Contaminant found in a batch of Moderna vaccine was believed to be a metallic particle, reported Japan's public broadcaster NHK citing health ministry sources.

On Thursday, Japan suspended use of 1.63 million doses shipped to 863 vaccination centres nationawide.

However, production of Moderna (MRNA.O) COVID-19 vaccines at a plant in Spain can continue, the European Union drugs regulator said on Friday, while it carries out its investigation of a suspected metallic contamination incident.

The European Union drugs regulator said it was investigating the incident at the Spanish plant run by Rovi (ROVI.MC), but did not find reasons to seek a temporary suspension of production after an initial assessment.

"COVID-19 vaccine production in Rovi is able to continue, following a preliminary risk assessment," the European Medicines Agency told Reuters in a statement.

"An investigation into the root cause is ongoing. EMA will be able to provide more information as the investigation progresses," it added.

Moderna has so far delivered to the EU nearly 75 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine, EU public data show. The company has two contracts with the 27-nation bloc for up to 460 million shots.

Spanish pharma company Rovi, which bottles Moderna vaccines for markets outside of the United States, said the contamination could be due to a manufacturing issue on a production line. A spokesperson said the company could not say anything more while it was investigating.

Moderna put the lot in question and two adjacent ones on hold.

(With inputs from agencies)

Contaminant found in a batch of Moderna vaccine was believed to be a metallic particle, reported Japan's public broadcaster NHK citing health ministry sources. On Thursday, Japan suspended use of 1.

Contaminant found in a batch of Moderna vaccine was believed to be a metallic particle, reported Japan's public broadcaster NHK citing health ministry sources. On Thursday, Japan suspended use of 1.63 million doses shipped to 863 vaccination centres nationawide. However, production of Moderna (MRNA.O) COVID-19 vaccines at a plant in Spain can continue, the European Union drugs regulator said on Friday, while it carries out its investigation of a suspected metallic contamination incident. The European Union drugs regulator said it was investigating the incident at the Spanish plant run by Rovi (ROVI.MC), but did not find reasons to seek a temporary suspension of production after an initial assessment. "COVID-19 vaccine production in Rovi is able to continue, following a preliminary risk assessment," the European Medicines Agency told Reuters in a statement. "An investigation into the root cause is ongoing. EMA will be able to provide more information as the investigation progresses," it added. Moderna has so far delivered to the EU nearly 75 million doses of its COVID-19 vaccine, EU public data show. The company has two contracts with the 27-nation bloc for up to 460 million shots. Spanish pharma company Rovi, which bottles Moderna vaccines for markets outside of the United States, said the contamination could be due to a manufacturing issue on a production line. A spokesperson said the company could not say anything more while it was investigating. Moderna put the lot in question and two adjacent ones on hold. (With inputs from agencies)

Japan: Moderna vaccine contaminant believed to be metallic particle

At a Senate hearing on efforts to combat COVID-19 last month, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky asked Dr&nbsp;Anthony Fauci whether the National Institutes of Health had funded “gain-of-function” research on coronaviruses in China.

“Gain-of-function research, as you know, is juicing up naturally occurring animal viruses to infect humans,” the senator said.

Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, flatly rejected the claim: “Sen&nbsp;Paul, with all due respect, you are entirely and completely incorrect, that the NIH has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute.”

This exchange, and the bit of scientific jargon at the heart of it, has gained traction in recent weeks, usually by people suggesting that the coronavirus was engineered, rather than having jumped from animals to humans, the explanation favoured by most experts on coronaviruses. The uproar has also drawn attention back to a decade-long debate among scientists over whether certain gain-of-function research is too risky to allow.

Spurred by some contested bird flu experiments in 2012, the US&nbsp;government adjusted its policies for oversight of certain types of pathogen studies. But some critics in the scientific community say that the policy is overly restrictive and that its enforcement has been far from transparent.

The stakes of the debate could not be higher. Too little research on emerging viruses will leave us unprepared for future pandemics. But too little attention to the safety risks will increase the chances that an experimental pathogen may escape a lab through an accident and cause an outbreak of its own.

