Tag Archives: caribbean

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Antigua Announces Reduced Taxes for Intra-Regional Travel

Antigua and Barbuda has announced a 50 percent reduction in taxes on airline tickets for travel within several countries of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM).

The government says the measure will last for six months in the first instance.

“We think at this time where regional travel is relatively low, extremely flat that there is very little to lose and even though it may not be the best condition which to analyze the elasticity of ticket prices, it will give us some indicative indication as to how a reduction in pricing would impact on demand without creating a financial crisis, “Prime Minister Gaston Browne said.

“There is nothing to lose at this time, very little will oose as a result of cutting those taxes. So in the case of Antigua and Barbuda, we have taken a decision to cut our regional airport taxes by 50 percent, effective Monday (June 28) and we will do so for six months to see how it impacts revenue and then to make a final determination going forward as to what percentage is sustainable, if it is 25, 40 or even the 50 percent,” he added.

Browne said that the matter had also been discussed within the sub-regional Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) “probably about three weeks ago.

Browne said that a reduction in taxes would assist the cash-strapped regional airline, LIAT, which has been placed under court-ordered administration.

“This will also help LIAT too especially if the OECS and Barbados could come together and agree on a travel bubble and to allow for fully vaccinated persons to move without quarantining. We think that will be a win-win for all of us.”

Last week, CARICOM leaders, who are members of the Prime Ministerial Sub-Committee on the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME), met and among the agenda items were the proposal to cut taxes.

There has been no indication as to the position adopted at the meeting, but the CARICOM leaders are to meet early next month for their annual summit, where it is expected that Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, who has lead responsibility for CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME), will report to her regional colleagues. The CSME allows for the free movement of goods, skills, labour and services within the region.

Browne said as a result of the high ticket prices, LIAT for example, for every country they fly into “they have to pay a tax, you have airport taxes for the passengers.

“In the case of Antigua and Barbuda, the airport taxes is US$97 and your ticket price would include the airport tax and if you are going into Barbados, there will be another airport tax.

“So technically speaking, your travel from Antigua to Barbados is US$600, half of your ticket cost is actually traveling taxes. So our proposal will be one in which we will ask the countries to move in lockstep with each other,” he said, hoping that a “travel bubble of low-risk countries” can be established as soon as possible.

CMC

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Coronavirus: Harris Extends SOE for 6 Months

The St. Kitts-Nevis coalition government Monday extended the state of emergency (SOE) by a further six months, with Prime Minister Dr Timothy Harris telling Parliament it is a critical tool in the fight against the coronavirus (COVID019) pandemic.

The SOE was due to expire on July 7, but Harris said that it was being extended as part of his administration’s efforts to protect the lives and livelihoods and contain the spread of the COVID-19 disease that has now resulted in the deaths of three people in the twin-island Federation.

“Since the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic last March, we have utilized this tool to help us control the virus. Emergency powers were utilized in the first instance in March 2020, for a period of 21 days which is the limit placed on the time span for which the Governor-General can promulgate a state of emergency without the approval of the Parliament,” Harris said as he moved the resolution extending the SOE.

“Given the continuing community spread there is a need for the State of Emergency to be extended beyond July 06 as the COVID-19 pandemic still presents an existential threat to the lives and livelihoods in St Kitts and Nevis.

“Indeed, on Saturday last our Chief Medical Officer advised that a new variant which is more transmissible is present in our Federation. We have come today, ahead of the expiry date of the current state of emergency to seek an extension for a period of six months,” Prime Minister Harris said.

He told legislators that the SOE provides a sound legal anchor for the promulgation of curfews in St. Kitts and Nevis that prohibit the movement of persons that can help halt the spread of the disease.

“If persons stay in shelter the probability of a COVID-19 spread is significantly and dramatically reduced Mr Speaker, and this is what, in large measure, we are attempting to do now.

“I, therefore, want to reiterate my call for all persons in St. Kitts and Nevis to stay at home including their yard space and minimize contact with others outside of their household during the period of the lockdown.”

Harris said while his administration understands that the temporary measures being implemented in the fight against COVID-19 may inconvenience many “these measures are being brought for one reason and one reason only that is to save lives”.

The latest figures show that the twin-island Federation has recorded 429 cases of the virus since March last year with 127 having recovered. There have been three deaths.

Relatives of one of those who have died said she had been fully vaccinated and that they are now awaiting information from health authorities after a recent meeting.

