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How India Got It Wrong, Costa Rica to Close, World Stats

Huge surge in cases followed erroneous ‘supermodelling’ study suggesting herd immunity had been achieved

by
Guardian (UK)

They will be remembered as India’s lost months: the stretch between September and February when Covid-19 cases in the country defied global trends, falling sharply throughout the coldest months of the year until they reached four-figure daily totals.

It was inexplicable. Was it the Indian climate? A protection conferred by childhood immunisations? Some speculated India may have naturally reached herd immunity. It was a tantalising idea that took hold in India’s highest circles of policymaking, media and science – even a government-commissioned study suggested herd immunity may indeed have been achieved. It would prove one of the most fatal miscalculations of the Covid-19 pandemic so far.

Now, with daily cases crossing 360,000, and recorded deaths beyond 3,200 per day, many see the lull between Covid-19 waves as a cruel illusion. “The elections, religious festivals and everything else opened up completely,” says Sujatha Rao, a former secretary of the Indian ministry of health and family welfare. “That was a very bad mistake and we have paid a very dear price, a heavy price for that oversight.”

‘We are witnessing a crime against humanity’: Arundhati Roy on India’s Covid catastrophe

An outbreak the size of India’s second wave, apparently fuelled by Covid-19 variants that appear to be more infectious than earlier strains, would have overwhelmed most public health systems – let alone one of the most chronically underfunded in the world, serving a vast, spread-out population.

But public health experts, including some involved in advising the government, say the scale of India’s current outbreak was also partly manmade, the result of a feeling of exceptionalism that emanated from the top of the Indian government and rippled across society, leading to countless administrative and personal decisions that, within a few months, would prove disastrous.

“There was a misreading of the situation in January that we had attained herd immunity and were unlikely to see a second wave,” says K Srinath Reddy, the president of the Public Health Foundation of India. “India went into full-blown celebratory mode. And we know the virus travels with people, and celebrates with crowds.”

Alongside warnings that people should maintain precautions, governments at all levels relaxed restrictions, allowed massive social events to resume and pressed ahead with raucous electioneering, confident the continued circulation of Covid-19 in states such as Kerala or Maharashtra were the dying embers of the virus, not evidence of the sparks that would ignite a second firestorm.

“There was a lot of mixed messaging coming through which made people very complacent,” Shahid Jameel, a virologist at Ashoka University, told a forum there on Tuesday. Some politicians and scientists boasted of low infection and death rates that gave Indians the impression “that somehow we are special”, Jameel added. “We are not special.”

Supermodels and herd immunity

Given India’s youthful population, Covid-19 death rates were expected to be smaller than elsewhere. But official numbers during the first wave were exceptionally low. In Karnataka, a state with a similar population to France, seroprevalence studies have suggested nearly half of people were infected by August. Yet the state’s Covid-19 death toll was about 12,000 last year, compared with the more than 60,000 people who died from the virus in France over the same period.

Studies are already beginning to understand the extent to which official Indian records of that time were unreliable. Ramanan Laxminarayan, the founder and director of the Centre for Disease Dynamics, Economics and Policy in Washington DC, told the Ashoka University panel that a forthcoming study of Indian mortality rates suggested the country had not escaped the first wave so unscathed.

“[The study shows] Indians are not exceptional at all,” he said. “In fact a lot of our mortality is in that 40-70 age group, where our mortality rates are higher than for other countries.”

The belief that India may have shaken off Covid-19 for good was bolstered by some scientists. Members of a committee established by the government to create a “supermodel” of Indian cases published a study in September claiming their model showed India may have already reached herd immunity. Others made a similar argument in newspaper columns.

Supporters wave towards a helicopter carrying the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, at a rally for West Bengal’s state legislative assembly elections, at Kawakhali on the outskirts of Siliguri, on April 10
Supporters wave to a helicopter carrying the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, at a rally for West Bengal’s state legislative assembly elections, at Kawakhali on the outskirts of Siliguri, on 10 April. Photograph: Diptendu Dutta/AFP/Getty Images

“The idea that India had hit herd immunity, that we only needed to be careful and we could eradicate the virus by February, and the implicit assumption that Indians were ‘exceptional’ in some way – in that most of those infected would be asymptomatic as a result of genetics or prior exposure – all of this was wrong,” says Gautam Menon, an expert in disease modelling at the Institute of Mathematical Sciences in Chennai.

