MEXICO CITY/SAN JOSE, Sept 2 (Reuters) – Nicaraguan activist Jesus Adolfo Tefel has already been detained once, in 2019, when he tried to bring water to mothers on a hunger strike against President Daniel Ortega. The government accused him of planning terrorist acts and, he said, locked him up for 46 days.

That time, he stayed in Nicaragua after the government released him without pressing charges. But when the Ortega government began arresting presidential contenders, journalists and activists in June ahead of November elections, Tefel fled across the border to Costa Rica with his family.

“I don’t have the slightest doubt I would have been arrested” again if I stayed, said Tefel, 35, citing his work with opposition leaders aiming to oust the longest-standing president in the Americas, who is seeking a fourth straight term in the elections.

Tefel’s family joined tens of thousands of people who have slipped into exile this year amid the crackdown. The Nicaraguan government did not immediately respond to questions about Tefel, whose earlier arrest was documented by human rights groups and international media including Reuters.

Data from the United States, Costa Rica and Mexico reveal an exodus shaping up to be among the biggest from Nicaragua since a 1980s civil war. It threatens to overwhelm Costa Rica’s asylum system and has swollen already record Central American migration numbers to the United States.

The jump in Nicaraguans going into exile is on track to be higher than in either 2018 or 2019, when repression of opposition protests against Ortega left at least 300 people dead.

The U.S. Customs and Border Protection in July logged more than 13,000 Nicaraguans either illegally crossing or seeking asylum at the nation’s borders, almost double the month before. That pushed Nicaragua to overtake El Salvador, traditionally one of the main drivers of Latino migration to the United States.

Some 33,000 Nicaraguans have been apprehended at U.S. borders so far this year, over twice as many as in all of 2019, the year with the most apprehensions of Nicaraguans in at least a decade.

This could be “the year with the most applications since records began,” said Costa Rican official Allan Rodriguez, who oversees the country’s asylum unit.

Ortega’s office did not respond to a request for comment about the rising migration or accusations of political persecution. Ortega has said his opponents seek to topple him and conspire against national interests.

Costa Rica is struggling to process 11,000 Nicaraguan refugee applications received in July and August, more than in the peak months of the last wave of repression.

Asylum officers have a backlog of 52,000 cases to review.

CRACKDOWNS

Ortega first took power after the 1979 overthrow of U.S.-backed right-wing dictator Anastasio Somoza by Sandinista rebels, and returned to office in 2007.

Working with his wife, Vice President Rosario Murillo, he has tightened his grip in the second-poorest country in the Americas.

He has abolished presidential term limits, expanded his family’s business empire and piled pressure on independent media, while at the same time using budget and tax laws to take control of at least a dozen media and news outlets.

Over the past three months, Ortega has arrested 35 opposition leaders, suspended a rival party and withheld newsprint, among other tactics that U.N. officials, the United States and Europe have called an abuse of power to stifle free speech and free elections.

“What we are seeing in Nicaragua is an escalating climate of repression, fear, and hopelessness,” a U.S. State Department spokesman said.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) did not respond to a request for comment.

Under President Joe Biden, the United States has identified bad governance and weak rule of law as a root cause of migration from Central America. It is seeking to cajole the “Northern Triangle” countries of El Salvador, Guatemala and Honduras to tackle these issues to stem flows.

Nicaragua, traditionally a lesser source of immigration to the United States, has been not included in that effort.

However, the State Department said the administration is using “diplomatic and economic tools” to pressure a government it calls undemocratic and authoritarian. Washington has sanctioned several people close to Ortega, including Vice President Murillo.

In Mexico, Nicaraguans are spending weeks or months in southern border towns as they await visas to stay legally or pass through safely to the U.S. border.

Lester Altamirano, 40, lived in the Mexican city of Tapachula for eight months before making it to California with his wife and 8-year-old daughter. He crossed into the United States in late May, a DHS document seen by Reuters showed, and he plans to apply for asylum.

The family first requested asylum in the United States in 2020 but was deported. Back in Nicaragua, Altamirano and his wife were jailed for 11 days for opposing the government, Altamirano said.

Altamirano’s anti-government Facebook posts then drew the attention of officials in his small town in northern Nicaragua.

