Suspected criminals in Mexico have used drones to drop explosives on police, injuring two officers.
Officials think the powerful Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) is behind Tuesday’s attack in the western state of Michoacán.
In August, two rigged drones were found in the car of suspected CJNG members.
The drones are thought to be the latest weapons in a deadly war between the drugs cartel and the security forces and vigilantes opposed to them.
New weapon in a deadly fight
Not much detail has been released about Tuesday’s attack but local media said two drones had been used.
It is believed they were rigged in a similar way to the two drones that were found in the car boot of suspected cartel members.
The drones seized last year had containers taped to them which had been filled with plastic explosives and ball bearings. Experts said they had been set up to be detonated remotely and could have inflicted deadly damage.
The officers injured on Tuesday had been deployed to clear roads leading to the city of Aguililla, in Michoacán, which had been blocked by the cartel to impede the access of the security forces.
image copyrightMichoacan State Security Department
image captionMembers of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel want to control the region, which is where their leader was born
Over the past weeks, hundreds of residents have been fleeing the city in fear as the CJNG and a rival group calling itself United Cartels (Cárteles Unidos), fight for control of the city.
Earlier this month, eight mutilated bodies were found in the area after a particularly deadly fight between the two groups.
Aguililla is the birthplace of CJNG leader Nemesio Oseguera Cervantes, also known as “El Mencho”.
“El Mencho” is one of Mexico’s most wanted men and the US Drug Enforcement Administration is offering a $10m (£7.2m) reward for information leading to his capture.
The cartel is believed to have further stepped up its attacks on the security forces in retaliation for the extradition to the United States of El Mencho’s son, Rubén Oseguera González, known as “Menchito” (Little Mencho), on drug trafficking charges.
(COVID-19) vaccine in Lima, Peru March 23, 2021. REUTERS/Sebastian CastanedaSouth America is now the most worrying region for COVID-19 infections, as cases mount in nearly every country, the director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) said on Wednesday.
“Nowhere are infections as worrisome as in South America,” Director Carissa Etienne said during a weekly news conference.
Brazil has seen the most merciless surge. Scientists forecast it will soon surpass the worst of a record January wave in the United States, with daily fatalities climbing above 4,000 on Tuesday.
“The situation in Brazil is concerning countrywide,” said COVID-19 incident director Sylvain Aldighieri. “Our concern at the moment is also for the Brazilian citizens themselves in this context of health services that are overwhelmed.”
Brazil needs access to more COVID-19 vaccines now and should be able to receive them through global partnerships, Aldighieri said.
PAHO can expand its help to Brazilian states if requested, he said, adding it is already aiding with virus genetic sequencing, procuring oxygen and coronavirus testing.
Intensive care units are nearing capacity in Peru and Ecuador, and in parts of Bolivia and Colombia cases have doubled in the last week, Etienne said, adding that the southern cone is also experiencing an acceleration in cases.
The United States, Brazil and Argentina are among the 10 countries seeing the highest number of new infections globally, she added.
The Americas recorded more than 1.3 million new coronavirus cases and over 37,000 deaths last week, Etienne said, more than half of all deaths reported globally.
“We cannot ease public health and social interventions without good data and justification,” Etienne said, adding slowing and stopping transmission “requires decisive action by local and national governments.”
More than 210 million vaccine doses have been administered across the Americas, Etienne said.
Bolivia, Nicaragua and Haiti may be affected by Serum Institute of India vaccine shipment delays, said sub-director Jarbas Barbosa, but the World Health Organization is appealing to the Indian government to ensure shipment agreements.
Rapid glut of cases stretches supplies of beds in intensive care units, ventilators and oxygen
Health workers join their shift to attend to Covid-19 patients at a centre in Mumbai, India. Photograph: Divyakant Solanki/EPA
India has reported 314,835 new coronavirus cases in the last 24 hours – the highest one-day tally recorded anywhere in the world. Deaths rose by 2,104 in the same time period, India’s worst daily toll.
Guardian (UK) Hundreds of Indians, including Delhi government administrators, have begged for help finding oxygen and other crucial medical supplies on social media as India reels from a devastating second wave of coronavirus, leading to caseloads growing by nearly 300,000 every day.
Faulty oxygen supplies at a western Indian hospital have killed more than 20 Covid-19 patients, adding to the country’s highest-ever daily death toll from the virus.