It was part of a stream of scientific advice flowing to the government, including more critical views warning there were still hundreds of millions of susceptible Indians, and that future strains of the virus could be more aggressive, as they had been in Europe and the US.

“But you must understand in which environment this advice landed,” Reddy said. “The Indian economy had gone into a slump before the pandemic. It had challenges during the pandemic, and it was just beginning to show some signs of recovery. There was some sense of urgency by the people in charge of the Indian economy, as well as industry leaders, to put it back on the rails.”

In that context, and with case numbers continuing to drop, “people heard what they wanted to hear”, says Reddy, who sits on the government’s national scientific Covid-19 taskforce.

“The politicians wanted to get back to their business, which is local elections and campaigning, the sportsmen wanted to get back to cricket tournaments,” he said. “There was a receptivity to any scenario predicting a full recovery with little possibility of a second wave.”

By late February, with official caseloads dwindling, life in India had been allowed to return to something close to normal. Malls in Delhi and Mumbai were busy. Crowds filed into cricket stadiums, including the largest in the world, named after the Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi.

Narendra Modi
Narendra Modi boasted of the size of the crowds he would address on the campaign trail. Photograph: Bikas Das/AP

In spite of warnings in November by an Indian parliamentary committee that the numbers of beds in government hospitals was “abysmally small”, four temporary hospitals in the capital were dismantled, according to the Indian Express, along with an 800-bed hospital in Pune and a Covid-19 facility in Assam state.

“There was this huge window of opportunity to really set ourselves up,” Rao says. “The time could have been used on a very focused approach to scale up readiness for wave two. [But] we thought we were over the worst and had managed it.”

For a stretch between 11 January and 15 April, the country’s national scientific taskforce on Covid-19, which advised on quarantine policies and testing and treatment protocols, did not hold a single meeting, according a report in the Caravan, confirmed by the Guardian.

‘God will overcome the fear of the virus’

In West Bengal, a state considered a prize for Modi’s ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP), India’s election commission overruled opposition parties and gave permission for the country’s longest-ever regional election campaign, along with elections in four other states and territories. Modi himself boasted of the size of the crowds he would address in the weeks to come. By the beginning of this week, West Bengal had the fastest growing Covid-19 outbreak in India. On Thursday, voting went ahead anyway.

Approval was also given for the Kumbh Mela, a religious festival in a north Indian city on the banks of the River Ganges that would draw millions of Hindu pilgrims. For the BJP, a party that seeks to give primacy to India’s Hindu heritage, the go-ahead for the festival was highly symbolic. The event was advertised as clean and safe on the front page of national newspapers in advertisements that bore Modi’s face.

Tirath Singh Rawat, the chief minister of the state where the Mela was being held, encouraged as many as possible to come. “Nobody will be stopped in the name of Covid-19, as we are sure the faith in God will overcome the fear of the virus,” he said. Recorded infections in the state have jumped 1,800% over the past 25 days.

In its public statements, few groups were more certain in their conclusion that the pandemic was over than the ruling BJP. At a meeting of its national executive early in the year, with its eye on the upcoming elections, the party issued nothing less than a victory cry.

Indian holy men, or Naga Sadhu, make their way to take a holy dip in the Ganges River during the Kumbh Mela at Haridwar, Uttarakhand, India, on 14 April.
Indian holy men, or Naga Sadhu, make their way to take a holy dip in the Ganges River during the Kumbh Mela at Haridwar, Uttarakhand, India, on 14 April. Photograph: Idrees Mohammed/EPA

In the face of the world “speculating over how India with its vast population and limited healthcare infrastructure” would deal with the pandemic, according to a party resolution, it could be “said with pride that India [had] defeated Covid under the able, sensitive, committed and visionary leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi”.

The resolution was issued on 21 February, a day when 14,199 cases were recorded across India. Two months later, the figure would be 314,644.

India: tearful relatives beg for oxygen and hospital beds for Covid patients – video

01:23
India: tearful relatives beg for oxygen and hospital beds for Covid patients – video

The same feeling that the worst was over seemed to influence a lack of urgency in the country’s vaccination programme. Despite having almost a year to build vaccine infrastructure to reach Indian adults, the rollout started slowly. The government trumpeted vaccine giveaways to rival China’s influence in south Asia, while getting its hands on fewer than a hundredth of the doses required to vaccinate India, counting on securing the rest later as younger groups become eligible for shots.

