had learned to adapt to the new infection risk by behaving more cautiously. A survey among purchasing managers showed Germany's private sector recession eased further in June, but coronavirus-related disruptions and uncertainty continued to weigh on demand.
Germany unlikely to see second economic slump due to coronavirus, says government advisor
T
he German economy is unlikely to face a second economic slump due to the coronavirus pandemic, the head of Germany's council of economic advisors said. Lars Feld, head of the panel that advises the government of Europe's largest economy, also said he thought a second wave of coronavirus infections with a second economic lockdown could be avoided.
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BUSINESS
Worst may be over for battered British economy
B
ritain's economy is shrinking at its fastest pace in centuries as the devastation wrought by the coronavirus pandemic saps demand, but it's likely to bounce back to growth next quarter as more businesses reopen. An historic downturn pushed the Bank of England to unleash unprecedented amounts of stimulus, and while it has slowed the pace of purchases, it is likely to increase its total spending again. The coronavirus has infected around 9.3 million people globally and Britain has the highest related death toll in Europe, despite a government-imposed lockdown that forced businesses to close their doors and citizens to stay home. Although the number of cases reported daily is dropping in Britain, a second wave of coronavirus infections was given as the biggest threat to the economic outlook. As activity ground to a near-halt after the March 23 lockdown, the economy would contract 17.3% this quarter, not quite as bad as the 17.5% fall forecast in May. Forecasts ranged from to a 6.3% drop to 25.5%. In a worst-case scenario it will shrink 19.0% this quarter, according to median forecasts. But like other countries around the world, Prime Minister Boris Johnson has slowly started to ease lockdown restrictions and the economy was expected to bounce back and grow 10.5% next quarter as a result.
"But even then, the economy will remain well below its pre-virus size, and we don't think it will be until late 2022 or 2023 until it has returned to those levels." This year, the economy will contract 8.7%, medians in the poll of nearly 80 economists showed, and then grow 5.5% next year. To support the economy, the Bank of England has cut its key interest rate to a record low of 0.10% and restarted asset purchases, or quantitative easing (QE). It bolstered its firepower by a further 100 billion pounds ($125 billion). Only one member of the Bank's Monetary Policy Committee - Chief Economist Andy Haldane - voted against the increase as he thought there was evidence a recovery was already taking shape. While the Bank surprised financial markets by saying it expected the latest asset purchases increase to see it through to the end of the year, 26 of 35 respondents to an additional question said it was not yet done with easing. All of those said it would again add more QE. "The MPC won't decide on more until November or December. By that point, we suspect Haldane's hopes will have been dashed, unemployment will be much
higher, and inflation will still be well below the 2% target," said Andrew Wishart at Capital Economics. "We suspect that the MPC will eventually increase the stock of QE from 745 billion pounds to a shade under 1 trillion pounds." No change in Bank Rate was predicted until 2023 at the earliest.
Transitioning Britain's transition period after leaving the European Union is due to expire at the end of December, and despite the havoc caused by the coronavirus pandemic, Britain has repeatedly said it would not ask for an extension. "Ruling out an extension to the transition period is a foolish move by a government that does not appear to be acting in the economy's interests," said Peter Dixon at Commerzbank. Still, as has been consistent in Reuters polls since the June 2016 vote to leave the EU, economists expected the two sides to agree on a trade deal. "Without an extension of the transition period, the UK risks exiting the EU with only a bare bones deal at best," said Martin Weder at ZKB. "In combination with the deep recession in the UK and the government's poor record in handling the pandemic, this results in a very bleak economic outlook."
"April was undoubtedly the low point in activity. We'll probably see a more pronounced rebound during the third quarter as a broader range of businesses are expected to reopen," said James Smith at ING.
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BUSINESS
Norway plans big expansion of oil exploration in the Arctic
warming and, although not a member of the European Union, has pledged to reduce carbon dioxide emissions in line with the bloc. However, this does not cover emissions produced by fossil fuels extracted from its territory and then used by others. "This clearly shows the Norwegian government's actions are not based on what is scientifically required to address the climate crisis," Greenpeace's head in Norway, Frode Pleym, said.
"Norway has failed to take the climate crisis seriously." The licensing round, Norway's 25th, had been delayed by a long-running debate over how far north the oil industry should be allowed to drill, culminating in a compromise that left significant room for more Arctic licences. The new round could open eight regions of the Barents Sea unavailable for exploration, each with a range of blocks, and one region of the Norwegian Sea.
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orway is planning a major expansion of oil exploration in the Arctic, despite commitments to tackling global warming and opposition from environmental groups. Minister of petroleum and energy Tina Bru said the expansion was needed to protect jobs and generate wealth. The government will auction up to 136 new oil exploration blocks in a major licensing round, with
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125 of those in the Arctic Barents Sea, a relatively unspoiled corner of the planet. "We need new discoveries to uphold employment and value creation," Bru said in a statement. Norway is western Europe's biggest oil producer and has built the world's biggest sovereign wealth fund, worth over $1 trillion (£799 billion), on the back of its oil wealth. It has signed up to the Paris agreement to tackle global
In recent years, some of the biggest international oil firms, such as Shell, ExxonMobil and Total, have stopped exploring for oil off Norway as most finds have either been dry or too small for them. "This is a special invitation to supermajors to return back to the NCS (Norwegian Continental Shelf)," said Per Magnus Nysveen, head of analysis at Oslo-based consultancy Rystad Energy. "The exploration potential of the Barents Sea is still huge, despite a negative trend for the most recent exploration wells."
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FINANCE
Frustration, fear and family: Lockdowns test investment bankers
founder and managing partner of headhunter Vici Advisory. "Juniors – especially analysts and interns – can also learn through osmosis and they need physical interaction in the office. They need to see how their managers are handling client relationships and solving problems," she said.
Relationship Challenge Global M&A volumes are down 41% so far this year, a far cry from the champagne-popping records of recent years when bankers at Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan, Morgan Stanley, Citi and Bank of America - the top five dealmakers - were the toast of Wall Street.
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ockdowns are sharpening the knives in the cut-throat world of M&A banking.
Stuck at home, armed only with a phone and a laptop, senior advisors are finding out just how strong their relationships with clients really are while frustrated juniors are left to crunch numbers in the shadows, deprived of the personal access to the rainmakers who could give their careers a boost. With the dreaded "doughnut" – or zero bonus – almost a given this year, and some banks looking to cut jobs to weather the health crisis, the strains on bankers watching multi-billion dollar prepandemic deals go up in smoke is taking its toll. "It's like a Darwinian selection," said a senior advisor at a Wall
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Street bank. "If you're a senior banker and you don't win a single pitch you can only blame yourself. You've failed to cultivate your relationships and now it's clear to everyone."
Massive government support for companies, particularly in Europe, is keeping many firms afloat and delaying the kind of lucrative takeover deals that have put M&A advisors at the top of the investment banking world, bankers and lawyers said.
"If you don't know them well enough, you will never win a mandate over Zoom," said the banker.
But the pressure to drum up business means the workload which often involves all-nighters and 100-hour weeks - is as heavy and stressful as ever, ramping up the risks for employers who turn a blind eye to potential burnout.
A lack of face-to-face contact is not just exposing the shortcomings of some senior financiers, it is also making it harder for junior associates to learn on the job and progress, headhunters, lawyers and bankers said.
"Employers have always been responsible legally and financially for harm caused when they didn't ensure an employee's mental or physical safety at work," said Melanie Stancliffe, employment partner at Cripps Pemberton Greenish.
"Junior bankers are challenged by old problems – long hours, excessive workload and lack of acknowledgement – but this lockdown has made them more acute," said Anna Marietta, co-
"Ensuring the physical safety of employees is the prime business reason to work from home and in this new normal, the focus needs to shift to protecting employees
July-August 2020 43
BRITISH HERALD from other risks so they are well and can support - not sue - their employer." For some bankers, the job stress is compounded by working from home in proximity to their families and juggling chores with conference calls, a shock to the system for people used to jetting around the world to schmooze clients. "The lockdown for many throws into sharp relief the health of their home lives," Paul McLaren, consultant psychiatrist at The Priory's Wellbeing Centre in the City of London. "For many high achieving City workers that is an area of their lives which they may have neglected, and participated in only from a distance. Rebalancing the power relationships at home with partners is a particular challenge at the moment."
Lockdown Strains Still, investment bankers, with their bumpers salaries and bonuses from years past, can afford more palatial setups than most employees working from home during the health crisis. Some senior bankers in Britain have escaped to their remote country piles while others have hunkered down in spacious pads with attic studies in upmarket London neighbourhoods.
FINANCE "Suddenly, a high-powered financial professional is stuck all day at home with someone that they usually barely see from week to week and with whom they've learned to co-exist at a distance," said Ayesha Vardag, known in City circles for winning multi-million dollar divorce settlements for her clients. Vardag said that inquiries from financial sector employees and their spouses jumped 170% in the week to May 27 as British lockdown restrictions began to ease, with some choosing to call time on their marriages before bonus cuts and layoffs damaged prospective settlements. "Many financial sector clients and their spouses are reactivating divorce enquiries they made before lockdown, left in abeyance because they wanted to work on their marriages," she said. "Then they found they couldn't stand it any longer."
'The Old-Fashioned Way' For junior bankers, who typically range in age from the early 20s to early 30s, the lack of career progress under lockdowns is the main source of stress coupled with an ongoing hiring freeze at most banks. Shut out of video calls with clients due to digital security concerns, five analysts and associates said their opportunities to learn from - and impress - their bosses were limited.