The Indian prime minister, Narendra Modi, who has been fiercely criticised for continuing to hold large election rallies throughout last week as the scale of the outbreak was becoming clear, said the virus was hitting the country “like a storm”. Hospitals are overwhelmed, many migrant workers are leaving cities and people are turning to social media for help finding medical attention, hospital beds and drugs.
The rapid rise in cases – including a record 295,000 on Tuesday, close to the largest number recorded on a single day anywhere since the pandemic emerged – has stretched supplies of beds in intensive care units, ventilators and oxygen. There was shock across the capital, Delhi, on Tuesday night when the city’s chief minister warned on Twitter that oxygen supplies in the city’s hospitals could run out within eight hours in public hospitals and sooner in some private facilities.
Adding to the sense of crisis, at least 22 patients died in a hospital in western India on Wednesday after a leak interrupted its oxygen supply, the Maharashtra state health minister said. The incident in the city of Nashik, one of India’s worst-hit areas, happened after the tank of gas leaked, said Rajesh Tope, the minister.
“Patients who were on ventilators at the hospital in Nashik have died,” he said in televised remarks. “The leakage was spotted at the tank supplying oxygen to these patients. The interrupted supply could be linked to the deaths of the patients in the hospital.”
Indian hospital staff fix an oxygen plant after a leak killed 22 Covid-19 patients in Nashik, India. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty
With medical infrastructure overwhelmed even in large cities, residents have been forced to use their own networks to find medical assistance and equipment. Seema Choudhury, an English tutor in a south Delhi neighbourhood, put out a plea for help on WhatsApp when she discovered her neighbours, a couple in their 70s with Covid-19, were becoming iller.
“Urgent help needed. The Guptas are in pretty bad shape. They need oxygen but can’t find any. Please help,” she wrote to a neighbourhood group. By the evening, the couple had managed to source oxygen tanks marked up to twice their ordinary price.
Such assistance was harder to get in smaller cities such as Lucknow in northern India, where Anil Tiwari said he spent Monday trying to find medical assistance for his father, Ranjan, whose Covid-19 symptoms had worsened in their 10th day.
Tiwari said he had tried 10 hospitals without finding a free bed. When he did find room at a smaller medical facility, he was told on Tuesday that supplies were running low and his father – whose oxygen levels were dipping – needed to be moved to another hospital.
“Some friends, God knows how, managed to get a small oxygen cylinder and I drove around with Papa in the back seat attached to the cylinder hoping to get a bed,” Tiwari said. “His anxiety level was high. I kept reassuring him, giving him hope. But he died in the car.”
He said his blamed his father’s death not on Covid but, “a failure of the system, of the leadership, to create medical infrastructure for which I pay taxes”.
Testing infrastructure has also been overwhelmed by the wave, which is combined with bureaucratic hurdles to prevent many from being admitted to hospital. “When I tested positive on Saturday, I wanted my parents to get tested too, but the lab told me not to come until Friday as it had a huge backlog,” said Swati Arora, 28, in Delhi.
Oxygen leak kills 22 in Indian hospital as Covid crisis worsens
Without a positive test result, many hospitals are refusing to admit patients, and some are dying in the interim as they await proof they have the disease. “With this delay in testing, we are getting patients who have deteriorated while waiting and when they reach us in this condition, we can’t save them,” said a doctor in Delhi who asked not to be named.
Experts have speculated the resurgence of cases over the past eight weeks may be the result of highly infectious variants that have taken advantage of the resumption of normal life in most of India in recent months as cases sharply declined. Modi and other political leaders have held mass rallies in West Bengal, where elections are being fought, while the Kumbh Mela religious festival attracted more than 10 million adherents to the northern city of Haridwar this month.
Supporters of India’s ruling Bharatiya Janata party (BJP) take part in a mass election rally in Kolkata, India, in early April. Photograph: Bikas Das/AP
The latest daily death toll of 2,023 people on Tuesday suggests the virus is still significantly less deadly among India’s young population than it has been elsewhere in the world, although official statistics are thought to be highly unreliable and sometimes deliberately undercounted.
“The best way to figure out [the death toll] is to see the jump in use of crematoria and graveyards,” said Dr Shahid Jameel, a virologist and director of the Trivedi school of biosciences at Ashoka University. “There are reports that crematoria that would take 10 to 20 bodies a day are now piling up about 100 a day.”