There had been dissent to this triumphalism among the country’s top scientific advisers, according to several sources, but in public they strove to put the best face on the situation. Such an impulse was not unique to the Indian outbreak, but was so distinct there that the Lancet warned in a September editorial that persistent “false optimism” risked undermining the country’s response.

“We don’t know what they did behind closed doors, but in the weekly Covid briefings of the health ministry, [advisers] came out day after day giving us data about how cases per millions and deaths per million in India were the lowest in the world,” said Abantika Ghosh, the health editor of the Indian news website the Print.

“But they would give us numbers of testing and vaccinations in absolute numbers, because in a per-million setting, they don’t look impressive, they’re quite low. Questions were sidestepped. There was this compulsion, it seemed, to look away from science, from evidence the world over and just establish that India is different.”

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Costa Rica to close non-essential businesses next week over COVID-19

Reuters
An employee cleans a restaurant chair in a hotel, as Costa Rica tourism industry braces for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Heredia, Costa Rica March 18, 2020. Picture taken March 18,2020. REUTERS/Juan Carlos Ulate

An employee cleans a restaurant chair in a hotel, as Costa Rica tourism industry braces for coronavirus disease (COVID-19) outbreak, in Heredia, Costa Rica March 18, 2020. Picture taken March 18,2020. REUTERS/Juan Carlos Ulate

Costa Rica will for the next week close non-essential businesses, including restaurants and bars, across the center of the country due to a sharp increase in new cases of COVID-19 and hospitalizations, the government said on Thursday.

From May 3-9, restaurants, bars, department stores, beauty salons, gyms and churches must close in 45 municipalities in central Costa Rica, where almost half the population lives and over two-thirds of new cases have been registered.

“We are in an unprecedented situation, and many people are going to die,” Health Minister Daniel Salas said after announcing 2,781 new daily infections, a record number. “There are already waiting lists to enter intensive care.”

The government will also impose travel restrictions during the week.

Costa Rica has so far reported almost 249,000 cases of COVID-19 and some 3,200 fatalities.

Some 10.5% of the population had been vaccinated as of Thursday, most of them over the age of 58, official data show.

==================================================

WORLD STATS

Coronavirus Cases:

151,192,390

Deaths:

3,181,289

Recovered:

128,611,558
Highlighted in green
= all cases have recovered from the infection
Highlighted in grey
= all cases have had an outcome (there are no active cases)

[back to top ↑]

Latest News

April 30 (GMT)

Updates

  • 6,796 new cases and 429 new deaths in Poland [source]
  • 8,731 new cases and 397 new deaths in Russia [source]
  • 1,583 new cases and 15 new deaths in Thaila

The post How India Got It Wrong, Costa Rica to Close, World Stats appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

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Fiji announces curfew as part of ongoing lockdown after factory worker diagnosed

Fiji has announced a 56-hour curfew as it rushes to trace contacts of a garment factory worker diagnosed with coronavirus amid the nation's first cases for a year.

While the capital, Suva was put into lockdown last week for 14 days after a handful of cases spread in the community after emerging from a quarantine hotel, officials have announced a curfew over the weekend, with none of the 100,000 residents allowed to leave their homes.

The are currently 49 people in the nation with the virus, 28 of those locally transmitted, according to the Fiji Times.

READ MORE: Fijian rugby team sing their hearts out from quarantine hotel balconies

Fiji

One of the new cases is a woman who worked in a garment factory, with her diagnosis sparking the crack-down.

She worked with almost 900 people and officials said in a statement they have only managed to test 300, and need to find hundreds more.

"We cannot waste another minute locating the rest of them," Permanent Secretary for Health and Medical Services, Dr James Fong said.

"To allow my teams to find these Fijians quickly, we will be locking down the Suva and Nausori Containment zones from 2000 hours tonight until 0400 hours Monday morning.

"No one should leave their homes… I say it again, within the lockdown zone, no one, not parents, not breadwinners, not children, no one should leave their homes.

https://twitter.com/FijianGovt/status/1388044564997447680?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

"The capital and the Nausori corridor will be on war-footing.

"We have 56 hours to break as many chains of COVID transmission as possible.

"My teams — alongside the members of our disciplined forces — will be taking full advantage of this opportunity to get ahead of the spread of this virus.