Instead of knocking on a partner's door to discuss ideas, some juniors said they had to lobby line managers to set up a call with their bank's top rainmakers. The top two M&A banks, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan, said they were pulling out the stops to keep junior colleagues engaged. They pointed to a range of initiatives such as cocktail parties hosted by senior executives on Zoom, wellness programmes, online yoga and virtual choirs to relieve stress. Banking bosses, meanwhile, are counselling their troops to sit tight and wait, as the deal drought will eventually end. "From the middle of March until the end of May, nobody felt it was the right time to buy a business. But things have started to change," said JPMorgan's co-head of global M&A Dirk Albersmeier. "Europe is coming out of this crisis faster than the United States. In certain European markets bankers are already sitting in the same room with their clients which may accelerate the recovery. Getting to an agreement is often easier the old-fashioned way."
For some, the opportunity to spend more time with their family is a rare gift they relish. For others, the pandemic is exposing fractures in their personal lives. Well-known lawyers and psychiatrists have reported a surge in requests for help with relationships and mental health.
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US
White Americans turn out for Floyd protests, but will they work for change?
commitment to do the work to fight racism. "Historically, when we see higher levels of participation from white folks in movements and moments like this, that participation falls off precipitously after we move away from the protest," said Charles McKinney, associate history professor and chair of Africana Studies at Rhodes College in Tennessee. After civil rights activists leading protest marches in Selma, Alabama, in 1965 were beaten bloody by police, twice as many Americans polled expressed sympathy with protesters than with the state of Alabama, Pew Research noted.
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eslie Batson, a white office administrator from Maryland, joined the thousands of marchers protesting the killing of George Floyd in Washington, D.C., after her children asked why the family had done nothing about racism. "This is my attempt to help elevate the voices of people of color, people who don't look like me and who don't benefit from the status quo," Batson, 42, said, as her 9- and 11-year-old children hid shyly behind her. In recent days, white Americans have donned "Black Lives Matter" shirts, carried homemade signs, and shouted "Hands up, Don't shoot" in cities and small towns across the United States. Sometimes they lay down in the streets, just as Floyd, an unarmed
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black man in handcuffs, lay face down and struggling to breathe as a white police officer knelt on his neck. Books like "White Fragility" and "The New Jim Crow" are topping US best-seller lists, and social media is flooded with #BlackLivesMatter posts. Fortune 500 companies and sports franchises, predominantly run and owned by white Americans, voiced support and the New York Stock Exchange held its longest moment of silence ever for Floyd. The United States has a long history of white participation in civil rights protests, but the current outpouring of support is unprecedented, historians and social scientists agree. That said, many question white Americans' long-term
In a separate opinion poll at the same time, however, 45% believed the US administration of President Lyndon Johnson was moving too fast on the voting rights and integration that protesters advocated. McKinney is analysing whether the high white protester turnout will translate into laws that aid the Black Lives Matter movement. "In order for this to be the last racial inflection point... white America must end its sideline sympathy and assume full ownership of this problem," said Allyn Brooks LaSure, a former US diplomat, and executive vicepresident for communications at the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a national coalition of civil and human rights groups. That would include awkward conversations on family Zoom calls, in work conference rooms, and at Thanksgiving dinners, he recommends.
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Real Change or Talk? Big companies around the world which have typically stayed away from this debate have pledged over $1.7 billion to advance racial justice and equity. City councils are voting to cut police funding and limit police tactics, and statues to the slave-holding supporters in the US Civil war are coming down. Some of the same US companies have elevated few African Americans to top jobs; two centuries after it started, the NYSE's traders and management remain overwhelmingly white; an anti-lynching bill named after a black teen killed in 1955 failed to pass the US Senate on June 5. On June 8, senior Democrats, including House speaker Nancy Pelosi, donned kente cloth, a Ghanaian fabric that is a prominent symbol of African arts and culture, knelt in the US Capitol building for nearly nine minutes of silence for Floyd. Charles Preston, a Chicagobased black activist and
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US
organiser, called the gesture "ridiculous." "I think it's a charade, it's hollow, it's empty and I don't understand what is the purpose of kneeling," he said. Politicians, he said, should push for policy changes that help African-Americans instead. The very gesture, known as "taking a knee," echoes the "Black Power" raised-fist salute that US Olympic medalists Tommie Smith and John Carlos made on the medal podium at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics. Half a century later, it was still controversial when San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick took a knee to protest police brutality and racial injustice in 2016. Years after leaving the team, he has yet to be picked up by another.
A New Generation Melanie Campbell, president of the National Coalition on Black
Civic Participation, said veteran activists have doubts this phase will endure for long. But she said the level of anger and frustration after Floyd's death is new. "This is a generation seeing mass shootings in schools, a divisive president, black people being killed and they are pushing back," she said. And the demographics of the country itself are changing. One in 10 eligible voters in the 2020 electorate, about 22 million Americans, will be part of a new generation that is the most ethnically diverse in US history, Pew reports, with just 52% of the generation white. "This is not an unsurmountable task," said Kyle Holman, a 21-year-old white student in Washington, D.C., who protested. "If we can just start by acknowledging that things can be really bad for people of color, have scales fall from our eyes, we will move this debate forward," he said.
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US
Coronavirus pandemic has US women re-thinking plans for motherhood "These are also the same groups who are more likely to say that because of the pandemic, they want to delay or reduce having a child right now," she said. The full effects are still unfolding, she added. "We're going to see an ongoing and increasing impact, particularly if the economic situation in the US remains uncertain," she said. In May, the US jobless rate among men was 11.6%, but 13.9% among women and 16.8% among Blacks.
A
third of US women want to postpone pregnancy or have fewer children because of the coronavirus, a change of plans more prevalent among Black women whose communities have been among the hardest hit, research showed. About 44% of Black women and 48% of Latina women said the virus has made them want fewer children and later, compared with 28% of white women, found research by the Guttmacher Institute, a reproductive rights research and policy organisation. The broad hesitation among women about having children post-pandemic reflects the impact of sweeping unemployment, loss of health
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insurance, recession, job uncertainty and the unsteady pace of economic recovery, it said. Women who said they were financially worse off in April than a year earlier were among those more likely than others to want to delay childbearing or have fewer children, it said. Women, especially Black women, have lost more jobs than men have during coronavirus shutdowns. "COVID-19 really had a ripple effect. The women who were particularly impacted by it are the same groups that already bear the brunt of existing inequalities," said Laura Lindberg, the report's lead researcher and principal research scientist at Guttmacher.
Also the pandemic has had a disproportionate impact in Black communities, and Black people are getting and dying of COVID-19 at high rates than white people, data shows. Guttmacher's research also found 46% of queer women were likely to have changed their fertility preferences because of the pandemic, compared with 33% of straight women, and 17% of women overall wanted to have a child sooner or wanted to have more children as a consequence. The pandemic is not the first large-scale disruption to have such an impact, the study said, noting that US fertility rates declined during the 2008 recession. The analysis was based on a nationwide online survey conducted by Guttmacher in the week of April 30 to May 6 among about 2,000 women aged 18 to 49.
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Gay Pride embraces its roots by joining hands with US black activists
black queer lives," Ellis said. J. August Richards, a gay black actor on television's "Council of Dads," said he doesn't mind missing out on the usual celebrations because of the momentum from protests sparked by the death of African American George Floyd after a white police kneeled on his neck for nearly nine minutes. "Right now, this uprising that is occurring - my entire attention is consumed by it," Richards said. Nevertheless, he is delighted that the LGBTQ community has thrown its weight behind black causes. "I think it's amazing and I pray it doesn't end here. I hope there is a continued conversation and a continued inclusion," he said.
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loats, all-night parties and parades may be out, but the LGBTQ community is returning to its roots by teaming up with black activists for Pride month celebrations in the United States. While the coronavirus epidemic has forced the cancellation of traditional Pride events in June, US gay groups are using virtual gatherings to amplify the voices of people of colour, whose demands for social justice are taking the nation by storm. "Pride started as a riot that was led by two women of colour at
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Stonewall 51 years ago," said Sarah Kate Ellis, chief executive of LGBTQ group GLAAD. "It is part protest, part celebration. I am thrilled that we can really be an ally and can be a presenter of pushing for change and locking arms with the Black Lives Matter movement." Riots at the Stonewall Inn in New York in 1969 were spearheaded by transgender activists Marsha P. Johnson, who was black, and Latina Sylvia Rivera. This year, GLAAD has turned plans for an online drag celebration into a "more substantive discussion around
Not everyone has been so welcoming. Plans by LA Pride to team up with Black Lives Matter for a gathering in Los Angeles were shelved after black activists said they hadn't been sufficiently consulted. Instead, black LGBTQ leaders are organising a solidarity march to protest racial injustice, and LA Pride is supporting the effort. But other initiatives are multiplying. Some 100 black, gay executives and entrepreneurs gathered for a virtual leadership forum on topics like health and social justice organised by Emil Wilbekin, founder of the Native Son black gay empowerment group. "Black gay men are stepping up and leading. And I think it's our time, not just to lead, but to actually be the light and to empower our own community," said Wilbekin.