Sorting out the balance of risks and benefits of the research has proved over the years to be immensely challenging. And now, the intensity of the politics and rhetoric over the lab leak theory threatens to push detailed science policy discussions to the sidelines.

“It’s just going to make it harder to get back to a serious debate,” said Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiologist at the Harvard TH&nbsp;Chan School of Public Health who has urged the government to be more transparent about its support of gain-of-function research.

In the 1970s, researchers were learning for the first time how to move genes from one organism to another to make bacteria produce human insulin. From the start, critics worried that such experiments could accidentally create deadly pathogens if they escaped from labs.

Tinkering with genes is not the only way that a scientist can give an organism new abilities. Researchers can also stage evolutionary experiments, in which pathogens are grown in the cells of an unfamiliar host species. At first, they do not replicate well. But new mutations can help them adapt, gradually improving their performance.

A decade ago, researchers used serial passage, as this procedure is known, to learn how new strains of influenza evolve. Flu strains start off in the guts of birds, and sometimes manage to mutate into a form that can spread among people.

Two teams of researchers — one from the University of Wisconsin in Madison and the other at Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands — designed experiments to identify which genetic mutations were essential for a successful jump from birds to people. They injected bird flu viruses into the noses of ferrets, waited for the viruses to replicate, and then transferred the new viruses to new ferrets. Soon the viruses evolved to become better at replicating in the ferrets.

When news of the experiments broke in late 2011, a controversy exploded. Some critics said the research was reckless and should not be published, for fear that other researchers would copy the work and accidentally release a new pandemic strain of flu.

A year later, the US&nbsp;Department of Health and Human Services held a meeting to consider what it called “gain-of-function research.” The name took hold, but scientific experts have grown increasingly frustrated with it ever since.

“It’s a horribly imprecise term,” said Gigi Gronvall, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security.

Many gain-of-function experiments could never pose an existential threat; instead, they have provided huge benefits to humanity. In 1937, researchers found that when they passed the yellow fever virus through chicken cells, it lost the ability to cause disease in humans — a discovery that led to a vaccine for yellow fever. Likewise, herpes viruses have been engineered to gain a new function of their own: attacking cancer cells. They are now an approved treatment for melanoma.

But the bird flu experiments raised concerns that certain gain-of-function studies could pose a tiny but real risk of dangerous outbreaks. In 2014, US&nbsp;officials announced that 18 such studies would be paused. The experiments were not just on influenza viruses, but on the coronaviruses that caused SARS and MERS.

Three years later, the government rolled out a new policy — the “P3CO framework” — for research on “enhanced potential pandemic pathogens.” The rule requires the agencies under the HHS umbrella, like NIH and its several institutes, to carry out a special review of grant applications for any research on “a credible source of a potential future human pandemic.” In 2019, after conducting such a scientific review, the agency gave the green light for two influenza projects to restart, triggering more debate about whether its policy was thorough enough.

When questioning Fauci last month, Paul brought up one of the most cited examples of gain-of-function research, a study of coronaviruses done by Ralph Baric at the University of North Carolina published in Nature Medicine in 2015. Working with data sent from Shi Zhengli, the director of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, Baric and his colleagues built a new coronavirus from an existing one. All of the work was done in the North Carolina lab, and neither Zhengli nor members of her lab participated.

The so-called chimeric virus that resulted was not more pathogenic than the parental virus, Baric said. “This work was approved by the NIH, was peer-reviewed, P3CO reviewed and approved,” Baric wrote in an email last month. The work also “involved a very different strain of beta coronavirus than the one that causes COVID-19,” he said, and was considered low risk because of the particular strain in question.

In the paper, he and his colleagues cautioned others about similar research. “The potential to prepare for and mitigate future outbreaks must be weighed against the risk of creating more dangerous pathogens,” they wrote.