"Unless you are travelling for a medical emergency or the Ministry has issued you a special clearance, it will be considered an offence and the police will arrest you."

READ MORE: Singapore man sails to Fiji after coronavirus lockdown

Most businesses, including supermarkets, will close in the island nation which pre-pandemic, was a popular spot for Australians to holiday.

The government said it will arrange food packages for people who need them.

Fiji reported one new case today, in the wife of another patient, out of more than 1000 tests. Yesterday there were five new cases.

https://twitter.com/FijianGovt/status/1387913414102568961?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw

Last week, the nation closed schools and cancelled sporting events as it announced its first coronavirus cases outside of quarantine in more than a year.

Fiji Air also cancelled all flights until May 8.

A soldier and a room cleaner at a quarantine hotel tested positive.

But at that stage, there wasn't any indication so far that the virus was spreading more widely in the community.

However, Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama said the nation was again facing a "grave and present danger."

READ MORE: Villages flattened as Fiji smashed by Category Five cyclone

The government ordered all gyms, bars and theatres within two containment zones closed and large gatherings were cancelled for at least two weeks.

Home to a little under a million people, Fiji has recorded just two virus deaths and 166 cases since the pandemic began, but experts fear its health system would be ill-equipped to deal with a major outbreak.

The nation has its own contact tracing app for mobile phones, CareFiji.

This week New Zealand announced it would give the nation 250,000 vaccines. Australia has also pledged to help. So far the nation has given almost 60,000 jabs.

-Reported with AP

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US, UK, Barbadian Authors Finalists for Women’s Fiction Prize

By JILL LAWLESS

LONDON (AP) — Novels that explore forgotten and neglected communities in Britain, the U.S. and the Caribbean were named finalists on Wednesday for the 30,000 pound ($42,000) Women’s Prize for fiction.

The six-book shortlist includes American author Brit Bennett’s tale of twins who take different paths, “The Vanishing Half,” U.S. writer Patricia Lockwood’s social media satire “No One is Talking About This” and “Transcendent Kingdom,” a story of African immigrants in Alabama by Ghanaian-American writer Yaa Gyasi.

Also in the running are Barbadian writer Cherie Jones’ story of gritty life on a beautiful island, “How the One-Armed Sister Sweeps Her House,” and two books by British writers: Susanna Clarke’s literary fantasy “Piranesi” and Claire Fuller’s rural family saga “Unsettled Ground.”

Booker Prize-winning novelist Bernardine Evaristo, who is chairing the judging panel, said several of the novels depicted “communities that aren’t really written about in fiction” and tough subjects such as domestic violence, addiction and depression.

“But they’re not miserable books,” she said. “They’re all really beautifully crafted stories. … They’re not lightweight, but they are a thrilling read.”

Founded in 1996, the prize is open to female English-language writers from around the world. Previous winners include Zadie Smith, Tayari Jones and Maggie O’Farrell.

Only one of this year’s finalists, Fuller, has published more than two books. Bennett, Clarke and Gyasi are nominated for their second published novels, while Lockwood and Jones are debut novelists.

Evaristo said the five judges “weren’t looking at whether they were debut novels. We weren’t even looking at the authors. It was the books, and whether the books spoke to us.”

“I think it might speak to the fact that perhaps there aren’t as many older women writers who have had long careers getting published,” said Evaristo, who won the Booker Prize in 2019 with her eighth novel, “Girl, Woman, Other.”

“There always seem to be lots of debuts around, but sustaining a long career is something that’s perhaps harder to do.”

The winner of the 2021 Women’s Prize will be announced July 7 at a ceremony

The post US, UK, Barbadian Authors Finalists for Women’s Fiction Prize appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

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India breaks another record for new COVID-19 infections

India has reported 386,452 new infections in the past 24 hours, marking yet another global record for the highest single-day case count. More than 3,600 people died.

The country recorded one million COVID-19 cases over the last three days, pushing the total number of cases in the country to more than 18 million since the pandemic began, according to figures released today by the country's Health Ministry.

Delhi's facilities have been cremating more than 600 bodies daily for the past week, according to the mayor of the North Delhi Municipal Corporation.

This is double the official daily death toll for the city, and an indicator there may be a major underreporting problem.