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TECHNOLOGY
Apple modifies app review process, letting developers 'challenge' guidelines
A
pple Inc said it would let software developers "challenge" the guidelines that govern its app review process and will end its practice of blocking routine bug fixes over minor violations. Apple's App Store is the only way for developers to distribute their software to consumers' iPhones and iPads. Apple keeps between 15% and 30% of revenues generated by developers in the store, making it a key part of its growth strategy as the pace of iPhone upgrades has slowed. To get into the store, apps undergo a review process governed by Apple guidelines. Some rules, such as requiring apps to offer an option to use
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Apple's in-app purchasing and split revenues with the iPhone maker, have become a flash point. Software makers have long been able to appeal Apple's rulings, but several they are frustrated by the fact Apple retains the final say. AWeber, a Pennsylvania-based maker of email marketing software, went back and forth with Apple for months last year over whether it needed to remove account creation links from its app and add in-app purchasing. “They’d flag something, we would make some modifications, and they would flag something different," Tom Kulzer, the
company's chief executive. In a news release, Apple said it will now provide a "mechanism" for developers to "challenge" the guidelines. Apple also said it will no longer delay routine bug fixes over App Store guideline violations unless they relate to "legal issues," instead requiring fixes at the next major release. Developers said those delays angered customers. "The fact you don't learn about it until you're trying to push a bug fix has a really negative impact on customers," said Andy Fowler, chief technology officer at Michigan-based sales software maker Nutshell.
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TECHNOLOGY
Twitter gears up to tackle violent upsurge against women in lockdown
Latin America. "Twitter is a very popular service during crisis. People come to find out what's happening, what's breaking and to get key information on real-time basis," Reen said. The initiative came after the United Nations warned there had been a "horrifying global surge" in domestic violence, with calls to helplines doubling or tripling in some countries, as lockdowns trapped many women indoors with their abusers. The feature is an expansion of Twitter's #ThereIsHelp initiative, which provides similar notifications on issues such as suicide prevention and vaccinations. UN chief Antonio Guterres has called on governments to take urgent measures to tackle the spike in domestic violence and make it a part of national response plans for COVID-19. More than 240 million women and girls aged 15 to 49 worldwide have faced sexual or physical violence by an intimate partner over the past 12 months, UN figures show.
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It says the figure is likely to increase due to health and money worries ratcheting up tensions at home.
witter has launched a new prompt to fight gender-based violence in response to a surge in sexual assaults and domestic attacks during lockdown, a company official said.
violence" or "sexual assault".
The social network said the feature, currently available in 11 countries, directs users to local helpline services if they search for terms such as "domestic
The prompt was introduced across Asia, then expanded to the United States on Wednesday, with notifications in English and Spanish. Next step: Europe and
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"This is the first time that this notification prompt has been made available in multiple locations in multiple languages," said Kathleen Reen, a senior director of Twitter in Asia-Pacific.
"Violence against women and girls across Asia-Pacific is pervasive but at the same time widely under-reported," said Melissa Alvarado, a manager at the UN Women Asia-Pacific, which partners with Twitter on the latest feature. "Connecting women who are feeling fearful or in danger is critical for their safety," she added in a statement.
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TECHNOLOGY
Facebook will label newsworthy posts that break rules as ad boycott widens
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platforms globally for at least 30 days.
acebook Inc will start labeling newsworthy content that violates the social media company's policies, and label all posts and ads about voting with links to authoritative information, including those from politicians. A Facebook spokeswoman confirmed its new policy would have meant attaching a link on voting information to US President Donald Trump's post last month about mail-in ballots. Rival Twitter had affixed a fact-checking label to that post. Facebook has drawn heat from employees and lawmakers over its decisions not to act on inflammatory posts by the president. "There are no exceptions for politicians in any of the policies I'm announcing here today," Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg said in a Facebook post. Zuckerberg also said Facebook would ban ads that claim people from groups based on race, religion, sexual orientation or immigration status are a threat to physical safety or health. The policy changes come during a growing ad boycott campaign, called "Stop Hate for Profit," that was started by several US civil rights groups after the death of George Floyd, to pressure the company to act on hate speech and misinformation. Zuckerberg's address fell short, said Rashad Robinson, president of civil rights group Color Of Change, which is one of the groups behind the boycott campaign.
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One of Facebook's top spenders, consumer goods giant Procter & Gamble Co, pledged to conduct a review of ad platforms and stop spending where it found hateful content. P&G declined to say if it had reached a decision on Facebook.
"What we've seen in today's address from Mark Zuckerberg is a failure to wrestle with the harms FB has caused on our democracy & civil rights," Robinson tweeted. "If this is the response he's giving to major advertisers withdrawing millions of dollars from the company, we can't trust his leadership." Shares of Facebook closed down more than 8% and Twitter ended 7% lower after Unilever PLC said it would stop its US ads on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter for the rest of the year, citing "divisiveness and hate speech during this polarised election period in the US" More than 90 advertisers including Japanese carmaker Honda Motor Co Ltd's US subsidiary, Unilever's Ben & Jerry's, Verizon Communications Inc and The North Face, a unit of VF Corp, have joined the campaign, according to a list by ad activism group Sleeping Giants. Hours after Facebook's announcement, Coca-Cola Co said starting from July 1, it would pause paid advertising on all social media
The campaign specifically asks businesses not to advertise on Facebook's platforms in July, though Twitter has also long been urged to clean up alleged abuses and misinformation on its platform. "We have developed policies and platform capabilities designed to protect and serve the public conversation, and as always, are committed to amplifying voices from under-represented communities and marginalized groups," said Sarah Personette, vice president for Twitter's Global Client Solutions. "We are respectful of our partners' decisions and will continue to work and communicate closely with them during this time." In a statement, a Facebook spokeswoman pointed to its civil rights audit and investments in Artificial Intelligence that allow it to find and take action on hate speech. "We know we have more work to do," she said, noting that Facebook will continue working with civil rights groups, the Global Alliance for Responsible Media, and other experts to develop more tools, technology and policies to "continue this fight."
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Britain's COVID-19 app: The game changer that wasn't Britain's lockdown that began on March 23. At a Downing Street coronavirus briefing, health secretary Matt Hancock announced that testing had begun on what he called the government's "next step – a new NHS app for contact tracing." He explained that people could use the app to report feeling unwell and it would anonymously alert other app users who recently had been in close contact with them. On April 28, he said he expected the app to be ready by mid-May.
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presymptomatic individuals, controlling the epidemic by manual contact tracing is infeasible," concluded the Oxford scientists' paper, which was published in the journal Science.
The origin of the NHS COVID-19 App goes back to a meeting on March 7 when three Oxford scientists met experts at NHSX, the technical arm of the UK's health service. The scientists presented an analysis that concluded manual contact tracing alone couldn't control the epidemic.
The Oxford researchers believed that a smartphone app could help locate individuals who didn't know they were infected – and by alerting them quickly could reduce and even halt the epidemic if enough people used it. Within days of the meeting, NHSX began the process of awarding millions of dollars worth of no-bid contracts to develop such an app, government procurement records show.
"Given the infectiousness of SARS-CoV-2 and the high proportion of transmissions from
In the weeks that followed, ministers seized on the technology as a route out of
s Britain's COVID-19 infections soared in the spring, the government reached for what it hoped could be a game changer – a smartphone app that could automate some of the work of human contact tracers.
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Privately, some researchers who had proposed the app were dismayed that the government had stopped widespread testing on March 12, a decision they believed undermined the app's effectiveness and public health in general. "We were very clear from the start that this thing needed to work with testing," David Bonsall, a clinical scientist at Oxford who attended the March 7 meeting, said. By early May, transport secretary Grant Shapps was heralding a test of the app on England's Isle of Wight. "Later in the month, that app will be rolled out and deployed, assuming the tests are successful, of course, to the population at large," he said. "This is a fantastic way to ensure that we are able to really keep a lid on this going forward." Pat Gelsinger, chief executive of VMware Inc, a Silicon Valley tech firm hired to develop the app, told a Fox Business television
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BRITISH HERALD interviewer, "I tell you, we think this is the best one in the world and we're really thrilled to be working with the NHS in the UK to help bring it about." But by the end of May, government officials were downplaying the app. In an interview with Sky News, Hancock called the app "helpful" but said traditional contact tracing needed to be rolled out first. Quoting another official, he said, "It puts the cherry on the cake but isn't the cake." Behind the scenes, NHSX testers were discovering serious technical problems. The agency had opted to develop an app that collected and stored data on central servers that could be used by health authorities and epidemiologists to study the disease. It relied on a technology called Bluetooth to determine who recently had been near someone displaying symptoms and for how long. NHSX testers were finding that
TECHNOLOGY while the app could detect three-quarters of nearby smartphones using Google's Android operating system, it sometimes could only identify four percent of Apple iPhones, according to government officials. The problem was that, on Apple devices, the app often couldn't utilise Bluetooth because of a design choice by Apple to preserve user privacy and prolong battery life. The issue was no secret. Apple and Google had jointly announced in April that they would release a toolkit to better enable Bluetooth on contacttracing apps. But to protect user privacy, it would only work on apps that stored data on phones, not central servers. The NHSX app didn't work that way. The government insisted it had developed a successful workaround to overcome the Apple issue. But not everyone was convinced. The advocacy group Privacy International, which had tested the app in early May, "found it wasn't working properly on iPhones," Gus Hosein, the
group's executive director, told Reuters. But because of the government's assurances, he said, "We just assumed we were doing something wrong." Other countries, including Germany, decided they would change their apps to work with the Apple-Google toolkit. That raised another problem with the UK app — it likely wouldn't be compatible with many other contact-tracing apps so British travellers wouldn't be notified if they were exposed to the virus. On June 18, weeks after the UK app was supposed to be rolled out, government officials announced a dramatic U-turn — they would abandon the app being tested on the Isle of Wight and try to create one that worked with the Apple-Google technology. Work had already begun on it and they had learned lessons from the test, they said. NHSX referred questions about the app to the health department, which said, "Developing effective contract-tracing technology is a challenge facing countries around the world and there is currently no solution that is accurate enough on estimating distance, identifying other users and calculating duration which are all required for contract tracing." A spokesman for VMware said it "is proud of the work we have done and continue to do to rapidly develop an application to support the UK's contact tracing and testing efforts." A government official expressed confidence the app would be ready by the autumn or winter — although initially, the official said, it might not contain contact tracing at all, but offer other services that are yet to be determined.