“It was going to be worse if we stayed. We had to risk it,” he said, echoing others Reuters spoke to for this story, including journalist Carlos Padilla, 26, who said he had been scared to protest on the street at home for fear of arrest.

Tefel, who once ran a tourism company in Nicaragua, said he does not know when he could return home without risking jail.

“I lived it in my own skin,” he said. “I know what it means to be locked up, and unjustly.”

The post Ortega’s Crackdown in Nicaragua Stirs Fast-Growing Exodus appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

CARACAS, Sept 2 (Reuters) – Soon after rebels from neighboring Colombia arrived in this Venezuelan village, they started choosing students from the local high school to harvest coca, the plant used to make cocaine, the school’s principal told Reuters.

Four years later, these foreigners from the National Liberation Army, or ELN, function as both a local government and a major employer in this town in the northwestern state of Zulia, according to the educator and 14 other residents. All spoke on condition of anonymity and asked that their community not be named because they feared retaliation.

The guerrillas pay villagers, including children, to staff narcotics operations, extortion rackets and wildcat gold mines in both countries, the people said. Colombian security officials say the criminal proceeds are financing the guerrillas’ long-running insurrection against the Colombian government. The group’s recruiting, the residents said, has intensified over the past year as the coronavirus pandemic has deepened misery in Venezuela, where the economy was already reeling from years of hyperinflation and shortages.

When the armed Colombians first arrived, the villagers said, they were flanked by local Socialist Party community leaders and proclaimed they were there to bring security with the blessing of President Nicolas Maduro.

But their brand of law and order, the people said, quickly morphed into tyranny. The Colombians forbade residents from sharing information about the group’s activities, set a strict 6 p.m. curfew, outlawed firearms and controlled who entered the town, the villagers said.

The rebels also brought money. As they tapped pupils to work the coca fields, they offered to “paint the school, fix the lights or whatever we needed,” the principal said in an interview. In 2020, with school enrollment already declining as hungry families fled the country, more than half the remaining 170 students left with the ELN, leaving just 80 kids in class, she said.

The Colombian government has long claimed Venezuela’s leadership grants safe harbor to anti-government Colombian rebels, and that Caracas allows cocaine to move through its territory for a cut of the profits. Maduro has denied the drug-trafficking accusations but expressed sympathy for the rebels’ leftist ideology and openly welcomed some guerilla leaders.

Venezuela’s Information Ministry did not respond to requests for comment about the guerrilla group’s activities in the country.

Pablo Beltran, the ELN’s second in command, denied the group is involved in cocaine production, drug trafficking or other illicit activities, or that it recruits Venezuelans to work in such operations. He told Reuters the group does charge fees to criminal drug groups entering territory it controls in Colombia where coca is cultivated. He acknowledged that poor Venezuelans driven by their nation’s economic crisis do work in those areas, but he said they are not paid by the ELN.

Beltran said the ELN does cross into Venezuelan territory, but the group’s policy was not to have a permanent presence there. He also denied the ELN was present in Venezuela with the blessing of Maduro.

“I hope we have his moral support,” Beltran said. “But the day they perceive there is a force like ours stationed there, they are not only losing sovereignty, but they are violating their constitution.”

This account is based on interviews with more than 60 Venezuelans – including pastors, ranchers and teachers – living in six states near the Colombian border. Reuters also spoke with lawmakers, human-rights activists, indigenous leaders, former Venezuelan military officers, two rebel defectors, and U.S. and Colombian authorities familiar with the rebels’ growing control of the region.

The interviews reveal a portrait of areas being transformed by armed Colombians taking advantage of Venezuela’s decline. Rebels who once hid from Colombia’s military in Venezuela’s jungles have moved into population centers, ruling alongside Maduro’s government in some places, supplanting it in others, residents of these areas said.

They are mainly ELN guerrillas and former fighters from another rebel group, the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia, or FARC, according to residents and internal Venezuelan intelligence documents viewed by Reuters. These combatants reject the landmark 2016 peace deal reached between the FARC and the Colombian government. The FARC dissident groups could not be reached for comment.

