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Eco/Invest/Demography

Munich Re among insurers facing ‘Major’ Beirut blast losses

Property damage alone from the blast, which killed more than 150 people and triggered the collapse of Lebanon’s government, could exceed $7 billion, according to the Institute of International Finance.

Although only a fraction of the losses are covered by insurance, the blast’s financial impact still could blow holes in reinsurers’ balance sheets. Insured losses at the port and nearby vessels and cargoes could reach $250 million, according to Guy Carpenter & Co., a U.S. brokerage.
“We are currently assuming that this will be a major loss for us,” Christoph Jurecka, Munich Re’s chief financial officer, told reporters in an Aug. 6 conference call. He declined to estimate the size of the loss, but Munich Re classifies total payouts of more than 10 million euros ($11.8 million) for one incident as “major.”

Hannover Re, another Germany-based reinsurer, also anticipates a loss of at least 10 million euros, a company board member, Sven Althoff, said last week in a call with analysts.

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Zydus Cadila launches India’s cheapest remdesivir version at $37 per vial

Zydus is the fifth company to launch a copy of the antiviral in India after privately held Hetero Labs Ltd, Cipla, Mylan NV and Jubilant Life Sciences Ltd.

Gilead has also entered into licensing agreements with Dr.Reddy’s Laboratories Ltd and Syngene International Ltd to make remdesivir for distribution in 127 countries, including India.

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New Zealand considers freight as possible source of new coronavirus cluster

The source of the outbreak has baffled health officials, who said they were confident there were no local transmission of the virus in New Zealand for 102 days and that the family had not travelled overseas.

“We are working hard to put together pieces of the puzzle on how this family got infected,” said Director General of Health Ashley Bloomfield.

Investigations were zeroing in on the potential the virus was imported by freight. Bloomfield said surface testing was underway at an Auckland cool store where a man from the infected family worked.

“We know the virus can survive within refrigerated environments for quite some time,” Bloomfield said during a televised media conference.

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COVID-19: 60,963 fresh cases take India’s tally to 23,29,638

India’s rate of recovery has improved to 70.37% as 1,639,599 people, 56,110 in the last 24 hours, have been discharged from hospitals so far. “The TEST, TRACK, TREAT strategy showing desired result- early identification and prompt isolation/hospitalisation aiding exponential growth in recoveries,” the ministry tweeted on Wednesday.

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Facebook removes 7 mn posts for sharing false information on Covid-19

The world’s biggest social media company removed about 22.5 million posts containing hate speech on its flagship app in the second quarter, up from 9.6 million in the first quarter. It also deleted 8.7 million posts connected to extremist organizations, compared with 6.3 million in the prior period.

Facebook said it relied more heavily on automation technology for reviewing content during the months of April, May and June as it had fewer reviewers at its offices due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

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World reaction to Russia’s COVID-19 vaccine

The World Health Organization and Russian health authorities are discussing the process for possible WHO prequalification, a WHO spokesman said on Tuesday.

“Prequalification of any vaccine includes the rigorous review and assessment of all required safety and efficacy data,” WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic told a U.N. briefing in Geneva, referring to clinical trials.

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