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Slow Covid vaccination to cost global economy $2.3 trillion: Study
“Emerging countries will shoulder around two-thirds of these losses, further delaying their economic convergence with more developed countries,” the EIU said.
It warned the delayed rollout of vaccines could fuel resentment, increasing the risk of social unrest in developing economies.
The Asia-Pacific Region will be the worst hit in absolute terms, accounting for nearly three-quarters of the losses.
But as a percentage of GDP, sub-Saharan Africa will suffer the worst losses.
U.S. CDC advisers back COVID-19 booster shots for those 65 and older, not for high-risk workers
Beyond older Americans, the committee also recommended the shots for all adults over 50 with underlying conditions, as well as some 18- to 49-year-olds with those conditions, based on their individual risk profile. Those conditions include cancer, diabetes, certain heart conditions and chronic kidney disease and lung disorders.
Pandemic outbreak overtakes Business Interruption as top business risk in China:Allianz Risk Barometer 2021:
In response to heightened BI vulnerabilities, many companies are aiming to build more resilient operations and to de-risk their supply chains.
According to Allianz Risk Barometer respondents, improving business continuity management is the main action companies are taking (62%), followed by developing alternative or multiple suppliers (45%), investing in digital supply chains (32%) and improved supplier selection and auditing (31%).
Covid may take four to five years to end; uncertainties to remain: Singapore Minister
“At some point of time the pandemic will pass, but it may take four to five years before we finally see the end of the pandemic and the start of a post-Covid normal. What will this new post-COVID world look like? No one can tell,” Singapore’s Education Minister Lawrence Wong said.
Moderna says its vaccine works against variants, developing booster shot
a World Health Organization (WHO) panel of experts recommended on Tuesday that the Moderna Covid-19 vaccine be given in two doses at an interval of 28 days, which could be extended under exceptional circumstances to 42 days.
Global Covid-19 cases surpass 100 million, as US seeks to reset its Covid fight
The widening gap for vaccine supplies between rich and poor countries led both South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and World Health Organization chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus to lash out at “vaccine nationalism.”
Ramaphosa told the WEF that low- and middle-income countries were being shouldered aside by wealthier nations able to acquire “up to four times what their population needs.”
China wanted to show off its vaccines. It’s backfiring
To be sure, the Chinese vaccines have a big appeal to many countries. More than 40 countries have expressed an interest in importing Chinese vaccines, according to China’s Foreign Ministry. Several world leaders, including President Reccep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey and President Joko Widodo of Indonesia, have gotten a Sinovac vaccine.
But the spotty and inconsistent disclosures about the vaccines remain a problem. Sinopharm, has said a vaccine candidate made by its Beijing Institute of Biological Products arm has an efficacy rate of 79 per cent, but it did not disclose crucial details. Sinopharm didn’t respond to a request for comment.
Programmes tackling extreme poverty reach nearly 92 mln people
Currently an estimated 700 million people live in extreme poverty, meaning surviving on less than US$1.90 a day. “One of the most stubborn challenges we face in development is positively transforming the lives of the extreme poor and vulnerable – a problem exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic,” Mari Pangestu, the World Bank’s managing director for Development Policy and Partnerships, said in a statement.
IMF lifts global growth forecast for 2021, still sees ‘exceptional uncertainty’
But it warned that the world economy continued to face “exceptional uncertainty” and new waves of COVID-19 infections and variants posed risks, and global activity would remain well below pre-COVID-19 projections made one year ago. IMF chief economist Gita Gopinath said U.S. President Joe Biden’s pledge to fund the World Health Organization’s COVAX vaccine initiative marked “a very big step” to containing the pandemic and ensuring more equitable distribution of vaccines.
“Much more will be needed, because as we can see, given the mutating virus, that this is not a problem that’s going away anytime soon,” Gopinath told a news conference. “There is still a tremendous amount of uncertainty,” she told Reuters in a separate interview. “We know that the health crisis is not over until it’s over everywhere.”
Brazil’s Bolsonaro gives nod to private sector buying COVID-19 shots, AstraZeneca balks
AstraZeneca, however, said in a statement on Tuesday that all of its vaccine supply “at this moment” is only available to governments and multilateral organizations around the world. “It is not possible to make vaccines available to the private sector,” it said. Several companies denied reports that they had joined the initiative, including hospital group DASA SA, which said in a statement it is seeking to understand the commercial availability of vaccines through its suppliers.
131 more COVID deaths, 13203 cases
The COVID-19 caseload rose to 1,06,67,736 with 13,203 more infections. There are 1,84,182 active cases, which is 1.73 per cent of the caseload and it remained below 2 lakh for the sixth consecutive day, according to the ministry data.
As many as 1,03,30,084 people have recuperated, taking the recovery rate to 96.83 per cent,.
From factory to faraway village: behind India’s mammoth vaccination drive
Despite initial glitches, particularly with CO-WIN – a centralised digital platform to roll out and track India’s mammoth vaccination programme – officials in Koraput said the system would suffice for the first two phases.