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Deep sea mining could destroy undiscovered species, says Ocean Panel
M
ining on the sea floor should not begin before a full assessment of likely environmental impacts can be made, a report commissioned by the High Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy (Ocean Panel) said. Environmentalists including Britain's David Attenborough have called for a ban on deepseabed mining that would extract resources including copper, cobalt, nickel, zinc, lithium, and rare earth elements from nodules on the ocean floor. The International Seabed Authority (ISA), a UN body headquartered in Jamaica, has drawn up regulations on exploration, but has yet to
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establish the rules for exploitation needed for mining to go ahead. The report authored by six academics said deep seabed mining was a "sustainability conundrum". Sea floor nodules contain battery metals needed to fuel the world's transition to clean energy, but trawling the sea floor for them is likely to disrupt ecosystems about which there has been scant research, as they are very difficult to reach. "If mining was to go ahead with the current state of knowledge, species and functions could be lost before they are known and understood," the authors wrote. The ISA is set to discuss
regulation that could allow deep seabed mining in its annual assembly, delayed from July to October this year because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The report said international research should be conducted to fill gaps in knowledge before any seabed mining is allowed, and protected zones should be established across all ocean regions under the ISA's jurisdiction. The authors also recommended countries should encourage the recycling of battery metals to reduce the need to find new supplies. The Ocean Panel brings together heads of state from 14 countries, including Australia, Canada, Chile, Kenya, Japan and Norway.
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WORLD
With no tourists to watch migration, Kenyan operator's planes are grounded that are definitely impacted and effected by (there being) no visitors. All the people who provide groceries, food, the guides, housekeeping, the barmen, its very unfortunate," Avedi said. Many lodges outside Nairobi have been forced to close. However, in the heart of Nairobi's National Park, one campsite run by safari company Gamewatchers reopened on June 12. The camp adheres to strict health guidelines, testing its staff for COVID-19 and checking visitors' temperature.
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or Kenyan-based safari operator Safarilink, June is the busiest time of year, as the company's small planes ferry tourists to national parks in Kenya and Tanzania to witness the majestic annual migration of 2 million animals.
This year, the coronavirus outbreak has brought those adventures in Kenya's Maasai Mara and Tanzania's Serengeti to a halt. Like other African airlines, Safarilink Aviation grounded its planes in March after Kenya closed its borders and stopped air travel, part of efforts to curb the spread of the disease.
"The feeling that today we have opened up even with the conditions is great," said Joseph Lelenguya, the manager of Nairobi Tented Camp. Most of its visitors at the moment are people who live in Nairobi, like Pierre Chaumont, who moved to Kenya from France seven years ago. "We saw lions this morning, buffalo, wild ostrich," Chaumont told Reuters. But it will take time for foreign tourists and their dollars to come back, Avedi said. "It might take a 2- to 3-year recovery," he said.
"During this period, we carry, just going to the Mara, about 10,000 passengers per month," said Alex Avedi, Safarilink Aviation's CEO. "As you can see all the aircraft are parked, there is no one going to see this magnificent spectacle." Safari lovers typically flock to the region hoping to witness hundreds of thousands of wildebeest that run the gauntlet of hungry crocodiles as they cross the Mara river in search of greener pastures on the Kenya-Tanzania border. Across Africa, wildlife reserves and parks have closed their gates as tourists stay home, hitting the continent's multi-billion-dollar tourist industry and leading to job cuts and loss of income for thousands. "There is a whole community around those conservancies
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WORLD
LGBT+ community in Gabon fears backlash after vote to legalise gay sex Gabon passed a law in July 2019 that punished sex between people of the same gender with up to six months imprisonment and a fine of 5 million CFA francs ($8,664). While the vote to allow samesex intimacy was met with glee by many in the LGBT+ community, others feared a backlash. "It is a good thing that this has happened and I am happy. But I will not be surprised if there's a riot in the near future and that forces the government to put the law back in place," said Didier, a gay Gabonese man. "Some said the president should lead the way and become gay since he wants to turn the country gay - because that is what they think this move means," said Didier, who declined to give his full name for fear of homophobic violence.
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abon's LGBT+ community said they feared a homophobic backlash after the lower house of parliament voted to legalise gay sex, less than a year after making it a crime. Forty-eight members of parliament voted to revise a 2019 law that criminalised same-sex relations, while 24 voted against and 25 abstained. To become law, the Senate also needs to approve the proposal.
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"The major part of the citizens are against it," Leslie Obuo, an LGBT+ journalist based in Gabon. Gabon's government did not respond to requests for comment. Gay sex is illegal most African countries. Botswana and Angola decriminalised samesex relations in 2019 but large populations of religious conservatives in Africa, including in Uganda, Kenya and Nigeria, oppose LGBT+ rights.
Thibault, a gay lawyer in the capital, Libreville, who also declined to publish his full name, said he was surprised at the government's U-turn, especially during the COVID-19 pandemic. "Just them starting this has stirred up homophobia and when or if it is passed, I expect that the law will be met with resistance from the general population," he said. "Riots and violence against the community will probably peak and eventually the government might do another U-turn."
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WORLD
Some countries using virus curbs to 'silence critics', ex-leaders warn
health emergencies, said IDEA's secretary-general. Among the countries he cited as having introduced authoritarian measures or having fallen short on accountability were the Philippines, Hungary, El Salvador and Turkey. "There are legitimate reasons to invoke emergency powers. However, it is always problematic when a government uses emergency powers to clamp down on independent media and other fundamental rights," said Kevin Casas-Zamora, also a former vice-president and government minister in Costa Rica.
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he COVID-19 pandemic has led to a surge in authoritarian behaviour by governments around the world, posing a growing threat to democracy, hundreds of former prime ministers, presidents, Nobel laureates and lawmakers have warned. The virus was first identified in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in December and has since spread around the world, prompting countries across Europe, Asia, the Americas and Africa to step in, many limiting free movement, free speech, public assembly and other civic rights. "Authoritarian regimes, not surprisingly, are using the crisis to silence critics and tighten their political grip," wrote some 500 signatories, including more than 60 former leaders, in an open letter organised by the Stockholm-based Institute
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for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA). "Even some democratically elected governments are fighting the pandemic by amassing emergency powers that restrict human rights and enhance state surveillance without regard to legal constraints (or) parliamentary oversight." More than 80 countries have enacted emergency measures, according to the US-based International Center for NonProfit Law, ranging from curfews and fines for those who breach the rules to extra surveillance, censorship and increased executive powers. The overall impact has been a dilution of democratic norms, which has implications for political freedom as well as the ability of governments to handle the crisis and future
"We want to draw attention to the plight of democracy in the midst of this crisis. It's not protecting democracy for its own sake; it's that democracy has an inherent value in dealing with this pandemic and preparing for the next one." The outbreak has already led to the postponement or cancellation of 66 elections worldwide, a third of them national polls, according to IDEA. Nearly 50 countries have imposed some form of restriction on press freedom, 21 of them democracies. For the signatories, including Fernando Henrique Cardoso, the former president of Brazil, and Jeb Bush, the former governor of Florida, a fundamental concern is that citizens begin to accept more authoritarian behaviour. "Democracy is under threat, and people who care about it must summon the will, the discipline, and the solidarity to defend it. At stake are the freedom, health, and dignity of people everywhere," they wrote.
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As COVID-19 races up the Amazon River, health services struggle to keep up As the coronavirus outbreak in Brazil rockets past 1 million cases, more than anywhere outside the United States, the frontlines have shifted increasingly from modern hospitals in major cities to poor, remote corners of this massive country. The cities of Belem and Macapa at the mouth of the Amazon River emerged as major coronavirus hotspots in April and May. The virus has since spread deep into surrounding rural areas.
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fter days suffering from shortness of breath, 49-year-old Andrelina Bizerra da Silva fainted suddenly.
Her family, Brazilian acai berry farmers on a tributary of the Amazon River, put her in a small boat with an outboard motor and raced down the winding Acuti Pereira River to the nearest health clinic in the town of Portel.
negative thoughts among us," said her nephew Felipe Costa Silva, after making the return trip with her coffin in the same boat. "How long is this going to last for? How many people are going to die?"
Reuters spent a week accompanying medical professionals in their battle with the pandemic near Marajo Island, which splits the Amazon in two as it approaches the Atlantic Ocean. In isolated settlements built on stilts along the river, most households survive on fishing and harvesting local fruits,
Without tests to confirm if she had COVID-19 or sufficient facilities to treat her if she did, officials at that outpost directed them further downriver to the biggest hospital nearby, in the town of Breves. Six hours had passed by the time they reached Breves. Silva was already dead. "To be honest, there are a lot of
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WORLD residents. She and her mother had come down with headaches and flu-like symptoms, but their coronavirus cases were not confirmed until medical workers visited their home, tucked far up a tributary. Their sickness had kept them from work. Costa said she was scraping by with a monthly subsidy of 600 reais ($116) from the federal government. For many residents, the pandemic marks their first contact with the public health system. It is a relief for some, but can bring a gnawing anxiety as treatment means sending relatives far downriver.
earning just a few dollars a day. Social distancing is nearly impossible in wooden shacks built close together. Many lack phones and it can take a day or more to reach health clinics. The coronavirus has taken root here, killing scores and infecting hundreds more, public health records show. Severe infections are often identified and treated late, when odds are against the patients.