More than 1,000 members of the ELN alone are operating in Venezuela, Colombia’s then-Foreign Minister Carlos Holmes Trujillo told the Organization of American States in 2019.

The rebels have filled gaps in Venezuela’s crumbling institutions, handing out food and medicine, even approving infrastructure projects in some areas, villagers told Reuters.

Many said the rebels’ presence had reduced street crime. But all the locals who spoke to Reuters said they feared these armed combatants. A villager in a different Zulia town likened living under ELN rule to “living in a prison with eyes always watching.”

One 16-year-old high-school dropout from outside the once-prosperous oil city of Maracaibo, Zulia’s capital, said he worked 12-hour shifts at an ELN coca farm, picking leaves until his hands bled. Still, the boy said, he gets three meals a day and makes the equivalent of $200 USD a month, a fortune in much of Venezuela.

OLD ALLIANCE

After Maduro’s predecessor Hugo Chavez came to power in 1999, the FARC and ELN were allowed to operate more openly inside Venezuela, according to former Venezuelan officials, residents, analysts, U.S. and Colombian authorities and former guerrillas.

What began as an alliance of like-minded revolutionaries, with common foes in the Colombian and U.S. governments, has morphed into a criminal partnership centered on drug and gold trafficking and other illicit schemes, according to Bram Ebus, who has reported on guerilla activities in Venezuela for the International Crisis Group, a Brussels-based think tank. These enterprises have become financial lifelines for the guerrillas and for Venezuelans stretching from small villages to the corridors of power in Caracas, Ebus, eight former Venezuelan military officers and two former members of FARC dissident groups told Reuters.

In March 2020, the U.S. Department of Justice indicted Maduro for allegedly heading a drug trafficking organization that worked with the FARC to flood the United States with cocaine, offering a $15 million reward for information leading to his capture.

Venezuela’s Foreign Minister at the time, Jorge Arreaza, called the charges unfounded. The Information Ministry did not respond to a request for comment about alleged financial ties between government officials and Colombian guerrilla groups.

U.S. authorities, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they’ve grown increasingly concerned about how entrenched in Venezuela the Colombian rebels have become.

Venezuela has also tracked the expansion of armed groups from Colombia in its territory, according to Manuel Christopher Figuera, an ex-general and former head of Venezuela’s National Intelligence Service, who fled the country in 2019. Figuera showed Reuters maps he said were produced in 2018 by one of the country’s intelligence agencies showing the purported locations of ELN and dissident FARC operatives in Venezuela and their range of alleged activities, including drug and arms trafficking, extortion, kidnapping and murder for hire.

Reuters was not able to verify the authenticity of the maps, which bore the insignia of the Strategic Center for Security and Protection of the Homeland. Venezuela’s Information Ministry did not respond to requests for comment, and calls to the number listed for the intelligence agency were not answered.

If Maduro’s government is allied with Colombian rebels, the relationship is not always friendly. In March, Venezuela’s military launched an offensive against a group of FARC dissidents in the border state of Apure after Maduro said the group was sent by Colombia to destabilize the country.

Colombia’s Defense Minister Diego Molano denied Maduro’s claim, describing the dispute as a conflict over control of drug-trafficking routes.

Locals in Apure, where thousands fled the fighting, told Reuters they’ve watched the guerrillas steadily consolidate power over the past five years, expanding their illicit business activities while largely assuming the role of law enforcement. A local rancher said they have even waded into economic regulation – telling farmers what they can charge for cheese and beef.

“They are the government,” the rancher said of the rebels. Apure’s governor did not respond to requests for comment.

Indigenous Venezuelans say they, too, have had their lives upended by the guerrillas, whom they’ve dubbed “rubber boots” for their tall, black footwear. In mineral-rich Amazonas state, more than a dozen tribal leaders told Reuters that the rebels in recent years have ramped up illegal mining of gold and coltan, a mineral found in cell phones.

In March, leaders from three tribes filed a complaint with the state human rights office alleging “a large number” of indigenous Venezuelans have been “enslaved and extorted by an irregular group of Colombians,” identified as FARC dissidents, who forced them to work in gold mines.

Amazonas’ human rights office acknowledged it had received the complaint, but made no further comment.