LIVE UPDATES: India flights to resume 'as soon as possible'

Family members carry the body of a COVID-19 victim at Gazipur crematorium on April 28, 2021 in New Delhi, India. (Photo by Raj K Raj/Hindustan Times via Getty Images)

"We start getting bodies in the morning and they keep coming in one after the other," said Suman Kumar Gupta, an official at Delhi's Nigambodh Ghat cremation site, on Wednesday.

For workers and volunteers at the crematorium, handling hundreds of bodies daily and witnessing a constant outpouring of anguish takes a heavy toll.

At the Seemapuri crematorium, a number of exhausted volunteers slumped against a wall, getting a little precious sleep before continuing with their work.

In between building the additional pyres and bringing out bodies, Jitender Singh Shunty, head of the Seemapuri crematorium in eastern New Delhi, sits with grieving families to offer comfort and support.

"We have cremated 55 bodies in the last five hours … (It) will be 100 by the end of the day," he said on Wednesday morning.

"I am tired — but this is not the time to get tired. This is the time to work for the nation, for humanity, and save lives."

The most harrowing part of his job, however, was seeing "young people die of COVID," Mr Shunty said.

"We have seen families who lost two to three young family members. I don't know what has happened to Delhi — it's really disheartening."

Data from the government's COVID-19 task force suggests young people are being infected at similar rates as the first wave. But experts, medical workers, crematorium staff and politicians warn that the sheer number of new cases and deaths suggest young people are being seriously impacted.

"In this wave of coronavirus, the young people are getting infected," said Chief Minister Kejriwal in a video tweeted on April 15. "I appeal to all the young people to take care of themselves."

READ MORE: Indians turn to black market, unproven drugs as virus surges

India

'We have been failed'

India's government is scrambling to take action as the virus spreads. Numerous states and cities have implemented new restrictions and shut down businesses in an attempt to contain the outbreak.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi has approved the procurement of 100,000 portable oxygen concentrators, in addition to hundreds of new oxygen generation plants.

International aid began arriving on Tuesday, with countries around the world sending oxygen cylinders, ventilators, medication and other essential supplies.

But these supplies need time to be distributed and oxygen plants need to be built. For some of the hardest-hit cities, such as New Delhi, the lack of immediate help and accessible resources means the bodies will keep piling up until assistance arrives.

Helplessness, frustration and anger toward the government's slow response is spreading among people on the ground — especially those facing the deluge of death every day.

"The situation will worsen because Delhi doesn't have oxygen, beds, ventilators, plasma injections," Mr Shunty said.

"I am very angry, and at the same time guilty because we cannot do more. The people who should be dealing with this are missing in action. They made promises and vanished."

"We have limited resources with a fleet of 18 ambulances. We are picking up 50 to 55 dead bodies every day," he added.

"So I am very angry because people who should be doing this are not doing it, and so volunteers are having to do it."

Families who have lost their loved ones, too, have been left with no closure or relief.

Barkha Dutt, a columnist at the Washington Post, lost her father to COVID-19 this week after he was ferried to the hospital on a faulty oxygen cylinder.

READ MORE: Concerns India infections are going unreported

"When we went to cremate him, there was no space at the cremation ground — there was a physical fight that erupted between multiple families," she said Wednesday. "We had to call the police to cremate my father.

"Despite my devastation, I was luckier than most Indians," Ms Dutt added. "I think of the families that need cremation grounds, where bodies have been lying on the floor.

"I'm speaking as an angry Indian who feels betrayed at the callousness and the tone deafness and the complete denial I continue to see around.

"We have been failed by policymakers, by politicians. We've been failed by the government that did not think to put in place a contingency plan for the second wave."

She pointed to Health Minister Harsh Vardhan, who has continued to insist that despite the deepening crisis, which has long surpassed 2020's first wave, India is now better equipped to deal with the virus.

That assertion rings hollow in her loss and grief — she has now lost both parents, and feels as if she has been "orphaned today," Ms Dutt said.

"My father's last words to me were, 'I'm choking. Please give me treatment.' And I tried my best," she said. "I have nobody left."

READ MORE: How India's virus outbreak compares to the rest of the world

They keep coming

As India's second wave of coronavirus sweeps through the country, bodies are piling up faster than workers can cremate them or build new pyres.

Flames crackle over the wails and prayers of grieving families as they mourn loved ones laid on funeral pyres that burn through the night in New Delhi.