The central government said on Monday it would lift age restrictions on Covid-19 vaccines to anyone over 18 from 1 May, although supplies are already thought to be under pressure and it is unclear whether the vaccination rate could exceed 3m a day, one of the fastest rates in the world but short of what is required to rapidly inoculate an adult population of about 900 million people.
Underscoring the fact that India will not be able to vaccinate its way out of the crisis in the medium term, the country’s largest vaccine manufacturer, the Serum Institute of India, said on Wednesday it would not be able to increase its production rate to 100m until July, later than its earlier estimate of the end of May. It currently produces between 60m and 70m doses a month.
Despite the soaring infections, Indian leaders are reluctant to reimpose widespread lockdowns of the kind that led to an exodus of migrant workers from cities last year, the largest mass migration in the country since partition in 1947.
Modi has instead advised state leaders to try to quarantine neighbourhoods and villages where infections are most acute, though bus and railway stations have been packed over the past week with people fearing they might again be forced to stop going to work and be stranded in cities without salaries.
India to Sell Astra Zenica Vaccine to Governments, Private Hospitals
NEW DELHI (Reuters) – The Serum Institute of India said on Wednesday it would sell the AstraZeneca vaccine to the country’s state governments at 400 rupees ($5.30) per dose and to private hospitals at 600 rupees ($7.95).
“Furthermore, owing to the complexity, and urgency of the situation it is challenging to supply it independently to each corporate entity,” it said in a statement. “We would urge all corporate and private individuals to access the vaccines through the state facilitated machinery and private health systems.”
The Hill- The slowdown in the daily pace of COVID-19 vaccinations has sparked concerns from health experts that it could slow the U.S. recovery from the pandemic.
As the Biden administration touted the accomplishment of administering 200 million vaccine doses, doubling the president’s goal of 100 million vaccines administered in his first 100 days in office, the country has seen a drop in the seven-day average of daily vaccinations following weeks of steady upticks.
The U.S. hit a peak in early April of getting 4.63 million COVID-19 vaccines into arms in a single day before Tuesday saw a total of 1.81 million doses administered, according to Our World in Data.
Overall, the seven-day average reached a highpoint of 3.38 million vaccines per day last week before it declined to 3.02 million on Tuesday.
Public health experts warn this deceleration of vaccine administration could jeopardize the country’s ability to get the virus under control as variants spread worldwide. It could also signal a decrease in demand due to lack of access or public hesitancy.
Administration officials attempted to alleviate concerns about the slowed rate of vaccinations, pointing to the increased availability of and confidence in vaccines amid efforts to encourage more people to get their shots.
When asked about the vaccination rate slowing compared to previous weeks, White House press secretary Jen Psaki said the administration is trying to address “barriers” that stop people from getting vaccinated, such as the administration’s plan to offer a tax credit to employers who offer paid time off for workers to get and recover from the vaccine.
“We will … get to a point where we have greater supply than we have demand is because – only in some regions of the country, I should say, as you know, not everywhere – is because we work quickly to increase supply and provide thousands of easy and convenient locations for people to get vaccinated,” she said.
Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) data indicates there are more than 60 million unused vaccines that have been delivered but not yet administered. As of Monday, all Americans 16 and older are qualified to get the vaccine, meaning eligibility soon will not be a factor in the vaccination rate.
On a call with reporters, an administration official downplayed the notion of hesitancy, instead saying it’s not easy to “pinpoint and generalize” whether supply has outpaced demand across the entire country, opting instead to call it a “spectrum.”
“We don’t think that we’re talking about a group of people that are quote unquote vaccine hesitant,” the official said. “We think we are now approaching groups of people who are – just by the fact that they’re younger, they are less at risk, and therefore, the urgency might be a little bit lower.”
“It doesn’t mean that they’re hesitant to get the vaccine,” they said. “It just means it needs to be more convenient for them.”
Polls measuring vaccine hesitancy have consistently shown greater reluctance among Republicans rather than just a certain age group. A recent Quinnipiac University poll found 45 percent of Republicans said they don’t plan to get the shot, and a Monmouth University poll determined that 43 percent of Republicans “likely will never” get the vaccine.
The Biden administration has attempted to combat hesitancy through advertising campaigns as well as the COVID-19 Community Corps, which recruits a network of community leaders, including faith leaders, to promote vaccinations.
The president, during a speech on Wednesday celebrating celebrated surpassing his vaccine goal. Biden compared the vaccination rate to that of his predecessor, saying it would have taken seven months to reach a rate of 200 million doses at the pace the former Trump administration was going.