Health officials have not publicly responded to the complaints and allegations now in the public domain.

The government has already announced a 24-hour lockdown as part of a slate of additional restrictive measures being taken to limit the movement of people, in an effort to stem the spread of the virus.

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UK: Travel Sector Demands Reopening in Nationwide Protest

Travel agents, pilots, tour operators, aviation workers and cabin crew are among the thousands of people who will ‘speak up for travel’ today, as part of a day of action.

The sector is seeking to put pressure on the government to capitalise on the Covid-19 vaccine rollout by safely reopening travel for the summer season and provide tailored financial support to businesses.

The pandemic has been a catastrophe for the travel industry, closing borders, and even making most travel to and from the UK illegal for months on end.

Data from ABTA estimates that as many as 195,000 jobs have been lost or are at risk within the travel industry, with IATA research indicating that hundreds of thousands of aviation jobs are supported by the furlough scheme.

Although travel is no longer illegal, the industry says the government has failed to deliver a restart to international travel as promised, by undermining the risk-based system ministers established for a safe return to travel.

In contrast, other countries are forging ahead with pragmatic, risk-based schemes that allow safe travel including most recently Germany, France and Spain.

Tim Alderslade, chief executive of Airlines UK, said: “It is now or never for the government to reopen travel and save what is remaining of the summer season, not just for families desperate to get away but the tens of thousands of jobs which rely upon this once thriving sector.

“Airlines are at the absolute limit of what they can borrow and without a genuine reopening this summer they will require Government support to survive.

“The best way to save UK aviation is to enable a return to the skies – safely – by taking advantage of our vaccine dividend and allowing fully vaccinated passengers to travel without restrictions from amber and green countries.

“This is now happening across much of Europe and the UK is in grave danger of needlessly falling behind.”

Without a meaningful summer season – a crucial period of the year for travel businesses, airlines and airports – many thousands of livelihoods are at stake, as well as the ability of the travel sector to recover and reconnect the UK to the world.

As part of the day of action there are a range of events and activities happening across the UK – including 800 people attending an organised lobby outside parliament in London, 200 people at an event in Holyrood in Edinburgh and 100 gathering in Belfast.

There will be a virtual lobby in Cardiff, as well as activities at a range of UK airports and meetings with MPs locally and campaigning on social media.

The industry bodies behind the protest – including ABTA, Airlines UK, the Business Travel Association, Airport Operators Association, UKinbound, Advantage Travel Partnership and the Travel Network Group – also say the UK government’s support through the crisis has been inadequate.

While other sectors have received tailored support, such as grant schemes, the story is quite different for travel, with many travel businesses excluded from the general grant support available and others only able to access the bare minimum.

Airlines and airports, meanwhile, have taken on billions of pounds of debt – raised privately and through government loans schemes – that will have to be paid back.

As a result, many businesses are struggling to survive – 57 per cent of small- and medium-sized travel agents said they would not have the cash to survive more than three months based on current trading conditions and available government support.

The travel day of action has support from the major airlines and tour operators as well as hundreds of small independent travel agents and leisure and business travel agents.

Collectively they are calling on the UK government to:

  • Allow international travel to return safely and in a risk managed way by properly implementing the Global Travel Taskforce’s plan for a traffic-light system, by expanding the green list in line with the evidence and making restrictions more proportionate, while keeping a strong red list to guard against variants. Government should also capitalise on the success of the vaccine rollout by removing testing and quarantine requirements for fully vaccinated individuals travelling from green and amber countries.
  • Bring forward a package of tailored financial support, including extension of furlough support until April 2022, recognising that the travel sector’s ability to trade and generate income is much slower than first anticipated and more gradual than for businesses in the domestic economy.

The government is expected to provide an update on the traffic light list within the next week, and a review of the requirements for international travel is due on June 28th.

Despite international travel significantly being curtailed, meaning businesses still have little opportunity to generate income, companies will be subject to the ten per cent rise in furlough costs at the end of the month, and payments towards business rates for travel agents will also go up.

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Drought Hit Brazil Enacts Emergency Elec. Power Measures

RIO DE JANEIRO/BRASILIA, June 28 (Reuters) – Brazil’s government on Monday unveiled emergency hydroelectric measures in response to a drought that has emptied reservoirs and fanned inflation expectations.

Mines and Energy minister Bento Albuquerque in a speech urged consumers to be conscientious in their power and water use, but did not announce energy rationing. He said the government was working on a voluntary program to incentivize companies to use power outside of peak hours.