The P3CO policy has a significant shortcoming, according to David Relman, a member of the US&nbsp;National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity and a microbiologist at Stanford University: It only applies to the grant process in agencies that are part of HHS. Grants from the National Science Foundation, the Pentagon or other agencies could include dangerous research and also need oversight, he said. Then there is the thornier question of private research.

Relman has also criticised the government’s process for screening and approving gain-of-function research. At a January 2020 meeting of the advisory board, he objected to the lack of information released about how two research proposals were approved.

Rozanne Sandri-Golin, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Virology, a scientist who works on the herpes virus and a fellow member of the board, said Relman made a strong case about the lack of transparency in the grant-screening process. The board was told that a committee made the decision, but “their names weren’t published, their backgrounds weren’t published and the process that they used for deciding whether or not it was going to be all right to now proceed with this research was not clearly defined,” she said.

The secrecy of the screening process was the most worrisome part of government oversight of potentially dangerous research, according to Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at University of Saskatchewan’s Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization, who was doing research in the United States at that time. “It’s not clear how they decide what’s acceptable gain of function and what’s not,” she said.

However, the “star chamber” nature of the process was not its biggest problem, said Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers, the state university of New Jersey, who has also been one of the most vocal proponents of the lab leak theory, and a longtime advocate of stricter control of research on dangerous pathogens. An even bigger issue, he said, was that gain-of-function research was simply not being screened in accordance with the policy established by HHS, which includes the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, run by Fauci.

The ideal solution, he said, would be the creation of an independent body to provide the oversight of dangerous pathogen research, similar to what the Nuclear Regulatory Commission does for studies of radioactive materials.

In the United States, “there are no biosafety rules or regulations that have the force of law,” he said. “And this is in contrast to every other aspect of biomedical research.” There are enforceable rules, for example, for experiments with human subjects, vertebrate animals, radioactive materials and lasers, but none for research with disease-causing organisms.

At a Senate hearing on efforts to combat COVID-19 last month, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky asked Dr Anthony Fauci whether the National Institutes of Health had funded “gain-of-function” research on coronaviruses in China.