‘YOU FEEL SHAME’

Some Venezuelans credit the rebels with keeping their families afloat.

A 42-year-old corn farmer in Apure who asked to not be named for fear of retribution, said he hasn’t seen his older brother since the FARC forcibly recruited him eight years ago. But every month without fail, he said, his brother calls their mother and sends $120, money he and his elderly parents depend on to survive.

In Zulia, a teacher who asked to be identified only by his first name – Armando – said boys are scarce in his high school because so many are working for the ELN on coca farms or at border crossings extorting bribes from migrants and traders.

Armando understands the lure of drug money. He said he, too, began harvesting coca for the ELN in 2017 to supplement his $3-a-month teaching salary. He has no plans to stop.

“You feel shame,” he said, “but you see food for your children in each leaf you pick.”

(Corrects name of Colombian rebel group in paragraph 2 to National Liberation Army, not National Liberation Party)

The post Guns, Drugs and Jobs- In these Venezuelan Towns Colombian Rebels Call the Shots appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

GUATEMALA CITY, Sept 2 (Reuters) – Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei announced new national transport curbs and social restrictions on Thursday in an effort to contain a surge of coronavirus infections and relieve pressure on hospitals.

Giammattei opted against the toughest lockdown measures but said from Saturday, auto transport will be prohibited for most trips from 8:00 p.m. to 4:00 a.m. and social gatherings such as weddings and public sports events will be banned for at least four weeks.

The president, who is a medical doctor, said in a televised speech the measures were “urgent and necessary to contain the spread of the pandemic”.

“It will give our hospital system a chance to breath,” he said, as the capital’s biggest hospital reported it could take no new patients due to the surge of COVID-19 cases.

The new measures require the approval of Congress, which is expected to be granted on Friday.

Guatemala, Central America’s biggest country with about 18 million residents, has posted nearly 480,000 coronavirus infections and more than 12,000 deaths, according to official data.

To date, only 1.3 million Guatemalans have been fully vaccinated.

The post Guatemala Enacts COVID Travel Curbs as Disease Spikes appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

Covid variants: how much protection do the different vaccines offer?

While restrictions in England could lift soon, impact of Delta variant on vaccination programme is uncertain

• Coronavirus – latest updates
• See all our coronavirus coverage

Nicola Davis Science correspondent

 

What does vaccine effectiveness mean?

Vaccine effectiveness is given as a percentage and refers to how well a vaccine works in the real world, as opposed to the term efficacy, which relates to vaccines’ performance in trials. The figures are often given with respect to symptomatic disease, although other outcomes, such as infection, hospitalisation or death, can be used.

If a Covid-19 vaccine is “90% effective” against symptomatic disease that means the risk of becoming ill is 90% lower among vaccinated people than among those who have not been vaccinated. For every 100 unvaccinated people who ended up with symptomatic Covid, for instance, only 10 would have been expected to have fallen ill had they received the jab.

What is vaccine failure?

The term is often used to refer to cases where people develop an infection or disease despite being vaccinated against it. This can relate to a problem with the vaccine itself, but can also refer to some people having a weaker immune response to the vaccine.

Using symptomatic disease as the outcome, a Covid vaccine that is “90% effective” could be said to have a 10% failure rate (ignoring changes in effectiveness over time). However, someone who is not protected against symptoms could still be protected against severe disease or death.

Deborah Dunn-Walters, a professor of immunology at the University of Surrey, says: “If you think of the population having a whole range of different levels of immunity, then where you set the bar in the range will determine the percentage protection figures.”

How effective are the vaccines against the Delta variant, B.1.617.2, compared with the Alpha variant, B.1.1.7?

Some studies, including lab-based work and analysis of real-world data, have suggested current Covid vaccines are somewhat less effective against the Delta variant than the Alpha variant.

According to Technical Briefing 13 from Public Health England, an analysis involving 7,673 symptomatic cases identified as B.1.1.7 and 2,934 cases identified as B.1.617.2 revealed that after a single dose of the Pfizer/BioNTech or Oxford/AstraZeneca Covid vaccines “there was a 17% absolute reduction in vaccine effectiveness against symptomatic disease with B.1.617.2 compared to B.1.1.7, but only a modest reduction in vaccine effectiveness after two doses”.