The news comes after President Jair Bolsonaro signed a temporary executive order that establishes an emergency body, known as the Chamber of Exceptional Rules for Hydro-energy Management.It is able to temporarily establish limits which “may result in a reduction in the flow of hydroelectric plants.” The order also paves the way for the government to buy electricity reserves from private companies.

Brazil – Latin America’s biggest country, with the world’s second highest COVID-19 death toll – is facing its worst drought in over 90 years, sparking fears of energy rationing and driving inflation fears. The lack of rain also poses a headache for the country’s giant agriculture sector.

Albuquerque has previously ruled out rationing, but said consumers should expect to pay more for their electricity, as power producers are forced to switch to more expensive sources.

On Friday, the National Electric Energy Agency (Aneel) recommended measures to control energy use and combat waste, asking consumers to take shorter showers and reduce the use of air conditioning, among other measures.

Writing by Gabriel Stargardter; Editing by Alistair Bell

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Haiti to Hold Constitutional Referendum Sept. 26

PORT-AU-PRINCE, June 28 (Reuters) – Haiti will hold a constitutional referendum on Sept. 26, the same date as presidential and legislative elections, authorities said, after postponing the date twice in part because of the pandemic, an official calendar showed Monday.

Political tensions in the Caribbean nation have been running high in recent months and Haitians have expressed fear of violence going to the polls. read more

Violence has spiked in the capital Port-au-Prince in recent weeks as rival groups battle with one another or the police for control of the streets, displacing thousands and worsening the country’s humanitarian crisis. read more

Elections were scheduled for Sept. 19. Postponing the referendum was done to give the health ministry time to deal with the COVID-19 crisis, Guylande Mesadieu, the president of the electoral board said in an interview.

The electoral council said in a statement that the country will implement health measures to curb the spread of the pandemic so that Haitians could cast their votes safely.

Municipal and local elections have been scheduled for Jan. 16, 2022, the calendar also showed.

It is not clear what the constitutional referendum will entail but Moise has previously said the powers of the president needed to be strengthened to break a “decades-long cycle of political crises”.

The presidency was weakened in Haiti’s 1987 Magna Carta.

Haitians mistrusted strong figureheads in the wake of the Duvalier family dictatorship notorious for human rights abuses and corruption.

Reporting by Andre Paultre in Port-au-Prince; Writing by Stefanie Eschenbacher; Editing by Stephen Coates

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Copa: Messi in Historic in 4-1 Win Over Bolivia

Lionel Messi scored twice as he became Argentina’s most capped player in their 4-1 win Copa America win over Bolivia.

The Barcelona forward, 34, made his 148th international appearance, to take Javier Mascherano’s record.

Messi set up Papu Gomez’s sixth-minute opener, before scoring a penalty and adding a second just before half-time to extend his record goals tally to 75.

Elsewhere, Manchester United striker Edinson Cavani scored a 21st-minute penalty as Uruguay beat Paraguay 1-0.

Inter Milan’s Lautaro Martinez also scored in Argentina’s win and the team are now unbeaten in their last 17 games.

They take on Ecuador in the quarter-finals on Sunday, while Uruguay play Colombia on Saturday.

Hosts Brazil play Chile, while Paraguay face Peru.

Report
Report

Copa America quarter-finals

Peru v Paraguay (Friday 22:00 BST)

Brazil v Chile (Saturday 01:00 BST)

Uruguay v Colombia (Saturday 23:00 BST)

Argentina v Ecuador (Sunday 02:00 BST)

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Mexico Marijuana: Top Court Says Private Recreational Use Okay

Mexico’s Supreme Court has decriminalised the private recreational use of cannabis by adults, calling the current prohibition unconstitutional.

In an 8-3 decision, the court ruled that adults would be able to apply for permits to cultivate and consume their own cannabis. Smoking in public and in front of children is banned.

The ruling does not mention the commercialisation of cannabis. The decision came after a legalisation bill stalled in Congress. “Today is a historic day for liberties,” Supreme Court president Arturo Zaldívar said.

But some groups said the ruling was unlikely to result in major immediate changes.

Mexico United Against Crime, a non-governmental organisation, said the decision “does not decriminalise the activities necessary to carry out consumption” such as possession and transportation.

Mexico’s lower house approved a bill legalising the recreational use of cannabis in March, but it still needs final approval by the Senate.

