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Insured losses from CrowdStrike’s outage likely total $540 million to $1.08 billion, says insurer Parametrix
Fortune 500 firms excluding Microsoft to see $5.4 bln in...
CrowdStrike blames defect in content update for massive IT crash
The incident crashed Microsoft Windows computer systems around the...
No work, no food: Pandemic deepens global hunger
The World Food Program sounded the alarm further last week in a joint report with the UN’s Food and Agriculture Organization, warning that “conflict, the economic repercussions of Covid-19 and the climate crisis are expected to drive higher levels of acute food insecurity in 23 hunger hot spots over the next four months,” mostly in Africa but also Central America, Afghanistan and North Korea.
Beazley launches life sciences offering in Asia Pacific
Prashansa Daga, Healthcare Underwriter said: “The life sciences sector across Asia has been growing significantly in recent years and has already overtaken EU in terms of size*. Asia Pacific is now the second largest market in terms of size after the US. Covid-19 has also exposed the need for self-reliance amongst different countries in the region as we saw closing of borders, restriction on movement of pharmaceutical ingredients and the global vaccine scramble. The response to Covid-19 has also fuelled a race to create tests, vaccines and treatments. As an industry driven by intrinsic innovation and inelastic demand for patient needs, life sciences is expected to see significant growth in years to come. Our policy provides clear, broad and flexible cover for a range of risks to help this diverse sector to manage its risk exposures and continue to expand and thrive.”
Delta variant now reported in 135 countries, global coronavirus cases could exceed 200 million by next week: WHO
The global number of new cases has been increasing for more than a month, with over 4 million cases reported in the past week – July 26 to August 1, the update said.
“This increasing trend is largely attributed to substantial increases in the Eastern Mediterranean and the Western Pacific Regions which reported 37 percent and 33 percent increases respectively as compared to the previous week, while the South-East Asia Region reported a 9 percent increase,” it said.
IMF OKs big increase in funds to alleviate pandemic impact
The general allocation of SDRs will become effective on Aug. 23. The IMF said that the new reserves will be credited to IMF member countries in proportion to their existing quotas with the agency. About USD275 billion of the new allocation will go to the world’s poorer countries.
Willis Towers mulls sale of reinsurance unit after halting merger
Reports this week suggested Gallagher was close to clinching a deal for Willis Re, but Willis Towers Watson Chief Executive Officer John Haley said he is considering wider possibilities.
“We’re conducting a review of strategic alternatives for Willis Re,” Haley told a conference call on Tuesday reporting on second-quarter results. While the timing was “appropriate” given the failed merger, he warned that a sale was not assured.
WHO calls for moratorium on booster COVID-19 vaccine shots until end of Sep
A small group of nations, including some in Europe, are planning additional shots for the fully inoculated even as the COVID-19 continues to infect and kill at alarming rates across the Global South, where vaccination levels remain “catastrophically low,” The Washington Post reported.
The report stated that the decision by wealthy countries to give booster shots to their own people rather than donating those doses to poorer countries is controversial. Health experts have called this move immoral.
U.S. automakers to say they aspire to up to 50% of EV sales by 2030 -sources
Automakers are spending tens of billions of dollars to speed EV adoption, even though U.S. EV sales outside Tesla Inc’s remain small. Consulting firm AlixPartners in June said investments in electric vehicles by 2025 could total $330 billion, a 41% increase from the firm’s comparable five-year investment outlook a year ago. As of now, electric vehicles represent about 2% of total global vehicle sales, and will be about 24% of total sales by 2030, the firm forecast.
Delta variant’s spread seen pushing herd immunity threshold above 80%
That represents a “much higher” bar than previous estimates of 60% to 70%, because delta is twice as transmissible, said Richard Franco, an assistant professor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham.
“It is becoming clear that this is a very dangerous, way more dangerous virus than the original one,” Franco said.
Depression affects more than 260 million people globally:UN
Depression affects more than 260 million people in the world while around half of all mental health conditions start by the age of 14, according to the news release. Suicide is the fourth leading cause of death in young people aged 15-29.
Working from home, unemployment, school closures and social isolation have affected people around the world during the COVID-19 pandemic; the challenges for people with mental health conditions, for whom access to treatment has, in many cases, been disrupted, are even greater.
‘1 in 3 Indian PC home users at high risk of cyber attack’
For this type of threat, Indian home users have a 5.78 per cent risk ratio, which is higher than the global average.Home users around the world have a 29.39 per cent chance of encountering any type of PC malware, which represents an increase of around 5 per cent compared to the previous year.
Geographies with more conflictive socio-political situations, such as the Middle East, Asia, Africa, and Eastern Europe, seem to be facing more risk in the online world as well.