The take-home message, says Dunn-Walters, is that “vaccines protect, and a second dose is very important against the Delta variant”.

What does 17% reduction mean?

The 17% reduction in vaccine effectiveness relates to symptomatic disease after one dose. But it does not tell us about disease severity. That matters because if the vaccines offer lower protection against severe disease from the Delta variant, the burden on hospitals as cases rise will be greater than otherwise.

Prof Adam Finn of Bristol University, who is a member of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation, says: “We don’t have certainty [over] the impact on vaccine effectiveness, especially regarding protection versus severe disease after one dose and after two doses.” It is also unclear how much more infectious the Delta variant is, he says.

In general Covid jabs are most effective against the most severe outcomes, such as death, and less effective against less severe ones, such as asymptomatic infection.

What could this mean for a third wave?

Finn says: “A more infectious virus which is able to escape vaccine induced immunity more often will cause a faster rise in cases as people mix more. But if the vaccines retain their ability to prevent severe disease then hospitalisations will not rise as fast as they have previously.”

Experts have said it is a “realistic possibility” that the Delta variant is as much as 50% more transmissible than the Alpha variant, while modelling suggests a variant that is 40% more transmissible than the Alpha variant could lead to daily hospitalisations exceeding those recorded over the winter. That is assuming the planned relaxation of Covid social restrictions goes ahead in June – and without taking into account any resistance of the variant to the vaccines.

When we will know more?

The picture is likely to take time to become clearer not least because while cases are rising numbers remain low, meaning a longer period is needed to compare outcomes for hospitalisation and other measures among vaccinated, partially vaccinated and unvaccinated people.

“We may not get good answers for a matter of weeks, or even months,” said Dr Peter English, a retired consultant in communicable disease control.

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

 

No urgency on Covid booster shots for healthy adults, says UK scientist

Exclusive: head of key research into third dose says it may be better to prioritise vulnerable first

Natalie Grover Science correspondent

GUARDIAN

 

There is “almost certainly no urgency” to press ahead with booster shots for healthy adults and it may be better to see how the pandemic pans out before a decision is made, the scientist leading key research into third shots has said.

Prof Saul Faust, chief investigator of the Cov-Boost study whose data next week is expected to help inform a decision on the rollout of boosters across the UK, told the Guardian that for now it may be preferable to prioritise only the vulnerable, including those with compromised immune systems.

Meanwhile, some scientists said booster shots may be useful for routine use even among highly vaccinated populations to reduce Covid transmission, especially given the prevalence of the Delta variant. On Thursday, scientists including Prof Neil Ferguson suggested that even if evidence did not yet show waning protection in the double-vaccinated against serious illness and death, booster shots could help reduce the spread of cases.

On the recommendation of the Joint Committee on Vaccination and Immunisation (JCVI), it was announced on Wednesday that half a million people aged 12 and over with severely weakened immune systems are to be offered third Covid vaccine shots.

A decision on whether to offer boosters for all healthy adults was expected to be announced next week at the earliest, the Guardian understands, although it could take longer.

The Cov-Boost study – which is designed to assess the use of one of seven different vaccines when given as a third dose, on top of the two doses of either the Pfizer/BioNTech or Oxford/AstraZeneca vaccines – is understood to be a key piece of research to inform the JCVI decision.

Faust said the study would help answer which vaccines were most effective as a third shot, depending on what jabs were given as the initial two shots, rather than which populations should receive a third dose. The committee will have access to early study findings some time next week, he added.

Last week, there were an average of more than 33,750 daily cases across the UK compared to less than 1,400 at the same time last year – before the rise of the highly infectious Delta variant and before all restrictions were eased – and 61,000 at the peak in January. But with nearly 80% of UK adults having received two vaccine doses, hospitalisations and deaths are far lower than at their peak.

High numbers of cases increase the risk to unvaccinated or otherwise vulnerable people, and could lead to the emergence of new variants.

Many rich countries with strong vaccine coverage have announced the routine rollout of third shots amid concerns about waning immunity.