Biden labeled the accomplishment “great progress” but issued a warning about continuing COVID-19 precautions and restrictions in the coming months.
“If we let up now and stop being vigilant, this virus will erase the progress we’ve already achieved, the sacrifices we’ve made, the lives have been put on hold, the loved ones who have been taken from us, time we’re never going to get back, to celebrate our independence from this virus on July 4 with family and friends in small groups,” Biden said.
When asked if the U.S. had reached the point where less demand for vaccines is the “biggest challenge” instead of ramping up supply, Biden responded, “Not yet.”
The drop-off in vaccinations has also occurred in the days after the CDC and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recommended a pause for the Johnson & Johnson vaccine after reporting six rare cases of blood clots.
Officials emphasized last week that the temporary halt of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine should not impact the vaccination rollout across the country as the Pfizer-BioNTech and Moderna vaccines have made up the majority of doses given out.
Tara Kirk Sell, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security, said it’s “unclear” whether the dip in vaccinations is an “aberration” but could be occurring partly due to the effects of the Johnson & Johnson pause.
“There may be a combination of vaccine hesitancy across the board from that, or probably more likely, there were a bunch of clinics scheduled with the J&J vaccine,” she said. “Those have to shift to using Pfizer and Moderna, and so there needs to be sort of a planning and logistical process to set up that switch.”
Health experts expressed concerns last week that the pause in the use of Johnson & Johnson vaccines could spark more hesitancy across the U.S. But polls released this week indicated that the pause wouldn’t affect most people’s willingness to get their shot.
Josh Michaud, the associate director for global health policy at the Kaiser Family Foundation, called the overall downward trend “concerning if not entirely surprising,” warning that places with less “vaccination coverage” could be at risk to face additional variants of COVID-19 that could be more transmissible or severe.
“If adults can’t be vaccinated at high levels then we might fall short of the level of population immunity that we need to really tamp down outbreaks and might play out as sort of the patchwork of immunity across the country,” he said.
St. Kitts and Nevis were rattled by a tremor just before 4:00 pm. Wednesday National Disaster Coordinator Abdias Samuel has confirmed.
Samuel speaking at a COVID-19 briefing noted that on Wednesday at approximately 3:43 pm. tremours were felt in the Federation.
“The UWI seismic research centre in Trinidad and Tobago would have notified that this would have occurred approximately 63KM northeast of St Kitts and Nevis at a depth of 10 kilometres at a magnitude of 4.4.”
St. Kitts PM says U.S. playing undersized role in Covid fight
PM Harris calls for more equitable vaccine distribution
As the pandemic hit the Caribbean, shattering tourism-dependent economies, the region received high-profile help from India, Cuba and Taiwan. Less visible has been the hemisphere’s only superpower.
The U.S. government has largely failed to step up and play its customary leadership role, according to one Caribbean leader.
“That is the perception,” St. Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Timothy Harris said in a phone interview. “We have not felt the full weight of the most powerful country in this fight against the pandemic.”
The U.S. has loomed large in the Caribbean for two centuries, and it’s often the first to provide assistance when natural disasters such as earthquakes and hurricanes hit.
This time, the first vaccines to arrive in the Caribbean Community, or CARICOM, were donated by India. Taiwan provided masks and face-shields early on in the outbreak, while Cuba has sent its controversial medical brigades to St. Kitts and some surrounding nations.
Harris acknowledged that the U.S. is helping by providing $2 billion to the Covax Facility to supply vaccines to poor nations, but he said the Caribbean has not seen any high-profile gestures from Washington.
“There has been no specific outreach at the bilateral level to member states within the CARICOM region,” he said.
The U.S. State Department didn’t reply to an email seeking comment, but the U.S. Agency for International Development says it “has provided billions to fight Covid-19 in more than 120 countries.”
While the U.S. now has enough vaccines to inoculate every one of its citizens, the Caribbean — like many other parts of the world — is still struggling to cover even its most vulnerable populations.
Harris said it’s in Washington’s interest to aid its neighbors. By making vaccines available in the region, the U.S. could help revive economies, cut poverty and thereby curb migration, he said.
“In a trans-boundary world no one is safe from Covid-19 until all are basically safe from Covid-19,” he said.