At a Senate hearing on efforts to combat COVID-19 last month, Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky asked Dr Anthony Fauci whether the National Institutes of Health had funded “gain-of-function” research on coronaviruses in China. “Gain-of-function research, as you know, is juicing up naturally occurring animal viruses to infect humans,” the senator said. Fauci, the nation’s top infectious disease expert, flatly rejected the claim: “Sen Paul, with all due respect, you are entirely and completely incorrect, that the NIH has not ever and does not now fund gain-of-function research in the Wuhan Institute.” This exchange, and the bit of scientific jargon at the heart of it, has gained traction in recent weeks, usually by people suggesting that the coronavirus was engineered, rather than having jumped from animals to humans, the explanation favoured by most experts on coronaviruses. The uproar has also drawn attention back to a decade-long debate among scientists over whether certain gain-of-function research is too risky to allow. Spurred by some contested bird flu experiments in 2012, the US government adjusted its policies for oversight of certain types of pathogen studies. But some critics in the scientific community say that the policy is overly restrictive and that its enforcement has been far from transparent. The stakes of the debate could not be higher. Too little research on emerging viruses will leave us unprepared for future pandemics. But too little attention to the safety risks will increase the chances that an experimental pathogen may escape a lab through an accident and cause an outbreak of its own. Sorting out the balance of risks and benefits of the research has proved over the years to be immensely challenging. And now, the intensity of the politics and rhetoric over the lab leak theory threatens to push detailed science policy discussions to the sidelines. “It’s just going to make it harder to get back to a serious debate,” said Marc Lipsitch, an epidemiologist at the Harvard TH Chan School of Public Health who has urged the government to be more transparent about its support of gain-of-function research. In the 1970s, researchers were learning for the first time how to move genes from one organism to another to make bacteria produce human insulin. From the start, critics worried that such experiments could accidentally create deadly pathogens if they escaped from labs. Tinkering with genes is not the only way that a scientist can give an organism new abilities. Researchers can also stage evolutionary experiments, in which pathogens are grown in the cells of an unfamiliar host species. At first, they do not replicate well. But new mutations can help them adapt, gradually improving their performance. A decade ago, researchers used serial passage, as this procedure is known, to learn how new strains of influenza evolve. Flu strains start off in the guts of birds, and sometimes manage to mutate into a form that can spread among people. Two teams of researchers — one from the University of Wisconsin in Madison and the other at Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam, the Netherlands — designed experiments to identify which genetic mutations were essential for a successful jump from birds to people. They injected bird flu viruses into the noses of ferrets, waited for the viruses to replicate, and then transferred the new viruses to new ferrets. Soon the viruses evolved to become better at replicating in the ferrets. When news of the experiments broke in late 2011, a controversy exploded. Some critics said the research was reckless and should not be published, for fear that other researchers would copy the work and accidentally release a new pandemic strain of flu. A year later, the US Department of Health and Human Services held a meeting to consider what it called “gain-of-function research.” The name took hold, but scientific experts have grown increasingly frustrated with it ever since. “It’s a horribly imprecise term,” said Gigi Gronvall, a senior scholar at the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security. Many gain-of-function experiments could never pose an existential threat; instead, they have provided huge benefits to humanity. In 1937, researchers found that when they passed the yellow fever virus through chicken cells, it lost the ability to cause disease in humans — a discovery that led to a vaccine for yellow fever. Likewise, herpes viruses have been engineered to gain a new function of their own: attacking cancer cells. They are now an approved treatment for melanoma. But the bird flu experiments raised concerns that certain gain-of-function studies could pose a tiny but real risk of dangerous outbreaks. In 2014, US officials announced that 18 such studies would be paused. The experiments were not just on influenza viruses, but on the coronaviruses that caused SARS and MERS. Three years later, the government rolled out a new policy — the “P3CO framework” — for research on “enhanced potential pandemic pathogens.” The rule requires the agencies under the HHS umbrella, like NIH and its several institutes, to carry out a special review of grant applications for any research on “a credible source of a potential future human pandemic.” In 2019, after conducting such a scientific review, the agency gave the green light for two influenza projects to restart, triggering more debate about whether its policy was thorough enough. When questioning Fauci last month, Paul brought up one of the most cited examples of gain-of-function research, a study of coronaviruses done by Ralph Baric at the University of North Carolina published in Nature Medicine in 2015. Working with data sent from Shi Zhengli, the director of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, Baric and his colleagues built a new coronavirus from an existing one. All of the work was done in the North Carolina lab, and neither Zhengli nor members of her lab participated. The so-called chimeric virus that resulted was not more pathogenic than the parental virus, Baric said. “This work was approved by the NIH, was peer-reviewed, P3CO reviewed and approved,” Baric wrote in an email last month. The work also “involved a very different strain of beta coronavirus than the one that causes COVID-19,” he said, and was considered low risk because of the particular strain in question. In the paper, he and his colleagues cautioned others about similar research. “The potential to prepare for and mitigate future outbreaks must be weighed against the risk of creating more dangerous pathogens,” they wrote. The P3CO policy has a significant shortcoming, according to David Relman, a member of the US National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity and a microbiologist at Stanford University: It only applies to the grant process in agencies that are part of HHS. Grants from the National Science Foundation, the Pentagon or other agencies could include dangerous research and also need oversight, he said. Then there is the thornier question of private research. Relman has also criticised the government’s process for screening and approving gain-of-function research. At a January 2020 meeting of the advisory board, he objected to the lack of information released about how two research proposals were approved. Rozanne Sandri-Golin, editor-in-chief of the Journal of Virology, a scientist who works on the herpes virus and a fellow member of the board, said Relman made a strong case about the lack of transparency in the grant-screening process. The board was told that a committee made the decision, but “their names weren’t published, their backgrounds weren’t published and the process that they used for deciding whether or not it was going to be all right to now proceed with this research was not clearly defined,” she said. The secrecy of the screening process was the most worrisome part of government oversight of potentially dangerous research, according to Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at University of Saskatchewan’s Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization, who was doing research in the United States at that time. “It’s not clear how they decide what’s acceptable gain of function and what’s not,” she said. However, the “star chamber” nature of the process was not its biggest problem, said Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers, the state university of New Jersey, who has also been one of the most vocal proponents of the lab leak theory, and a longtime advocate of stricter control of research on dangerous pathogens. An even bigger issue, he said, was that gain-of-function research was simply not being screened in accordance with the policy established by HHS, which includes the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, run by Fauci. The ideal solution, he said, would be the creation of an independent body to provide the oversight of dangerous pathogen research, similar to what the Nuclear Regulatory Commission does for studies of radioactive materials. In the United States, “there are no biosafety rules or regulations that have the force of law,” he said. “And this is in contrast to every other aspect of biomedical research.” There are enforceable rules, for example, for experiments with human subjects, vertebrate animals, radioactive materials and lasers, but none for research with disease-causing organisms.