Preliminary data shows that people experience a fall in antibody levels weeks and months after getting their jabs, but so far the fall does not appear to have reduced protection against severe disease and death. In general, there is little scientific consensus on what level of antibodies and other tools in the immune system’s armament confer protective immunity.

However, boosters might work to prevent more infections and transmission, suggested Helen Petousis-Harris, a vaccinologist from the University of Auckland. “Because in order to prevent that infection, we really need the presence of these antibodies, and if they’ve waned, that might make establishing an infection easier.”

UK data suggests somebody who is double-vaccinated is about half as likely to be infected as someone who is unvaccinated, and although the double-vaccinated person is far less likely to develop severe disease, they can still infect others.

“The other thing is, boosters could help improve immunity to variants, and people who might not have responded so well at the beginning to the primary doses might also benefit from a booster,” Petousis-Harris added. “It’s likely that these things will contribute to the overall community immunity.”

Israel, for instance, has already kicked off its booster programme. “I think in Israel, they actually want to suppress transmission … If you have even 10% of your population unvaccinated, then one way of reducing risk to them is by boosting the immunity of everyone else,” said Ferguson, an epidemiologist at Imperial College London.

“I think the UK is adopting a much more incremental approach – so at the moment our joint committee on vaccination is only recommending boosters [third shots] for clinically extremely vulnerable people, which is only about 1% of the population.”

 

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

WORLD STATS

Coronavirus Cases:

220,010,773

view by country

Deaths:

4,557,691

Recovered:

196,675,885

The post Vaccine Protection?, COVID Booster Shots: No Urgency for Healthy Adults–UK Study, World Stats appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

The post Newspaper Cover for 3rd September, 2021 appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

 

The Norwegian Government has decided to send an expanded emergency medical team to Haiti to assist the country in the aftermath of the earthquake on 14 August, which was followed by a devastating tropical storm.

The team is being sent in response to a request for assistance from the authorities in Haiti.

‘The health services in Haiti were already under pressure before these natural disasters struck. Haiti has now requested assistance from Norway in connection with the response. We are therefore sending a specially trained emergency medical team of around 30 people. We are also sending supplies to set up a clinic in the affected area and equipment for a camp to accommodate the team and other humanitarian aid workers. The team will be equipped to treat a minimum of 100 patients per day,’ said Minister of Foreign Affairs Ine Eriksen Søreide.

Norway will provide an expanded emergency medical team (Nor EMT), which includes health, logistics and security personnel, as well as personnel to run the camp where the team and other workers will stay. After Norway has completed its mission, the equipment will be donated to the Haitian authorities for further use.

The Nor EMT team is scheduled to depart for Haiti on 6 September. The mission is initially expected to last for six weeks. The Norwegian Directorate for Civil Protection is cooperating with the Norwegian Directorate of Health to assemble the team and organise the supplies and equipment.

‘Nor EMT personnel are highly trained, and have broad experience in providing assistance under very difficult conditions. The team will be able to provide great help to Haiti as it deals with this immense crisis,’ said Minister of Justice and Public Security Monica Mæland.

Haiti is in urgent need of assistance. The massive devastation caused by the earthquake on 14 August was exacerbated by the tropical storm that arrived two days later. Approximately 2 200 people have died, and over 12 000 are injured. Very few of Haiti’s inhabitants have been vaccinated against Covid-19, and there are fears that cholera and other infectious diseases will spread quickly in the wake of the disasters.

‘There is widespread shortage of medical supplies and equipment in the country. Infrastructure and roads have been destroyed in many places, and the health service is buckling under the strain. Haiti needs our help, and Norway stands ready to provide assistance,’ said Minister of Health and Care Services Bent Høie.

‘We are worried that the lack of clean water in the affected areas will lead to outbreaks of cholera and other infectious diseases. There is an urgent need for medical assistance,’ said Ms Eriksen Søreide.

What is a Nor EMT?

The Norwegian Emergency Medical Team (Nor EMT) was established in 2018. Nor EMT can be quickly deployed to respond to emergencies such as earthquakes, other natural disasters and serious outbreaks of disease if the UN, the EU or an individual country request assistance. The team consists of specially trained personnel and is equipped to treat a minimum of 100 patients per day. Nor EMT can provide much needed primary health care, treat and stabilise acute medical conditions, and transfer and transport patients to the appropriate treatment facility. The Nor EMT team supplements the activities of NGOs in crisis situations. It is part of the EU Civil Protection Mechanism, which aims to provide support and strengthen the crisis management capacity of member states and WHO.