St. Kitts and Nevis — a dual-island nation of 53,000 people in the Eastern Caribbean — has done better than many of its neighbors. By shutting down tourism from March 2020 through October, it kept a lid on cases. It’s one of the few countries in the hemisphere to report no deaths due to Covid-19. And it has inoculated about 25% of its population, more than most of its peers.
Harris is hoping the nation’s safety protocols and track record help it woo back the tourists that underpin its economy. But first, vaccines need to be shared more equitably, he says.
“We believe that is a duty for mankind,” Harris said, “and we hope that more countries will live up to that.”
“Do not travel to Antigua and Barbuda due to Covid-19.” That’s the first line of the US State Department’s latest travel advisory for the twin island nation, issued yesterday.
This advisory comes despite the significant reduction in the country’s new reported infections, amid the loosening of restrictions like the nightly curfew and in-restaurant dining, and ahead of the resumption of cruise tourism in a few months’ time.
The US Embassy in Bridgetown, Barbados, issued a statement on the advisory yesterday, saying effective this week, the State Department is adopting the [US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention] CDC’s “Level 4: Covid-19 Very High” travel health notice for some Caribbean countries – including Antigua and Barbuda – that recommends no travel.
When issued by the CDC back in November last year, the same advisory came under intense scrutiny, particularly as the country’s infection rate was rather low in comparison to some regional neighbours which had higher infection rates, but were categorised as posing a ‘moderate risk’ at the time.
Foreign Affairs Minister EP Chet Greene expressed shock upon getting the news of that advisory, while he, Tourism Minister Charles Fernandez, and many others immediately feared for the potential fallout within the tourism sector, as a result of changed attitudes to travel and more directly, cancelled trips.
The very real threat to tourism, coupled with the perceived “unfairness” prompted intervention by Antigua and Barbuda’s Ambassador to the United States, Sir Ronald Sanders, who expressed the country’s concern to the US authorities.
Sir Ronald later explained that the change came as a result of technical factors – a change in the CDC’s assessment methods and the use of “outdated” data – and he advised that a revision would be forthcoming. That revision saw the country downgraded to a Level 2: Moderate warning, until March this year when it was returned to Level 4.
It is currently unclear whether the State Department’s adoption of the CDC’s ‘very high’ travel advisory will come with any additional and/or greater impacts, but it certainly is a dent in the hopes of several groups, including the hospitality, aviation and local transportation sectors, that are all looking forward to an improvement in their business.
Concerns will no doubt be had in this situation, especially since current Covid-19 numbers have been low for several weeks and the country has begun to slowly open up.
Starting August this year, the Crystal Symphony vessel – under the management of Crystal Cruises – is scheduled to homeport in Antigua for luxury excursions lasting until the end of December.
Along with the prospects of that and other potential cruise business, talks of increased airlift to the island have been bandied about lately, which if confirmed, would be big news for the many that benefit from traffic at the VC Bird International Airport.
The adoption of this travel advisory could only raise just a few heads, given the fact that the CDC’s similar advisory was already in place. However, the thousands of people gearing up for movement in the tourism sector will definitely be keeping their fingers crossed that it doesn’t interfere with the prospects for financial stimulation.
Along with Antigua and Barbuda, the statement from the embassy noted that Barbados, St Lucia, and St Vincent and the Grenadines were also included in the travel advisory update, along with a number of other countries.
A man fixes a flat tire of a car covered in ash after a series of eruptions from La Soufriere volcano in Orange Hill, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, April 18, 2021.
VOLCANO ON ST. VINCENT STILL ERUPTING – The prime minister of St. Vincent and the Grenadines appealed for international help Tuesday as the Caribbean island nation begins to tackle the daunting cleanup from a series of volcanic eruptions that have not stopped.
“The lives and livelihoods of our people have been terribly affected,” Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves told reporters in a video press conference. ”We are in a dire situation, frankly.”
About 20,000 people were evacuated from the area nearest to La Soufrière volcano on the north side of St. Vincent after it began erupting on April 9 for the first time in 42 years. The island nation has a population of about 110,000.
In some areas, ash is a meter deep, and it has given the normally green and lush island an apocalyptic appearance.
No one was killed in the eruptions, which the prime minister said have spewed more than 100 million cubic meters of ash on the island and into the sea, and has been carried as far away as India. But damage has been extensive to agriculture, homes and the island’s tourism industry.
“The humanitarian relief for the prolonged period is going to be huge,” Gonsalves said. “The cost is massive, no question about that, before we reach reconstruction.”
He estimates that rebuilding will run to the hundreds of millions of dollars.