"Before the pandemic, we used to cremate eight to 10 people (daily)," said Jitender Singh Shunty, head of the Seemapuri crematorium in eastern New Delhi. "Now, we are cremating 100 to 120 a day."

Demand is so high that Seemapuri crematorium has expanded into its parking lot, where dozens of workers construct new cremation platforms from bricks and mortar. There is so little space and so many bodies that families have to get a ticket and wait in line for their turn.

So many fires have been lit in New Delhi that wood stocks are running low.

On Tuesday, Jai Prakash, the mayor of North Delhi, wrote a letter to Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal, asking that the forest department provide a steady supply.

In the meantime, families are having to pay for the wood to burn their relatives' bodies. Many see no choice, as they jockey for space at crowded crematoriums.

Cremation is considered an important part of Hindu funeral rites, due to the belief the body must be destroyed for the soul to proceed to reincarnation.

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Brittany Higgins meeting with Scott Morrison 'difficult'

Scott Morrison "acknowledged the system let Brittany Higgins down" in the first meeting between the pair since she alleged she was raped in Parliament House.

The former Liberal staffer went public in February with allegations she was sexually assaulted by a male political staffer in then-Defence Industry Minister Linda Reynolds' ministerial office in the early hours of March 23, 2019.

Ms Higgins has been pushing for cultural reform in Parliament since then and described her first meeting with Mr Morrison today as "difficult".

READ MORE: Former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins says review 'long overdue'

BrittanY Higgins speaks at Canberra March 4 Justice

"It was a difficult conversation to have on a personal level," Ms Higgins said.

She said the discussion with Mr Morrison was "honest and frank", and she believes the prime minister now has a deeper understanding of what happened to her. 

"He fundamentally seemed to understand what had happened to me… and that was encouraging," Ms Higgins said. 

"It was a difficult conversation, it was robust, but ultimately, in the end, I think there was a consensus that reform needs to happen." 

"And he is going to do the right thing by the women here," she added. 

Mr Morrison said he was pleased to hear more about how he can make parliament workplaces "safe and more respectful".

"We are committed to reform of the Parliamentary workplace," he said in a statement.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison.

"I look forward to her participating in the ongoing discussions on this matter through the Independent Review into Commonwealth Parliamentary Workplaces.

Mr Morrison said Ms Higgins' views would be "invaluable" to the independent inquiry into Parliament House's workplace culture, led by sex discrimination commissioner Kate Jenkins.

"I acknowledged her courage in coming forward and assisting in this work," he said.

"I am committed to achieving an independent process to deal with these difficult issues."

Mr Morrison said he use the meeting to thank her for her "contribution to his government".

Ms Higgins accepted a formal invitation from Mr Morrison last week, outlining what she wished to discuss, including reforms to the Fair Work Act in respect to staff terminations of Parliamentarians and the establishment of an Independent Complaints Body.

Ms Higgins is also calling for improved procedures for Department of Public Service (DPS) employees.

She met with Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese this morning, who said she was possessed of "extraordinary courage".

READ MORE: Former Parliament staffer Brittany Higgins announces forthcoming memoir

"But the first thing that I'd say about today's meeting was that it was an opportunity for me to listen," Mr Albanese said.

"We need to listen to women and to listen to their concerns, to listen to the experience that they've gone through, and to listen to their views about solutions."

Mr Albanese has backed Ms Higgins' calls for an independent body that people in parliament, from staffers to senators, could resort to.

"To build confidence in the system, there's a need for an independent body so that any woman or any staff member faced with the issues which Brittany was faced with, with the reported sexual assault, or people with other issues related to staffing, relating to culture in Parliament House or in parliamentary offices, are able to go forward and get independent advice," he said.

"At the moment, the way that the parliamentary services act operates is to really give no power for members of staff to be able to raise issues."

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St. Vincent: Flooding, Mudslides Add to Volcano Woes, UN Res. of Support

KINGSTOWN, St. Vincent (AP) — Heavy rains poured down on the island of St. Vincent and the Grenadines on Thursday, causing flooding and mudslides that damaged some homes and further battered areas already burdened by heavy ashfall from eruptions of La Soufriere volcano.

Authorities said there were no reports of deaths or injuries as the storm deluged the Caribbean nation for hours, with some areas receiving from 3 inches (7.5 centimeters) to 5 inches (12.5 centimeters) of rain. Forecasters warned that an additional 2 inches (5 centimeters) were possible over the next 24 hours.