Portel, a small town just across the river from Marajo Island. He leads a sprawling team of medics that routinely travel hours on end, often battling unpredictable currents and fastapproaching weather fronts. Maria Luiza Costa, a manioc farmer, is one of those isolated
Andreza Lima de Cruz, 25, watched as doctors on a floating ambulance motored away with her father to the hospital in Portel after he tested positive for the coronavirus. "We know that arriving there, there's no certainty that he'll come back," Lima said. "I honestly want him to stay here. But we have to think of him as well."
Yet public health professionals put on a brave face, making house calls and ferrying patients on hours-long boat trips. "It's quite complicated because of the difficulty of access," said Alex Glaison, a medic, after treating a patient in their riverside home. "What keeps us going is getting results." Some residents live 36 hours from the town center, turning healthcare into a logistical nightmare, said Nizomar Junior, the municipal health secretary in
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Africa's unsung army of women wages war on COVID-19 pandemic Now, as transmission of the new coronavirus spreads, women like Omondi are essential foot soldiers in the war on COVID-19. Charities such as Catholic Relief Services, which is supporting coronavirus training for about 5,000 community health volunteers in Kenya, say this workforce is key.
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rmed with a face mask, notebook and pen, Everlyne Akinyi Omondi sets out each morning from her one-room home in Nairobi's informal settlement of Kawangware to do a job few others would contemplate in a pandemic. As cases of the new coronavirus climb and Kenyans are told to stay home and avoid human contact, 38-year-old Omondi moves house to house through Kawangware's maze of narrow lanes. Standing at the doorways of the cramped, corrugated houses, she talks about COVID-19, shows residents how to wash hands or don a mask, patiently answering their questions. "I know there are risks of contracting the virus, but I don't feel so scared. I have made a pledge to keep my community safe," said Omondi, turning to reprimand a group of children crowded around her for not maintaining social distancing rules.
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"You see how small and close together the places where we live are. We have to make sure people understand how they can stop corona from spreading. Here, if one person gets it, everyone can." The mother of three is not a doctor, nurse or medic of any sort - just one of tens of thousands of ordinary African women who, without fanfare, battle the virus in their communities. Poorly paid or not at all, these unsung armies of mostly female community health workers have for years doled out advice and health services to families living in remote villages and urban slums who lack formal support. Recruited and trained by government and charities - they are found from Kenya to Tanzania, Ethiopia to Malawi, Liberia to South Africa - the women go door to door, dispensing advice on everything from family planning to immunisations.
"Community health volunteers are not given the recognition they deserve, but they are important frontline workers. They have a wide range of knowledge and experience from dealing with cholera outbreaks to malaria prevention," said Moses Orinda, CRS's senior project officer in Kenya. "For COVID-19, they have the ability to contact trace, provide support to home-based patients and conduct essential prevention and control activities," Orinda said.
Community Transmission The COVID-19 virus has infected close to 10 million people and killed almost half a million worldwide, according to Johns Hopkins University. Initially the virus multiplied more slowly in Africa than in Asia or Europe, but all 54 nations on the continent are now infected, with more than 330,000 cases and over 8,800 deaths combined, says the African Union's Centre for Disease Control. South Africa, Egypt and Nigeria have recorded most cases, but experts say true numbers may be much higher as many nations
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lack reliable diagnostic or testing capabilities. With densely-packed slums, poor access to water, widespread disease and weak health systems, many countries will struggle to control the fast-spreading virus, they add. "For now, Africa still only accounts for a small fraction of cases worldwide," said Matshidiso Moeti, the World Health Organization (WHO) Africa director. "But the pace of the spread is quickening. Swift and early action by African countries has helped to keep numbers low, but constant vigilance is needed to stop COVID-19 from overwhelming health facilities." More than half of African countries have witnessed community transmission - cases where patients have no travel history or known contact with infected people - suggesting the virus is moving undetected in the population, says WHO.
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The warning from WHO is stark: up to 190,000 Africans could die if containment measures such as contact tracing, isolation, personal hygiene and distancing are not improved.
'Invisible' Armies Already known and respected, community health workers are a perfect first-line response to a pandemic, say health experts. Raj Panjabi, of Harvard Medical School and CEO of Last Mile Health, said community health workers showed their value when another deadly virus hit in Liberia. "When Ebola threatened to bring humanity to its knees, informal community providers stepped up to learn the signs and symptoms of Ebola, to team up with nurses and doctors, to go door to door to find the sick and get them into care," he said. "You couldn't have stopped the epidemic without a ground force of these community members."
This is not hard to believe.
One of their key jobs is busting myths and slaying stigmas.
Many cities are home to sprawling, overcrowded settlements, housing tens of thousands of people, where the key to containing the spread - hand-washing and social distancing - are a luxury.
A belief that only whites get the virus or that it can be cured with hot, sweet tea is rampant, while mass testing is elusive due to the stigma a positive result can carry.
In Kawangware, there is scant access to water or the space for self-isolation. Families of five live in one-room shacks. There is no piped water and households share toilets. According to the United Nations, only 14% of Kenyans have the facilities to wash their hands at home with soap and water.
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Government health officials say the women have built up trust through years of contact so locals are happy to pay heed. "We know that they can pass messages on which sometimes the government cannot. They live in the same communities and have good social standing, so it is much easier for them to do provide information," said
Catherine Mugo, a sub-county community strategy coordinator at Kenya's ministry of health. Mugo isn't far wrong. As Omondi wends through the knot of narrow alleys that make up Kawangware, residents rush out to greet her, children give chase, and women break off from hanging washing for her advice. What to do if there is no money for soap? Borrowing a bucket, water and bleach, she shows them how to make a safe chlorine solution strong enough to kill the virus. Some can't afford to buy face masks for running errands. Stay home, she orders; send out somebody who does own one. "Everlyne is good. She has brought us new information," said resident Patrick Gitonga. "She has shown us new ways." Health professionals and charity workers say governments need to value this workforce - to give them a living wage as well as the personal protective equipment needed to work safely. Omondi, who has been working as a community health volunteer for 10 years without pay and is responsible for 100 households in her neighbourhood, would welcome some recognition. "Having a salary or some stipend would be really useful," said Omondi, whose five-strong family struggles to get by. "But you know, most of us are doing this work because we have something in (our) heart that tells us that we cannot let our neighbour suffer."
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In conflict-hit countries, coronavirus testing may not reach women
to report the sex and age breakdown of confirmed COVID-19 cases so it can analyse who is affected most. Fewer than half of globally confirmed cases had been reported with sex and age data, so any interpretation of gender differences should be done with caution, said the WHO in May. As of this week the disease had infected about 9 million people and killed almost half a million worldwide. Studies in China, Europe and the United States have shown that men are more likely than women to be hospitalised and die of coronavirus. But they have not shown the gender gap in confirmed cases that set off warning signals for the IRC. In most of Europe, the numbers of cases are roughly equal between men and women. "The numbers do not add up," said Mearns.
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ig gaps between the number of male and female coronavirus cases in parts of Africa and the Middle East suggest that women may be struggling to access testing or care, an aid agency said. In Pakistan, Afghanistan and Yemen, more than 70% of reported cases were male, compared to a global average of 51%, and the same was true in Central African Republic, Chad and Somalia, said the
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International Rescue Committee (IRC). "What we are seeing is a situation in which women are potentially being left out of testing and their health deprioritised," said Stacey Mearns, senior technical advisor of emergency health at the IRC. "This could have serious ramifications for their physical wellbeing." The World Health Organization (WHO) has urged countries
Testing is extremely limited in most low-income countries, and even more so in conflict zones, which is where the biggest gender gaps occurred, said the IRC. Women in conflict-hit areas often have difficulty accessing health services due to gender discrimination and inequality, the agency added. Globally, experts have warned that women may suffer the brunt of the virus' impact because they are less likely to have health care, more likely to take on unpaid work and more likely to lose their jobs.
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WORLD
‘Black Lives Matter’ movement stirs Ghanaian artist in COVID-19 limbo standing in front of the workin-progress in her studio at the Black Rock Senegal residency. She has a rare perspective on the Black experience after growing up surrounded by white people in communist East Germany, the daughter of a Ghanaian father and German mother. "I was always standing out too much," recalled Opoku, who now calls Accra home. "I learned to resist the racist energy and hate against coloured people in East Germany, especially after the wall came down."
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tear slipped down the cheek of GhanaianGerman artist Zohra Opoku as she recalled how the global Black Lives Matter had kindled her pain and anger while she was stranded away from home due to coronavirus lockdowns.
images of an unidentified face from ancient Egyptian art. Some are printed in red and tumble from a screenprint of Opoku's face like teardrops.
The quest for identity is a central theme in her work. In earlier self-portraits, Opoku obscured her face with plants. In her latest series, she combines images of bare tree branches from her native Germany with dissected photos of herself.
The protests "have shaken us and awakened us and sharpened our senses about what kind of world we want to live in," she said,
"I've always been interested in disappearing in an environment because of my upbringing," she said.