The post Norway to Send Emergency Medical Team to Haiti appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

The post PAHO: 75% of Latin American and Caribbean Populations Not Fully Vaccinated appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

Sep 02, 2021

The Rundown

High court divides 5-4 to leave Texas abortion law in place

WASHINGTON (AP) — A deeply divided Supreme Court is allowing a Texas law that bans most abortions to remain in force, for now stripping most women of the right to an abortion in the nation’s second-largest…Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

Ida not done with US yet; hurricane’s remnants rip Northeast

NEW YORK (AP) — Relentless rain from the remnants of Hurricane Ida sent the New York City area into a state of emergency early Thursday, as the storm carried into New England with threats of more tornadoes…Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

India locks down Kashmir after top separatist leader’s death

SRINAGAR, India (AP) — Indian authorities cracked down on public movement and imposed a near-total communications blackout Thursday in disputed Kashmir after the death of Syed Ali Geelani , a top separatis…Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

‘It looked apocalyptic’: Crew describes Afghan departure

WASHINGTON (AP) — It looked like a zombie apocalypse. For the U.S. military pilots and aircrew about to make their final takeoffs out of Afghanistan, the sky was lit up with fireworks and sporadic gunfire …Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

Those left in Afghanistan complain of broken US promises

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Even in the final days of Washington’s chaotic airlift in Afghanistan, Javed Habibi was getting phone calls from the U.S. government promising that the green card holder from Rich…Read More

OTHER TOP STORIES

Lake Tahoe wildfire seemed controllable, then it wasn’t

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — Just last week, managers overseeing the fight against the massive wildfire scorching California’s Lake Tahoe region thought they could have it conta…Read More

Merkel steps down with legacy dominated by tackling crises

BERLIN (AP) — Angela Merkel will leave office as one of modern Germany’s longest-serving leaders and a global diplomatic heavyweight, with a legacy defined by her management …Read More

AP Explains: Congress asks tech companies for Jan. 6 records

WASHINGTON (AP) — A House committee investigating the Jan. 6 U.S. Capitol insurrection has requested that telecommunications and social media companies preserve the personal …Read More

‘Top Gun: Maverick’ flies to 2022 due to coronavirus surge

NEW YORK (AP) — Paramount Pictures on Wednesday postponed the release of “Top Gun: Maverick,” sending another of the fall’s top movies out of 2021 due to the rise in coronavi…Read More

 

 

High court divides 5-4 to leave Texas abortion law in place

WASHINGTON (AP) — A deeply divided Supreme Court is allowing a Texas law that bans most abortions to remain in force, for now stripping most women of the right to an abortion in the nation’s second-largest…Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

Ida not done with US yet; hurricane’s remnants rip Northeast

NEW YORK (AP) — Relentless rain from the remnants of Hurricane Ida sent the New York City area into a state of emergency early Thursday, as the storm carried into New England with threats of more tornadoes…Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

India locks down Kashmir after top separatist leader’s death

SRINAGAR, India (AP) — Indian authorities cracked down on public movement and imposed a near-total communications blackout Thursday in disputed Kashmir after the death of Syed Ali Geelani , a top separatis…Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

‘It looked apocalyptic’: Crew describes Afghan departure

WASHINGTON (AP) — It looked like a zombie apocalypse. For the U.S. military pilots and aircrew about to make their final takeoffs out of Afghanistan, the sky was lit up with fireworks and sporadic gunfire …Read More

*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=default” width=”600″ border=”0″ />
*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />	*****@***il.com&p=24983795&stpe=static” border=”0″ />

Those left in Afghanistan complain of broken US promises

KABUL, Afghanistan (AP) — Even in the final days of Washington’s chaotic airlift in Afghanistan, Javed Habibi was getting phone calls from the U.S. government promising that the green card holder from Rich…Read More

The post World View: Texas Anti-Abortion Bill Okayed, Ida Moves North, Kashmir Leader Killed, Afghans Claim Broken US Promise, More appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

HAVANA, Sept 1 (Reuters) – Cuba will begin vaccinating adolescents against COVID-19 this week and younger children from mid-September as part of a drive to immunize more than 90% of the population by December, state-run media said on Wednesday.