There were reports of caved-in roofs and some structures wrecked by landslides and flooding in rural areas, and authorities said bridges also sustained damage. Problems in Kingstown, the capital, were confined to high water.

“I drove my vehicle into Kingstown this morning. However, if the flood doesn’t clear, I may have to leave it in the city,” said Darren Williams, a salesman.

The troubles follow a series of eruptions at La Soufriere that began April 9 and blanketed parts of St. Vincent island with heavy ash that has damaged buildings and ruined farm fields. Over 20,000 people have had to leave their homes and the water supply and electricity were disrupted.

Roderick Stewart, a volcano seismologist at the University of the West Indies Seismic Research Center, said on the state radio station that monitoring equipment had registered indications of lahars, dangerous slides of fast-moving volcanic ash turned into slurry by the rainstorm.

“Our seismometers have been picking up signals from lahars in several locations, so we suspect there are lahars in all the major drainages and it may have caused quite a lot of damage as it passed down from the volcano into the sea,” Stewart said.

He said the volcano itself had been relatively quiet recently.

“It does seem to be going back — I won’t say to sleep, cause that’s a bit hopeful — but it does seem to be quieting down,” Stewart said.

==========================================

UN Adopts Resolution of Solidarity

The United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) on Wednesday adopted a resolution in solidarity with and support for the Government and people of St Vincent and the Grenadines, as well as neighbouring countries affected by the impact of the eruptions of the La Soufriere volcano.

Guyana’s Permanent Representative to the UN and chair of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) caucus, Carolyn Rodrigues-Birkett, introduced the resolution on behalf of the 14-member regional integration grouping.

The resolution received overwhelming support, with 174 of the 193 member states co-sponsoring the resolution, which was adopted by consensus.

In her statement, Ambassador Rodrigues-Birkett highlighted the “deep concern about the serious consequences of the explosive eruptions of the La Soufrière volcano …since April 9, 2021 which has resulted in the displacement of residents, loss of livelihoods, food security and nutrition, health security, and access to social infrastructure, and about the urgent need to restore normal conditions for the population.”

The post St. Vincent: Flooding, Mudslides Add to Volcano Woes, UN Res. of Support appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

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Home invasion victim's terror: 'I thought I was going to die'

A Melbourne woman who was threatened at knifepoint by an armed intruder says she is too frightened to stay in her home.

Two armed burglars forced their way into the Glenroy home, in the city's north-west, about 4.30am on Monday, terrorising tenant Kayla just minutes after her 34-year-old husband Cory left for work.

The intruders wreaked havoc inside the rental property, causing thousands of dollars' worth of damage and stealing a computer with precious family photos. 

READ MORE: Men in balaclavas wanted after smashing rocks through business

Kayla told 9News she feared for her life as one of the men held a knife just inches away from her throat.

"I thought I was going to die," she said.

"I didn't think I was gonna survive it.

"He's put the knife two inches away from my throat.

"He's tried to lunge the knife, tried to stab me. He's threatened to kill me."

One of the men made aggressive demands for money during the terrifying encounter.

"The guy was telling me: 'Where's my thousand dollars? Give me my f—ing money'," she said.

Meanwhile, the second man was stealing a knife, handbag and a computer with precious photos of Kayla's grandfather.

"I can't get any of that stuff back because it's all gone now."

The couple's trusted Staffy, Willow, saved the day by jumping on the intruders in a protective defence, causing them to step back, Kayla said.

The pair smashed the couple's $4000 TV before fleeing the scene.

Cory, 34, said he felt like he failed to protect his wife as he was not home at the time of the terrifying ordeal.

"I wasn't worried about the house, I was worried about my wife because …. in a way I feel like I failed at my job," he said.

https://omny.fm/shows/mornings-with-neil-mitchell/thought-they-were-going-to-kill-me-glenroy-woman-t/embed?style=cover

Police are investigating the aggravated burglary and have a number of leads.

The burglars are described as stocky and Middle Eastern in appearance and were last seen taking off in a silver Holden Astra.

The couple only moved into the rental around four weeks ago, but after what happened they say they are too terrified to stay here.

They desperately want to break their lease but are embroiled in a dispute with their real estate agent.

"I don't want to and I can't," Kayla said.