The legislation would let users with a permit carry up to 28g and grow as many as eight plants at home for personal use. At present, it is illegal to carry more than five grams.

Supporters of legalisation hope it could reduce some of the violence related to illegal drugs trade, which claims the lives of thousands of people in the country every year.

 

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Russia Sees COVID Surge Linked to Delta Variant, Slow Vaccine Drive

 

Grave diggers wearing personal protective equipment bury a person at a graveyard in Saint Petersburg

MOSCOW (Reuters) -Russia is facing a surge in COVID-19 cases that authorities blame on the highly infectious Delta variant and slow progress in vaccinating people, with deaths linked to the virus hitting a new record in Moscow on Friday.

Officials have scrambled to compel people to get inoculated amid tepid demand for the vaccine since cases spiked this month. Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin on Friday said 21 million people had been vaccinated out of a population of 144 million.

The government coronavirus task force reported 20,393 new COVID-19 cases, the most confirmed in a single day since Jan. 24, including 7,916 in Moscow, taking the official national tally since the pandemic began to 5,409,088.

It said 601 people had died of coronavirus-linked causes in the past 24 hours, with 98 in the capital, pushing the national death toll to 132,064. St Petersburg also reported 98 deaths.

The federal statistics agency has kept a separate count and has said Russia recorded around 270,000 deaths related to COVID-19 from April 2020 to April 2021.

Moscow authorities have ordered bars and restaurants from Monday to serve people only if they can present a QR-code showing they have been vaccinated, had an infection indicating immunity or recently tested negative.

But one chain of private medical clinics, Invitro, said it was suspending antibody tests for 7 to 10 days due to a shortage of reagents, RIA reported.

Anna Popova, the head of consumer health watchdog Rospotrebnadzor, said eight Russian regions would make vaccination against COVID-19 compulsory some time next week, in addition to 10 regions where that is already the case.

The local health ministry in Russia’s far eastern Khabarovsk region on Friday said it had been forced to suspend vaccinations at some sites in two cities due to shortages.

The Kremlin said on Friday rising demand and storage difficulties were responsible for vaccine shortages, which would be resolved in the coming days.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said he was planning to be vaccinated with the one-dose Sputnik Light, Russia’s fourth registered vaccine against COVID-19, in the coming weeks.

(Reporting by Gleb Stolyarov, Alexander Marrow, Anton Kolodyazhnyy and Polina Ivanova; Writing by Alexander Marrow; Editing by Katya Golubkova, Alex Richardson and Giles Elgood

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Study: Signs of Long-Lasting Protection from COVID-19 Vaccines

By Peter Sullivan

The Hil

The COVID-19 vaccines from Pfizer and Moderna produce a “persistent” immune response and give a sign of long-lasting protection, a new study finds.

The study is a positive development in the discussion around whether booster shots of the vaccines will be needed and when, though there has not been a definitive answer to that question yet.

The study published in the journal Nature on Monday centers on what are known as germinal centers, what Ali Ellebedy, the study’s senior author and an associate professor at Washington University in St. Louis, describes as “boot camps for immune cells.”

The study found that those training grounds in the body for immune cells were still active 15 weeks after the first dose of vaccine.

“Germinal centers are the key to a persistent, protective immune response,” Ellebedy said in a statement. “Germinal centers are where our immune memories are formed. And the longer we have a germinal center, the stronger and more durable our immunity will be because there’s a fierce selection process happening there, and only the best immune cells survive.”

“We found that germinal centers were still going strong 15 weeks after the vaccine’s first dose,” he added. “We’re still monitoring the germinal centers, and they’re not declining; in some people, they’re still ongoing. This is truly remarkable.”

One key wild card in the discussion of booster doses is what variants of the virus develop. So far, the vaccines have held up well against new variants of the virus, including the highly transmissible delta variant that is on the rise in the United States.

But if a new variant develops that is more resistant to the current vaccines, that could prompt a need for booster doses, possibly with a modified vaccine designed to fight the new variant.

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Delta Variant 20% of Cases in France; Fears of 5th Wave in Tokyo   

French minister says cases of the variant are rising; cases rising in Tokyo one month from Olympics
People wearing face masks to help protect against the spread of coronavirus walk through an underpass in Tokyo.
People wearing face masks to help protect against the spread of coronavirus walk through an underpass in Tokyo. Photograph: Koji Sasahara/AP

(now) and (earlier) Guardian (UK)

Bangladesh soldiers set to patrol streets as national Covid lockdown looms

Hannah Ellis-Petersen

Guardian (UK)

Bangladesh prepared to enter into its harshest lockdown yet, with people only allowed to leave their homes in an emergency and soldiers set to patrol the streets, as a deadly resurgence of Covid-19 infections swept the country.