After Senegal closed its borders in March, the internationally renowned visual artist had no option but to remain at a residency in Dakar, where she had been creating large textile collages to explore her selfimage after a cancer diagnosis. When the death of George Floyd in US police custody sparked a global reckoning over racial injustice and oppression, the 44-year-old stitched a new piece in tribute to the movement. 'Say Their Names' is a white and indigo-dyed canvas onto which Opoku has sewn dozens of
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FINANCE ASIA
From tubs to toilets, Vietnam hotel opens with gold-plated pizzazz
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five-star hotel in the Vietnamese capital of Hanoi has opened with a twist that it hopes will attract guests with intimately expensive tastes: gold-plated bath tubs, basins and even toilets, all housed behind a massive golden exterior. The Dolce Hanoi Golden Lake Hotel has made the extra effort to bring visitors back to Vietnam where the tourism sector is slowly reopening after a three-month coronavirus lockdown. The hotel, owned by Hoa Binh Group and managed by US-based Wyndham Hotels & Resorts Inc stands in stark contrast to its surrounding weather-worn Soviet-era buildings. "At the moment, there is no other hotel like this in the world," said Nguyen Huu Duong, majority owner and chairman of Hoa Binh Group.
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Hotel facilities include a 24 carat gold-tiled infinity pool on the rooftop, while inside guest rooms, bathrooms are laced with yellow metal. From $250 a night, the hotel is in the same price bracket as rival luxury accommodation in the city. "It has changed my mind about what luxury can be. Other luxury hotels usually use marble as tiles, but here everything is gold-plated down to the washing basin," said 62-year-old guest Luong Van Thuan, himself a hotel owner. Vietnam has been relatively successful in containing the coronavirus outbreak with only 350 or so cases and no reported deaths. Duong said if not for the pandemic, the hotel would likely be fully booked with international guests. Around a tonne of gold was used to cover the hotel, said Duong, a Vietnam War veteran and former cycle taxi driver who made his fortune in construction and property. He is planning gold-plated projects in Ho Chi Minh City and a resort in central Vietnam.
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China’s Belt and Road initiative in a post-COVID world Shiv Shanker Nair
The Headlines In the Feb. 17 issue of Time magazine, in a lead article headlined “The Coronavirus Outbreak Could Derail Xi Jinping’s Dreams of a Chinese Century” their political columnist wrote “the crisis has already demonstrated that the centralisation of political power under Xi has made Chinese society brittle. The question now is what it will endure before it begins to crack”. The South China Morning Post in an article around the same time predicted “Closure of overseas markets to hit exports, while psychological scars, bankruptcy and job losses will hit domestic demand”.
Quite a few other western economic and political pundits have predicted everything from resurgent quasi-independent Hong Kong to a collapse of the One Belt One Road (OBOR) initiative with billions in losses to the Chinese government. Asia expert Parag Khanna compared the effects of COVID-19 on the OBOR initiative to that of the plague in the Middle Ages that effectively shut down the Silk Road, the main trade artery between the Orient and the Occident. According to Khanna, author of The Future Is Asian, mistrust of China and its Belt and Road infrastructure initiative was already growing. The current global pandemic will only add to that. The crisis will force China to accelerate its efforts to bring
other nations to the table to cofund and co-manage its Belt and Road projects. In an interview with CBC he said, “I did not call my book The Future is Chinese, I called the book the Future is Asian for a good reason because China has never been number one in the world and it is never been number one in all of Asia, because Asia, inherently, is so diverse. You have the Indian civilisation, Japanese civilisation. Russia is actually an Asian power, Persia, I mean Iran, Korea, Australia, India. The United States is still a major military presence, there are many balancing powers to contain China’s rise, so the notion that has taken hold over the last 20 years, that China is inevitably destined to be number one, and the prominent global power on the planet Earth was always a complete myth, it was always wrong.” Based on my quarter of a century in working with Chinese SOEs and with the Chinese as a people “I have to paraphrase Mark Twain’s often quoted quip “The rumours of the demise of the Chinese economy are vastly exaggerated”. It is true that that the Chinese economy has taken a major hit.
The Facts Let us look at the human cost first. On April 3, according to Official Chinese MOH sources, Coronavirus cases in total were 81,620, of these deaths totalled 3,322 and recoveries were 76,571; active cases were 1,727.
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ASIA prevention and control, 71.43 billion yuan of which has been used. The fiscal authority also increases the 1.85 trillion yuan of the quota of newly issued local government bonds to mitigate the adverse impact of the epidemic. From January to February, nearly 70% of the quota (approximately 1.2 trillion yuan) of local government bonds had been issued. On March 13, in response to the global financial panic, the central bank cut the targeted reserve requirement ratio by 0.5 to 1 percentage points, which released 550 billion yuan of long-term funds.
The Pushback In terms of economic costs, the impact on the Chinese economy has been catastrophic. As COVID-19 spreads from China to over 90 countries across the world, the country's economic growth could hit its lowest point since 1990. According to the worst-case scenario projected by over 40 economists, China's GDP growth could fall as low as to 2.4 percent in the first quarter of 2020, and five percent for the whole year. The two graphs from the BBC allow us to visualise the massive drop in industrial production. According to the Chinese National Bureau of Statistics, in the first quarter of 2020, exports dropped 16 percent, retail sales 20.5 percent, fixed asset investment 24.5 percent. And surprisingly, the NBS admitted that one measure of unemployment topped six percent. To avoid an economic meltdown, the Chinese government has adopted a package of policies to support the resumption of work and production, including
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fiscal, monetary, financial and trade policies. To maintain market liquidity and meet the needs for working capital and other financing, the People’s Bank of China (PBC) eased the credit market through conventional policy instruments, including open market operations, the reserve requirement ratio, loan facilities, refinancing, and rediscount policies. Chinese financial institutions also implemented a series of financial support measures, especially for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs), including reducing interest rates, increasing debt rollovers and renewal loans, and providing specific credit lines for the resumption of production. The central bank encouraged online financial companies such as Ant Financial to ease financing for small and micro businesses. The central government also launched a package of policies to stabilise international trade and foreign investment and continues to open the market. By March 4, the Ministry of Finance arranged a total of 110.48 billion yuan of special funds for epidemic
Since the middle of March, when China announced that the situation in the country had stabilised, China’s mighty manufacturing machine — which accounts for a quarter of the world’s manufacturing output — showed glimmers of revving up again. According to The New York Times, “Airbus, the European aircraft maker, said that it began to reopen its narrow-body jet assembly operations last week in Tianjin but that it would only gradually increase production, whilst implementing all required health and safety measures.” Airbus needs the production: It acknowledged that it could not meet global demand for narrow-body jets, which airlines are clamouring for after the grounding of Boeing’s 737 Max jet. The Tianjin plant has a targeted production rate of six jets per month. Volkswagen has partially restarted one of its 15 assembly plants in China. General Motors has begun a gradual process to reopen its more than a dozen assembly plants, and Hyundai
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BRITISH HERALD had restarted most of its Chinese production by last week. Caterpillar, the heavy equipment company, has said it that it has reopened most plants in China and Honda restarted production in the middle of March. China’s consumer electronics components factories have slowly reopened and by the last week of March, practically all had reopened except those in Wuhan. However, with the exception of factories producing medical protective equipment, which the Chinese government has asked to run around the clock, few businesses seem to be returning yet to their previous pace. However, there are structural impediments to demand in China that will at least for this summer restrict consumer spending and impact on manufacturing. Many leading economists feel that China is set for a “W-shaped” pattern of economic activity. In such a pattern, the economy nose-dives when most businesses close during lockdowns and then seems to recover when factories and stores reopen. But with many consumers still scared of infection and leery of spending money, the economy then dips a second time before embarking on a more sustainable recovery. Tens of millions of migrant workers are unemployed. Estimates of overall unemployment run as high as 20 percent. Many white-collar workers have suffered pay cuts. In such a scenario government fiscal introduction is the key to riding out the second half of the “W”. Interestingly enough at the National Peoples’ Congress in Beijing, President Xi Jin Pei
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ASIA announced a raft of fiscal policies to kick start the economy and stimulate consumer demand.
The abdication of US Global Leadership After World War II, America leveraged its newfound superpower status to build an international order of rules and institutions which, while not perfect, have brought us the most peaceful and prosperous 70 years of human history. Concurrently, even during the more than four-decade-long Cold War, the US managed to exercise leadership with its prime adversary, the Soviet Union. They worked together where national interests overlapped such as on non-proliferation and arms control to help minimise Mutually Assured Destruction which could have ended life as we know it, and the eradication of the age-old scourge of smallpox, in cooperation with the World Health Organization (WHO), that annually had killed millions. Since President Donald Trump took office, in sharp contrast to its previous often constructive leadership, the US is not merely missing in action internationally, it's generally characterised by dysfunction, divisiveness and disaster. Nothing illustrates this more starkly than the COVID-19 pandemic. President Trump’s America-first policies, contempt for multilateral organisations and testy relationships with other world leaders are contributing to what many see as a surprising lack of global unity and coordination in combating the COVID-19 pandemic. It is usually the US president who would lead such an effort in times of global emergency. With Trump’s unembellished nationalism and his efforts to blame first China and then WHO for the coronavirus, and his various misstatements of fact,
America no longer serves the planet. As the US has receded from global leadership, China has filled the vacuum in numerous multinational organisations in both human resources and funding. Having stemmed the initial outbreak on its own soil, the regime of Xi Jinping sent aid, including desperately needed medical masks and ventilators, to hard-hit Italy and Serbia as well as the European Union more generally. The head of one of China’s biggest companies, Jack Ma of Alibaba, offered test kits and masks to the United States — along with 54 countries in Africa.