The United Nations launched a humanitarian appeal for $29.2 million on Tuesday to assist the most vulnerable with basic needs, including clean water, food and shelter, as well as to help initiate recovery. Last Thursday, the United Nations released $1 million from its emergency fund to help with urgent needs.
The world body is also deploying a team of a dozen experts this week to work with the government to assess what is needed to clean up and safely dispose of the massive amounts of ash, as well as to evaluate the ecological impact, Didier Trebucq, U.N. resident coordinator for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean, said.
Trebucq added that there is still a lot of uncertainty as eruptions continue.
“We felt a tremor this morning,” he told reporters. “Two days ago, we could see another eruption.”
Gonsalves said when La Soufrière last erupted in 1979, it did so over a period of about seven months. Prior to that, in 1902, it went on even longer.
But should the volcano cease erupting sooner, the island nation will not be entirely at ease. Hurricane season starts in six weeks, and this year, it is forecast to be very active.
The guilty verdict of former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin for the death of George Floyd has made waves across the United States, with President Joe Biden welcoming the jury’s decision as bringing in a new era of justice for Black Americans and accountability for the country’s police and justice systems.
The jury’s swift verdict set off jubilation mixed with sorrow across the city of Minneapolis and around the nation. Biden said the conviction of Chauvin “can be a giant step forward” for the nation’s fight against systemic racism. But he declared that “it’s not enough.”
Also this morning:
Biden hits latest vaccine milestone
Man bitten by rattlesnake while trying to move it with barbeque tongs
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — After three weeks of testimony, the trial of the former police officer charged with killing George Floyd ended swiftly: barely more than a day of jury deliberations, then just minutes for the verdicts to be read — guilty, guilty and guilty — and Derek Chauvin was handcuffed and taken away to prison. Chauvin, 45, could be sent to prison for decades when he is sentenced in about two months a case that triggered worldwide protests, violence and a furious reexamination of racism and policing in the U.S. The verdict set off jubilation mixed with sorrow across the city and around the nation. Hundreds of people poured into the streets of Minneapolis, some running through traffic with banners. Drivers blared their horns in celebration….Read More
NEW YORK (AP) — When the verdicts came in — Guilty, Guilty, Guilty — Lucia Edmonds let out the breath she hadn’t even realized she’d been holding. The relief that the 91-year-old Black woman felt flooding over her when white former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin was convicted for killing George Floyd was hard-earned, coming after a lifetime of seeing other cases end differently. “I was prepared for the fact that it might not be a guilty verdict because it’s happened so many times before,” the Washington, D.C., resident said. She recalled the shock of the Rodney King case nearly three decades ago when four Los Angeles officers were acquitted of beating King, a Black motorist. …Read More
MINNEAPOLIS (AP) — Relief, even if fleeting and momentary, is a feeling that Black Americans have rarely known in America: From slavery to Jim Crow segregation to enduring punishments for living while Black, a breath of fresh air untainted by oppression has long been hard to come by. Nonetheless, the conviction of ex-cop Derek Chauvin for murdering George Floyd nearly a year ago allowed many across this city and the nation to exhale pent up anxiety — and to inhale a sense of hope. But what might they feel hope for? …Read More
WASHINGTON (AP) — President Joe Biden said the conviction of former Minneapolis Police Officer Derek Chauvin in the killing of George Floyd “can be a giant step forward” for the nation in the fight against systemic racism. But he declared that “it’s not enough.” Biden spoke Tuesday from the White House hours after the verdict alongside Vice President Kamala Harris, with the pair saying the country’s work is far from finished with the verdict. “We can’t stop here,” Biden declared. …Read More
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — Police shot and killed a teenage girl in Columbus on Tuesday afternoon, according to newspaper reports, just as the verdict in the George Floyd murder trial was being announced. The Ohio Bureau of Criminal Investigation was at the scene Tuesday night on the city’s southeast side, The Columbus Dispatch reported . Officers had responded to an attempted stabbing call when police shot the girl at about 4:45 p.m., the newspaper reported. The 911 caller reported a female was trying to stab them before hanging up, according to the Dispatch. …Read More
India has been overwhelmed by hundreds of thousands of new coronavirus cases daily, bringing pain, fear and agony to many lives as lockdowns have been placed in Delhi and…Read More
WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. is set to meet President Joe Biden’s latest vaccine goal of administering 200 million COVID-19 shots in his first 100 days in office, as the Wh…Read More
BRUSSELS (AP) — The European Union reached a tentative climate deal that should make the 27-nation bloc climate-neutral by 2050, with member states and parliament agreein…Read More
CORONA, Calif. (AP) — A Southern California man is recovering after he was bitten by a rattlesnake when he tried to pick up the poisonous reptile using barbecue tongs, au…Read More
Juventus chairman Andrea Agnelli says the European Super League project cannot proceed following the withdrawal of the six Premier League clubs.