All children ages 2 through 18 will receive at least two doses of the Cuban-developed Soberana-2 vaccine beginning Sept. 3, the official Cubadebate digital news outlet reported.

Health Ministry official Ileana Morales Suarez was quoted as saying the campaign would resemble annual vaccinations against various childhood diseases, taking place at thousands of community-based family medical practices and clinics.

Trials of the vaccine in minors found it to be safe and that it elicited a stronger immune response than in adults, according to state-owned manufacturer Finlay Institute.

The decision was announced at a weekly meeting of leaders and scientists to confront the pandemic on the Communist-run Caribbean island currently battling a Delta variant-driven surge that has strained its health system and hit the younger population much harder than previous versions of the virus.

Over the past week, Cuba averaged between 6,500 and 7,000 cases per day and 70 to 80 deaths, down significantly from a few weeks ago but still one of the highest rates in the world in terms of cases per 100,000 inhabitants.

Vaccination of the adult population primarily using another locally-developed shot, Abdala, will be stepped up with the goal of ensuring all eligible adults have at least begun the three-shot-treatment by the end of the month.

Cubans are desperate to get their kids back in school after months of home schooling, a prospect postponed again this September.

The country is suffering shortages of everything from food and medicine to parts and inputs for power plants and agriculture, due to closure of the tourism industry, tough U.S. sanctions and its own inefficiencies.

It desperately wants to tame the disease in time for the tourism season that begins in November.

Both Cuban vaccines, with a reported efficacy of more than 90%, have been approved by local regulators for emergency use, although the data has not yet been published in peer-reviewed journals.

In the capital, Havana, where more than 60% of the 2.2 million residents are fully vaccinated, cases and deaths per 100,000 residents are far below the national average, according to government statistics.

Currently around 50% of Cuba’s 11.3 million residents have received at least one dose of vaccine, with more than 3.5 million fully vaccinated.

The post Cuba Prepares to Vaccinate Its Entire Population appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.

BRASILIA, Sept 1 (Reuters) – Brazil’s Supreme Court on Wednesday heard arguments for and against a cut-off date for land claims that indigenous people say are vital for their survival, while the government advocated for legal certainty for farmers in the agricultural powerhouse.

The top court weighed whether a state government applied an overly narrow interpretation of indigenous rights by only recognizing tribal lands occupied by native communities at the time Brazil’s constitution was ratified in 1988.

The case is expected to drag out for days and set a precedent that would affect hundreds of native land claims.

Indigenous people danced and chanted outside the court as they anxiously watched the proceedings on an outdoor screen.

A lawyer for the largest indigenous umbrella organization APIB, Luiz Eloy Amado of the Terena people, said the rule was unconstitutional because there was no timeframe in the 1988 Constitution, which guaranteed the right to ancestral lands.

“The land question is fundamental for Brazil’s indigenous people,” Amado told the court. He added that some 800 claims, a quarter of which are in the final stages of recognition, would be stalled if the 1988 deadline was not rejected by the court.

Protected indigenous lands offer a bulwark against deforestation in the Amazon. A defeat in court for the indigenous people would set a precedent for the rollback of native rights that far-right President Jair Bolsonaro has sought with the backing of powerful farming interests.

The government’s solicitor general, Bruno Bianco, argued that the time framework gave legal security to farmers, many of whom have lived for decades on land once inhabited by natives who were pushed out by the arrival of European settlers.

Bianco said the issue was best decided by Congress, where a bill establishing the 1988 deadline as law has cleared a lower chamber committee. He said the court should put off a decision until after legislators pass the bill, a strategy supported by Brazil’s powerful farm lobby.

The court adjourned until Thursday, when 18 speakers will appear before the justices start discussing the issue.

The post Brazil Supreme Court Weighs Landmark Case On Indigenous Land Rights appeared first on The St Kitts Nevis Observer.