China’s post-COVID foreign policy and the redesigned BRI With the global economy gasping for breath in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, talks of a reconstruction plan to resuscitate ailing economies are beginning to surface, a conversation around the Marshall Plan being invoked in many quarters. How will a 2020 Marshall-esque Plan pan out? Who will fund and lead the reconstruction this time around, in a debt-laden world with governments struggling to keep economies from failing? In today's context, as the question of who is in a position to lead a post COVID-19 reconstruction is asked, the answer that follows is almost a reflexive one: China. The Marshall Plan, however, was defined as “a programme designed to rehabilitate the economies of 17 western and southern European countries in order to create stable conditions in which democratic institutions
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ASIA Gone are the days of massive loans to build infrastructure using Chinese labour. What is now envisaged is a new “Peoples Partnership”, where Chinese SOEs will invest in concessions worldwide, to build infrastructure that is critical both for the host country as well as for Chinese commercial and political interest. Partnerships with western operators and where possible outright acquisition of western companies with experience of operating concessions will ensure commercial paybacks of investments.
could survive.” Even the most ardent fans of China will admit that Chinese foreign policy is not aimed at creating stable conditions in which democratic institutions thrive. Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is Xi Jinping’s signature foreign policy agenda to build traditional and digital infrastructure around the world. China has constructed its loosely governed $1 trillion infrastructure initiative to ensure that Beijing reaps many of the benefits, but this structure of governance has also created significant foreign dependencies upon China. Most BRI infrastructure contracts are given to Chinese companies, most projects rely overwhelmingly on Chinese labour and supplies, and BRI depends on the availability of massive amounts of cheap credit from Chinese banks. In becoming the epicentre of a global public health crisis with far-reaching economic consequences, China has also revealed the inherent vulnerabilities of an international initiative that is governed through its reliance on Beijing. It is my opinion that post-COVID the outlook is far from bleak. As
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China seeks to share its valuable experience of battling COVID-19 with other BRI countries, one key area of potential will be in projects focused on strengthening the health systems of low-income countries, even if focused on soft processes rather than hard infrastructure. This would be a potential area where China is likely to publicise its efforts as being a part of the BRI. Beyond the short-term, changes to global supply chains will bring new opportunities for diversification through joint activity with others in both North and Southeast Asia. There is also potential for accelerated digital BRI activity in relation to Chinese tech companies, especially given the new digital RMB that was recently unveiled. In my interaction with senior Chinese colleagues both in government and in the state-owned enterprises that have traditionally been the beneficiaries of OBOR, it is clear that a new radically redesigned BRI will be unveiled at the National People’s Congress.
The target countries are Eastern and Central Europe, Latin America and the Pacific islands. Recent Chinese investments in Latin America were a test bed for the new policy. Prime amongst them is the contract to build and operate the Bogota metro (China harbour) and the Third Bridge over the Panama Canal. Chinese companies are in negotiations to acquire concessions over at least two major ports in Brazil and to build and operate a deep-water port in Surinam. Negotiations are also ongoing to build and operate oil storage facilities along the African coast and to build and operate a 1,600km railway line to bring bauxite from the mine to the port in Guinea. In the Philippines, Chinese contractors are discussing building a network of toll bridges to connect the Visayas islands. All these multimillion-dollar projects create jobs in the recipient countries, bind them closer to a more benevolent China that is seen to be willing to invest when no one else dared, and more importantly open markets for Chinese companies. Best of all, unlike loan projects, there is no stigma and the Chinese make a handsome return on their capital.
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HEALTH
Vaccine makers face biggest medical manufacturing challenge in history to address a critical shortage in automated filling and finishing capacity - the final step in the manufacturing process of putting the vaccine into vials or syringes, sealing them and packaging them up for shipping. "This is the biggest logistical challenge the world has ever faced," said Toby Peters, an engineering and technology expert at Britain's Birmingham university. "We could be looking at vaccinating 60% of the population."
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eveloping a COVID-19 vaccine in record time will be tough. Producing enough to end the pandemic will be the biggest medical manufacturing feat in history.
That work is underway From deploying experts amid global travel restrictions to managing extreme storage conditions, and even inventing new kinds of vials and syringes for billions of doses, the path is strewn with formidable hurdles, according to interviews with more than a dozen vaccine developers and their backers. Any hitch in an untested supply chain - which could stretch from Pune in India to England's Oxford and Baltimore in the United
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States - could torpedo or delay the complex process. Col. Nelson Michael, director of the US Army's Center for Infectious Disease Research who is working on the government's "Warp Speed" project to deliver a vaccine at scale by January, said companies usually have years to figure this stuff out.
"Now, they have weeks" Much of the world's attention is focused on the scientific race to develop a vaccine. But behind the scenes, experts are facing a stark reality: we may simply not have enough capacity to make, package and distribute billions of doses all at once. Companies and governments are racing to scale-up machinery
Several developers, including frontrunner Moderna, are experimenting with new ways to mitigate the extreme cold storage demands of their vaccines, which at present need to be kept at minus 80 degrees Celsius (-112 Fahrenheit). SiO2 Materials Science is working on producing vials that won't shatter at super-cold temperatures. Travel restrictions, meanwhile, are posing more prosaic problems; Johnson & Johnson, which plans to start clinical trials this summer, has struggled to send its vaccine experts to oversee the launch of production sites, for example.
'Never In History' By setting up massive clinical trials involving 10,000 to 30,000 volunteers per vaccine, scientists hope to get an answer on whether a vaccine works as early as this October. But even
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BRITISH HERALD if they succeed, manufacturing in bulk, getting regulators to sign off and packaging billions of doses is a monumental challenge. Seth Berkley, chief executive of the GAVI vaccines alliance, said in reality, the world is unlikely to go straight from having zero vaccines to having enough doses for everyone. "It's likely to be a tailored approach to start with," he said in an interview. "We're looking to have something like one to two billion doses of vaccine in the first year, spread out over the world population." J&J has partnered with the US government on a $1 billion investment to speed development and production of its vaccine, even before it's proven to work. It has contracted Emergent Biosolutions and Catalent to manufacture in bulk in the United States. Catalent will also do some fill-and-finish work. "Never in history has so much vaccine been developed at the same time - so that capacity doesn't exist," said Paul Stoffels, J&J's chief scientific officer, who sees filling
HEALTH capacity as the main limiting factor. Emergent's manufacturing plant in Bayview, Maryland, can accommodate four vaccines in parallel using different manufacturing platforms and equipment. Funded by the government in 2012, the plant includes singleuse disposable bioreactor equipment featuring plastic bags rather than stainless steel fermentation equipment, which makes it easier to switch from one vaccine to another. The company received an additional $628 million to make those four suites available to support any candidate the government selects, CEO Bob Kramer said.
Blow-Fill-SealRepeat As well as working with J&J, New Jersey-based Catalent signed a deal with British drugmaker AstraZeneca to provide vial-filling
and packaging services at its plant in Anagni, Italy. It aims to handle hundreds of millions of doses, starting as early as August 2020 and possibly running through until March 2022. It has ordered high-speed vial-filling equipment to boost output at its Indiana plant, where it is also hiring an additional 300 workers. Michael Riley, Catalent's North American president for biologics, said his biggest challenge was trying to compress work that normally takes years into months. Adding to the challenge is that glass vials are in short supply. To save glass, companies plan to use larger vials of five to 20 doses - but this raises new problems, such as potential waste, if not all the doses are used before the vaccine spoils. "The downside is that after a healthcare practitioner opens a vial, they need to then vaccinate 20 people in a short, 24-hour time," said Prashant Yadav, a global healthcare supply-chain expert at the Center for Global Development in Washington. As part of the same drive, the US Department of Health and Human Services and the Department of Defense have awarded ApiJect Systems up to $138 million to upgrade its facilities to be able to make up to 100 million plastic pre-filled syringes by the end of this year, and as many as 600 million in 2021. The company plans to use a technology called Blow-Fill-Seal, where syringes are blown out of plastic, filled with vaccine and sealed in seconds. This will need Food and Drug Administration approval, CEO Jay Walker told.
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Breaking Cold Chain SiO2 Materials Science is, meanwhile, ramping up capacity of plastic vials with a glass lining, which are more stable at ultralow temperatures. "You can bring us down to minus 196 Celsius, which none of the vaccines need," Chief Business Officer Lawrence Ganti said. "You can throw it against the wall and it doesn't break. Our founder has done that. He's thrown frozen vials at me." The company expects to boost production from the current 5-10 million vials a year to 120 million within three-and-a-half months, he said. Once packaged, many vaccines need to be kept cold - and some leading contenders made from genetic material such as messenger RNA need to be kept very cold - presenting another challenge that may limit access. "People who work with mRNA store it at minus 80 degrees centigrade, which is not something you're gonna find in most pharmacies or doctor's offices," said Dr. Paul Offit, director of the Vaccine Education Center at Children's Hospital of Philadelphia and co-inventor of the rotavirus vaccine. Peters of Birmingham university has been gathering data from poorer regions of Africa and Asia, and said breaks in the temperature-controlled supply chain - "cold chain" - are already frequent. In some places, it is common to lose 25% or more of vaccines because of broken cold chains, he said. "So if you're looking to manufacture four billion, and you reckon you're going to lose 25%, then you have to manufacture
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five billion," he said. "It's all the elements to move it from the point of manufacture to the point of aggregation, right down to the health centres and then out to the community."
Quarantine Quagmire Companies developing mRNA vaccines, including Moderna and Translate Bio, which is partnering with Sanofi are working to make candidates stable at higher temperatures. Ron Renaud, CEO of Translate Bio, said he was confident this would happen "within a short amount of time". Colleen Hussey, a Moderna spokeswoman, said: "We are getting more confident that we could run our supply chain at -20C, which is an easier storage condition than deep freezing," she said. Moderna plans to add a small
period of time in which the vaccine can be stored at normal fridge temperatures of 2 to 8 degrees Celsius in doctors' offices or clinics. "We will know more in the next 2-3 months," she said. The pandemic is also presenting obstacles of a less technical nature. Catalent, which has some 30 plants globally, has had to write special permission slips in eight languages explaining that their workers are considered essential. J&J is having trouble getting experienced personnel to far-flung labs to oversee the transfer of technology to contract manufacturers because they're subject to 14-day quarantines. "It is absolutely a factor," said Stoffels. "If you have to send your people to the middle of India to get to filling capacity, that's not easy at the moment."