Fight over Covid’s origins renews debate on risks of lab work

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has crippled industries, plummeted economies and increased unemployment globally. On Wednesday, the United Nations said that the pandemic has pushed over 100 million moe people into poverty.&nbsp;

Owing to the pandemic, working hours have considerably decreased and good quality jobs are less fairly available.&nbsp; In a new report, the United Nation’s International Labour Organization (ILO) warned that the crisis in labour market caused by the pandemic is not over yet.

Employment levels will not return to pre-pandemic levels before 2023 based on the current trajectory. The report, titled World Employment and Social Outlook said that the world will be short of 75 million jobs by the end of 2021 compared to if there had been no pandemic.

Even by the next year, there would be 23 million fewer jobs than would have been in a normal scenario. ILO chief Guy Ryder told reporters that besides being a public health crisis, COVID-19 has been “an employment and human crisis”.

Also read:&nbsp;<a href="http://13.235.153.162/world/us-unemployment-claims-at-lowest-level-since-pandemic-began-373396" hreflang="en">US unemployment claims at lowest level since pandemic began</a>

"Without a deliberate effort to accelerate the creation of decent jobs, and support the most vulnerable members of society and the recovery of the hardest-hit economic sectors, the lingering effects of the pandemic could be with us for years in the form of lost human and economic potential, and higher poverty and inequality”, Ryder was cited as saying by AFP.

In 2019, the global unemployment stood at 187 million. The number will shoot up to 205 million people in 2022 and experts claim the real numbers are way worse.

Even among jobs that people retained, working hours have been cut tremendously. In 2020, 8.8 per cent of global working hours were lost compared to 2019. This means 255 million full-time jobs worth of time was lost!

Also read:&nbsp;<a href="http://13.235.153.162/world/is-unemployment-new-epidemic-spreading-across-china-296650" hreflang="en">Is unemployment new 'epidemic' spreading across China?</a>

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has crippled industries, plummeted economies and increased unemployment globally. On Wednesday, the United Nations said that the pandemic has pushed over 100 million moe people into poverty.

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has crippled industries, plummeted economies and increased unemployment globally. On Wednesday, the United Nations said that the pandemic has pushed over 100 million moe people into poverty. Owing to the pandemic, working hours have considerably decreased and good quality jobs are less fairly available. In a new report, the United Nation’s International Labour Organization (ILO) warned that the crisis in labour market caused by the pandemic is not over yet. Employment levels will not return to pre-pandemic levels before 2023 based on the current trajectory. The report, titled World Employment and Social Outlook said that the world will be short of 75 million jobs by the end of 2021 compared to if there had been no pandemic. Even by the next year, there would be 23 million fewer jobs than would have been in a normal scenario. ILO chief Guy Ryder told reporters that besides being a public health crisis, COVID-19 has been “an employment and human crisis”. Also read: US unemployment claims at lowest level since pandemic began "Without a deliberate effort to accelerate the creation of decent jobs, and support the most vulnerable members of society and the recovery of the hardest-hit economic sectors, the lingering effects of the pandemic could be with us for years in the form of lost human and economic potential, and higher poverty and inequality”, Ryder was cited as saying by AFP. In 2019, the global unemployment stood at 187 million. The number will shoot up to 205 million people in 2022 and experts claim the real numbers are way worse. Even among jobs that people retained, working hours have been cut tremendously. In 2020, 8.8 per cent of global working hours were lost compared to 2019. This means 255 million full-time jobs worth of time was lost! Also read: Is unemployment new 'epidemic' spreading across China?