Agnelli was one of the chief architects of the breakaway plans, which involved 12 clubs from England, Spain and Italy.
However, with teams withdrawing, he accepts it cannot now go ahead.
“To be frank and honest no, evidently that is not the case,” said Agnelli, when asked whether the Super League could still happen.
“I remain convinced of the beauty of that project, of the value that it would have developed to the pyramid, of the creation of the best competition in the world, but evidently no. I don’t think that project is now still up and running.”
Agnelli was described as a “snake and a liar” by Uefa president Aleksander Ceferin on Monday after the announcement of the breakaway plans on Sunday evening.
Agnelli resigned his position as chairman of the European Clubs’ Association on Sunday and refused to take calls from Ceferin.
The 12-team Super League, set up by the six English teams and Inter, plus Spain’s Atletico Madrid, Barcelona and Real Madrid and Italy’s AC Milan and Juventus was announced on Sunday to widespread condemnation.
“Despite the announced departure of the English clubs, forced to take such decisions due to the pressure put on them, we are convinced our proposal is fully aligned with European law and regulations,” the ESL said earlier on Wednesday, adding it was “convinced that the current status quo of European football needs to change”.
“Real Madrid president Florentino Perez is insisting on the idea of keeping the group together to push for change,” says Spanish football expert Guillem Balague.
“Barcelona say they agreed to the ESL, but only if the season ticket holders’ assembly approve it, which could be their way out.”
Balague also says Atletico Madrid are meeting on Wednesday morning to review their position.
People with mild Covid-19 could take a pill or capsule at home to prevent the illness turning serious and requiring hospital treatment, under government plans to fast-track development of treatments for the disease.
The government is launching an antivirals taskforce to find at least two drugs by the autumn that people can take to stop coronavirus in its tracks and speed up recovery from it.
Boris Johnson said the plans were part of the UK adapting to a new reality. The prime minister told a Downing Street press conference on Tuesday: “The majority of scientific opinion in this country is still firmly of the view that there will be another wave of Covid at some stage this year.”
Johnson suggested the antivirals research would form part of a three-pronged approach to tackle this anticipated third wave, including booster jabs in the autumn to combat new variants as well as continuing mass testing.
However, he said that the reopening of the economy would proceed as planned, despite the warnings. “I see nothing in the data now that makes me think we are going to have to deviate in any way from the roadmap, cautious but irreversible, that we have set out.”
The government hopes the antivirals taskforce will match the success of the vaccines taskforce, which bought a range of effective Covid jabs for the UK and has put the country ahead of most of the world in immunisation against the coronavirus.
The new drive aims to find drugs that work against the virus – and its variants – in the early stages of disease. Most of the drugs discovered so far have been for use by people severely ill in hospital. Dexamethasone, a cheap steroid already in widespread use, was the biggest breakthrough. It was identified in the UK’s Recovery trial and is now saving lives all over the globe.
Now that there are far fewer deaths in the UK, more attention is being paid to drugs that could help stop mild Covid-19 infection from progressing to a more serious illness.
The taskforce is likely to focus on antiviral monoclonal antibodies – proteins made in the laboratory to fight the virus as the immune system does. The former US president Donald Trump was given an antibody cocktail that may have speeded his recovery from Covid. However, they are expensive and there have been questions over whether these drugs will be fully effective against variants.
The prime minister and health secretary both referenced the vaccines taskforce in the announcement of the new body. “The success of our vaccination programme has demonstrated what the UK can achieve when we bring together our brightest minds,” said Johnson.
“Our new antivirals taskforce will seek to develop innovative treatments you can take at home to stop Covid-19 in its tracks. These could provide another vital defence against any future increase in infections and save more lives.”
The health secretary, Matt Hancock, said he was “committed to boosting the UK’s position as a life science superpower and this new taskforce will help us beat Covid-19 and build back better”.