As the national Covid positivity rate exceeded 20% and the country on Monday recorded its highest single-day death toll of the pandemic so far, the government announced a set of tough measures to attempt to curb the spread, including the closure of public transport networks and confining the population to their homes for a week.

Cabinet secretary Khandker Anwarul Islam said troops would be deployed from Thursday to help enforce the lockdown. “The armed forces will be on patrol. If anyone ignores their orders, legal action will be available to them,” he told reporters late Monday.

Islam added that “if needed, it [lockdown] will be extended.”

Most of the south Asian nation’s 168 million population will be confined to their homes by Thursday as part of the restrictions. Only essential services and some larger garment factories supplying international markets will be allowed to operate.

The halting of buses and trains last week has already left tens of thousands of migrant workers living in the capital Dhaka stranded and unable to get home. In scenes reminiscent of India’s lockdown last year, many migrant workers began walking home along the roads in the sweltering summer heat while others crammed into ferries, with no social distancing possible.

Officials have linked the rise in infections to the deadly Covid-19 second wave that swept neighbouring India in April, fuelled in part by the transmissible Delta variant. India and Bangladesh share a long and porous border and thousands of migrant workers have crossed over from India in recent weeks.

More than two-thirds of new virus cases in Bangladesh’s capital are of the Delta variant, a recent study by the independent Dhaka-based International Centre for Diarrhoeal Disease Research reported.

Authorities in Bangladesh feared a repeat of scenes in India, and more recently Nepal, where the deadly Covid-19 wave overwhelmed hospitals, led to oxygen shortages and brought the healthcare system to its knees.

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Ministers in England are expected to announce plans that will mean school pupils will no longer have to automatically isolate after contact with a positive Covid case. The proposals are that self-isolating will be replaced by a testing regime to prevent children from missing school.

Our community team would like to hear from teachers and parents what they think about the plans and how it will affect them and schoolchildren.

Ireland’s government is to decide today whether to permit only those who are fully vaccinated to eat and drink inside bars and restaurants.

Speaking to journalists before a cabinet meeting, Reuters report that transport minister Eamon Ryan said the government was considering a recommendation by the National Public Health Emergency Team that would require people to “show vaccination status”.

The restrictions could mean delaying Monday’s planned re-opening of indoor hospitality to allow time to develop a system to manage the changes. Ireland would be one of the first places in Europe to introduce the measure.

Bars, restaurants, and cafes have been closed in Ireland for much of the past 16 months, with the latest national lockdown in place since late December. Outdoor dining and drinking has been allowed since 7 June.

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The French pharmaceutical giant Sanofi has said today that it will invest about €400m ($476.4m) in research and development of next-generation vaccines using mRNA technologies, which proved their efficiency in the Pfizer and Moderna Covid vaccines.

Sanofi has lagged its US competitors on the Covid vaccines front, and says that its “mRNA center of excellence” would bring together approximately 400 employees.

“During the Covid-19 pandemic, mRNA technologies demonstrated potential to deliver new vaccines faster than ever before,” said Jean-Francois Toussaint, global head of R&D at Sanofi Pasteur, reports Reuters.

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Cambridge hospital’s mask upgrade appears to eliminate Covid-19 risk to staff

Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge is making headlines this morning after a study that claims that using an improved type of PPE in hospital settings reduced transmission of Covid to staff.

Data had suggested that staff working on Covid wards nearly 50 times more likely to contract the virus than staff working elsewhere in the hospital. They then made the decision to swap from one type of mask – fluid resistant surgical masks (FRSMs) – to another: filtering face piece 3 (FFP3).

Since the change, in December 2020, data shows that staff working the Covid wards were no more likely to contract Covid than people in the non-Covid areas of the hospital. Addenbrooke’s research has yet to be peer-reviewed.

Nevertheless, Dr Mike Weekes, who worked on the study, said it gives “some real world evidence that FFP3 masks are actually effective and more effective than the surgical masks. We should be thinking about is changing to use FFP3 masks for anyone caring for a patient with coronavirus.”

However, he did add a note of caution, saying: “Clearly, it’s a relatively small study in one trust and so we need to see these findings replicated elsewhere.

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