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ENTERTAINMENT
Black artists call on Hollywood to prove Black Lives Matter
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ore than 300 Black actors and filmmakers, including Idris Elba, Queen Latifah and Billy Porter, asked Hollywood to divest in the police and invest in anti-racist content. An open letter addressed to "Our Allies in Hollywood" attacked what it called the industry's "legacy of white supremacy" and said Hollywood "encourages the epidemic of police violence and culture of anti-Blackness."
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The letter, organised by the group Hollywood 4 Black Lives, was written in the midst of a cultural and political reckoning in the United States about systemic racism and mass protests about the killing of Black people by police. Specific demands included abolishing the employment of police officers on sets and putting pressure on Los
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employ more Black people with executive, budget and green lighting powers.
Angeles city authorities to reduce budgets for policing. It called on the movie and television industry to "end the intentional glorification of police brutality and corruption in our storytelling" and for studios to
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Long-running police TV shows "Live PD" and "Cops" were canceled earlier this month. Multiple celebrities, including talk show hosts Jimmy Kimmel and Jimmy Fallon, and "30 Rock" creator Tina Fey have issued public apologies for wearing black face or depicting white characters made up as Black people. "It is time for Hollywood to acknowledge its role and take on the responsibility of repairing the damage and being a proactive
part of the change," the letter said. According to a report on diversity in Hollywood published in February by the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), people of colour took 27.6% of lead roles in top films for 2019, almost triple the percentage in 2011. Heads of movie studios were 91% white and 82% male, according to the UCLA report. Signatories to the letter included campaign groups Black Lives Matter and Color of Change, as well as actors Viola Davis, Tiffany Haddish, Janelle Monae, Mahershala Ali, Laverne Cox, Cynthia Erivo and "Black Panther" star Chadwick Boseman.
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SPORTS
Punching through the pandemic: Kenyan boxing club gives kids a break ensuring they don't engage in evils found in the slums. Also staying fit is a way of fighting the virus." Since the club opened its doors in 1985, it has trained several professional boxers and Kenyan champions, including John Kimani, the assistant coach. "Here at Mathare North Boxing Club we don't charge. What we do is give back to the community," Kimani said. Andrew Odhiambo, 18, epitomises that spirit. A boxer since he was 8 years old, he wants to share what he has learned with other young people in his community.
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anessa Wanjera packs a punch. The 14-yearold Kenyan took up boxing two years ago but she already has big dreams.
"I want to help my peers," said Odhiambo. "I train because I want to be somebody. I want to make Mathare proud of me."
"I want to be a champion, instead of staying in the slums," Wanjera said.
More children in the neighbourhood are training at the gym than usual and it has become a crucial outlet for local kids forced to stay at home because schools remain shut due to the coronavirus pandemic.
Wanjera is one of a group of children who train at the Mathare North Boxing Club in Nairobi, where head coach Bernard Muiruri hopes the programme will help keep kids out of trouble. While government restrictions are in place on public gatherings and people's movement, the gym has measures in place to conform to social distancing and hygiene guidelines. It limits the number of visitors allowed on the premises at any one time, is cleaned three times a day and gives out hand sanitiser
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to people who do not bring it. "We have adhered to all COVID-19 regulations set by the government," Muiruri said. "The training keeps the children busy,
And boxing is not the only lesson they learn. "We tell them there is life outside boxing," said Kimani. "They don't just come here for boxing, we give them lessons in life."
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Djokovic's charity event exposes risks faced by professional athletes also organised nights out in Belgrade and pictures and videos of him dancing with the players made it to social media. The players, however, did not break any government protocols in Serbia or Croatia with both countries easing lockdown measures weeks before the event. But it highlighted the risks of athletes from different countries being in close proximity to one another, which could be a concern for the men's ATP and women's WTA Tour when they resume the professional circuit in August after five months.
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ovak Djokovic aimed to help people affected by the COVID-19 pandemic with his charity tournament but with a number of players testing positive for the virus after attending the event, it could imperil the resumption of professional tennis.
While the other tournaments were contested without any fans in attendance and those present adhered to social distancing rules, Djokovic's Adria Tour attracted a capacity crowd in the Serbian capital, where players interacted, embraced and partied like they did in pre-COVID-19 days.
The men's world number one was the fourth player to contract the virus after Bulgarian Grigor Dimitrov, Croatia's Borna Coric and Viktor Troicki previously tested positive after playing in the Adria Tour event in the Balkan region.
"Djokovic shot himself in the foot by organising the Adria Tour," Radmilo Armenulic, a former Yugoslavia Davis Cup coach, said.
The tournament was among many events that have recently been held while professional tennis remains suspended due to the pandemic. But there was one key difference about Djokovic's event.
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"The organisation of the Belgrade leg was catastrophic, the stands were so full that fans were virtually sitting on top of each other. He staged this event with the best of intentions but it turns out it was a big mistake." While the players hugged at the net, played basketball, posed for pictures and attended news conferences together, Djokovic
The United States Tennis Association (USTA) has also announced plans for the US Open Grand Slam to be held as scheduled from Aug. 31 in New York and governing bodies are expected to have strict protocols is place. "We have to be careful because we also have to be conscious that even with extreme measures, you could actually end up having some players testing positive," ATP chairman Andrea Gaudenzi told the New York Times.
BUBBLE During the US Open, players and guests must wear masks when onsite unless practising or competing and testing will be conducted before travelling to the United States and at least once per week along with daily temperature checks.
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BRITISH HERALD Top players, including Djokovic, have in recent times expressed their displeasure at the stringent measures, something that the ATP and the WTA are also expected to incorporate at their tournaments. Gaudenzi said he hoped players will be more receptive to restrictions following the Adria Tour fiasco. Stacey Allaster, the new US Open tournament director, said organisers had to take a "leap of faith" regarding players' willingness to follow the protocols.
SPORTS "If you think about it, we really designed this tournament around a bubble," said Brian Hainline, the chief medical officer for the NCAA. "If someone becomes infected, that's a possibility, if they go out and they put themselves at a behaviour where their behaviour is risky, they're really taking on a responsibility of saying what I'm doing is not that important to my fellow players." Armenulic, however, believes it will take the sport at least a year to go back to where it was before the pandemic and professional
circuit should not resume before next year's Australian Open. "Unfortunately, this virus is still present, and it is a new reality that we are still learning to cope and live with," Djokovic, a 17-times Grand Slam singles champion, said. "I am hoping things will ease with time so we can all resume lives the way they were. "I am so deeply sorry our tournament has caused harm. We were wrong and it was too soon."
Commonwealth Games - Athletes to be allowed to take a knee in protest, says Games chief
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thletes competing in the 2022 Commonwealth Games in Birmingham, England will be allowed to take a knee in support of worldwide antiracism movements, competition organisers said.
"The movement is challenging all institutions to really look introspectively at what we can do to be more fair, more free, have better equality. Sport is no different," Commonwealth
Grevemberg said athlete protests have long been a part of the Commonwealth Games, citing the example of former Australian sprinter Cathy Freeman, who wrapped herself in the Aboriginal flag after winning the 200 and 400 metre races in the 1994 Games. Freeman went on to win the 400 metre race at the Sydney 2000 Olympics, afterwards draping herself in both the Aboriginal and Australian flags.
Several major sports organisations have moved to allow protests at their events following the death of George Floyd, a black man who died on May 25 after a white policeman knelt on his neck for nearly nine minutes. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) confirmed athletes are still banned from protesting at the Olympic Games but Commonwealth Games organisers said they would respect people's rights to voice their opinions.
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and we need to embrace it. We maybe have more responsibility because of the shared history of the Commonwealth so we need to find solutions that don’t build walls but rather build bridges.”
Games chief executive David Grevemberg told reporters. "We are comfortable with the uncomfortable conversation
"The reason her moment was so powerful at the Sydney Olympics in 2000 was because of what she did in Victoria in 1994," Grevemberg added.
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SPORTS
US Open to conduct wheelchair tournament after player backlash
as "disgusting discrimination", thanked organisers for reversing the decision. "I was in tears (when the event was excluded)," the twice US Open champion said on Australia's Channel Nine.
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S Open organisers said they will include a wheelchair tournament at this year's Grand Slam following a player backlash over their decision to scrap the event as part of measures to curb the spread of COVID-19. The United States Tennis Association's announcement comes five days after the national governing body said it was rethinking their decision and that it could have better communicated with wheelchair athletes.
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"The decision was made following multiple virtual meetings with a group of wheelchair athletes and the International Tennis Federation over the last week," the USTA said in a statement. "The 2020 US Open Wheelchair Competition will feature men's and women's singles and doubles and quad singles and doubles, with draw sizes similar to past US Opens." Australian Paralympic tennis champion Dylan Alcott, who led the player backlash and had described the exclusion
"It was just because it was so hard sometimes, growing up with a disability, where able-bodied people decide which restaurant you go in to, which school you go in to, which tennis tournaments you can play. "It's a huge turning point to show how supportive a community can be and from the bottom of my heart, I can't say thanks enough." The changes at this year's US Open in New York include no spectators, reducing the number of teams in the men's and women's doubles events by half, and the elimination of the mixed doubles and juniors competitions.
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