The UK was leading the world in rolling out treatments for Covid, he said, mentioning dexamethasone and also the hospital drug tocilizumab. “In combination with our fantastic vaccination programme, medicines are a vital weapon to protect our loved ones from this terrible virus,” Hancock said.
“Modelled on the success of the vaccines and therapeutics taskforces, which have played a crucial part in our response to the pandemic, we are now bringing together a new team that will supercharge the search for antiviral treatments and roll them out as soon as the autumn.
”Some of the drugs administered in hospital are given intravenously or by infusion, which makes them hard to use at home. “Antivirals in tablet form are another key tool for the response. They could help protect those not protected by or ineligible for vaccines. They could also be another layer of defence in the face of new variants of concern,” said the government’s chief scientific adviser, Sir Patrick Vallance.
The vaccines taskforce was until recently led by the businesswoman Kate Bingham. The government has said there will be a competition to decide the chair of the antivirals taskforce. The new taskforce will work alongside the therapeutics taskforce, led by the deputy chief medical officer, Prof Jonathan Van-Tam, which identifies potential Covid drugs and steers them into trials and eventually the NHS.
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Johnson & Johnson to Resume Distribution of COVID Vaccine
JJohnson & Johnson said it will resume distribution in Europe after EU regulators said its benefits outweigh the risks. A Congressional panel is investigating J&J manufacturer Emergent, and women are getting vaccinated more than men.
European regulator says Johnson & Johnson vaccine benefits outweigh risks
Europe’s drug regulator said Tuesday that it’s recommending a warning be added to the Johnson & Johnson COVID-19 vaccine about a possible link to blood clots, but noted they are “very rare” and the benefits still outweigh the risks.
In response, the company said it will resume its vaccine rollout in Europe.
J&J had decided to delay its rollout in the EU’s member states last week, after U.S. regulators called for a pause on the vaccine following concerns about the potential serious side effect.
“The reported combination of blood clots and low blood platelets is very rare, and the overall benefits of COVID-19 Vaccine Janssen in preventing COVID-19 outweigh the risks of side effects,” the European Medicines Agency (EMA) said in a statement.
Just eight cases of the blood clots out of about 7 million people who received the single-dose vaccine have been identified in the U.S., the agency noted.
Next move? The EMA’s decision could foreshadow what U.S. regulators will decide on Friday, when a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) advisory committee meets again. The panel of experts previously met last week, but they put off a decision on what to do about the vaccine until another meeting this Friday because of a lack of evidence. That delay drew criticism from some experts, who said there was no good reason to prolong the pause.
Seen it before: The EMA noted that similar instances of rare blood clots have been linked to a different COVID-19 vaccine, from AstraZeneca. Use of that vaccine has resumed after pauses in some countries in Europe, though some nations have added age restrictions.
The clotting cases with the Johnson & Johnson vaccine have mostly been in women under 60 years of age.
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Argentina produces Russia’s Sputnik V vaccine in regional first
Reuters
Doses of the Sputnik V (Gam-COVID-Vac) vaccine against the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) are pictured at the Tecnopolis Park, in Buenos Aires, Argentina April 15, 2021. REUTERS/Agustin Marcarian
An Argentine firm has produced test batches of Russia’s Sputnik V COVID-19 vaccine, the first in Latin America, with aims to scale up manufacturing of the drug by mid-year as the wider region grapples with a new surge in infections.
Russian sovereign wealth fund RDIF and Laboratorios Richmond (RICH.BA)said on Tuesday that the Argentina pharmaceutical company had carried out the test production and that the batches would be sent to Russia’s Gamaleya Institute for quality inspection.
“We estimate that, if the process is positive, scale production would begin in June 2021,” Richmond said in a statement, adding it aimed to have the vaccine ready “in the shortest possible time for the country and the region.”
Argentina’s inoculation program has relied heavily on Sputnik V. The South American country was one of the first globally to use the vaccine on scale to inoculate its population and has faced delays getting other vaccines.
The country has seen cases of the novel coronavirus hit daily records highs over the last week, forcing the government to tighten restrictions in and around capital city Buenos Aires and pledge to speed up its vaccination program.
Russian scientist Denis Logunov, a lead developer of the Sputnik V vaccine, said on Friday that the vaccine had proven itself 97.6% effective against COVID-19 in a real-world assessment, based on data from 3.8 million people.
That was higher than the 91.6% rate outlined in results from a large-scale trial of Sputnik V published in The Lancet medical journal earlier this year.
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