Covid pandemic has pushed 100 million more people into poverty, UN report reveals

United Kingdom Prime Minister Boris Johnson was reportedly so sceptical of the risks posed by COVID-19 that he was willing to inject himself with the virus.

Dominic Cummings, his former top aide&nbsp;told parliament on Wednesday that Johnson simply wasn’t doing enough to limit the spread of the virus when the first wave hit.

He added that most officials in the country were worried that the Johnson administration would not be&nbsp;“constructive” in terms of virus mitigation strategies as the PM chaired emergency “COBR” meetings.

<div class="videoWrapper trancodeVideo"><iframe allowfullscreen="" autoplay="1" class="includeVideo" frameborder="0" height="350" src="https://www.wionews.com/videos/pm-boris-johnson-faces-pressure-over-alleged-let-bodies-pile-high-remark-380776/embed" style="width:100%;max-width:560px;" width="560"></iframe></div>

"The view of various officials inside Number 10 was, if we have Prime Minister chairing COBR meetings and he just tells everyone this is swine flu, don't worry about it and I'm going to get (Chief Medical Officer) Chris Whitty to inject me live on TV with coronavirus... that would not help," Cummings was quoted as telling lawmakers by news agency Reuters.

It appears that Johnson only understood the severity of coronavirus after contracting it himself, for which he required intensive care in April 2020.

Also read:&nbsp;<a href="http://13.235.153.162/world/nurse-who-played-key-role-in-boris-johnsons-covid-recovery-has-quit-heres-what-happened-385889" hreflang="en">Nurse who played key role in Boris Johnson's Covid recovery has quit. Here's what happened</a>

With over&nbsp;128,000 deaths, the United Kingdom has the world's fifth worst official COVID-19 toll. Boris Johnson was accused of being slow in addressing the significance of the threat from the virus in early 2020 while it made its way from China to the rest of the world.

Dominic Cummings is responsible for strategising the 2016 Brexit campaign, followed by Johnson’s election win in 2019. Cummings was quizzed by British lawmakers on the lessons the country and its administration could learn from COVID-19.

After leaving the government in late 2020, Cummings has referred to the collective failures on the part of British government multiple times.&nbsp;He said that the British health ministry was a “smoking ruin” and claimed that Western governments had failed in responding actively to the crisis. Cummings also added that the UK was highly unprepared for the pandemic.

Also read:&nbsp;<a href="http://13.235.153.162/world/former-aide-accuses-uk-pm-boris-johnson-of-lying-over-covid-response-386901" hreflang="en">Former aide accuses UK PM Boris Johnson of lying over Covid response</a>

United Kingdom Prime Minister Boris Johnson was reportedly so sceptical of the risks posed by COVID-19 that he was willing to inject himself with the virus. Dominic Cummings, his former top aide told parliament on Wednesday that Johnson simply wasn’t doing enough to limit the spread of the virus when the first wave hit.

United Kingdom Prime Minister Boris Johnson was reportedly so sceptical of the risks posed by COVID-19 that he was willing to inject himself with the virus. Dominic Cummings, his former top aide told parliament on Wednesday that Johnson simply wasn’t doing enough to limit the spread of the virus when the first wave hit. He added that most officials in the country were worried that the Johnson administration would not be “constructive” in terms of virus mitigation strategies as the PM chaired emergency “COBR” meetings. "The view of various officials inside Number 10 was, if we have Prime Minister chairing COBR meetings and he just tells everyone this is swine flu, don't worry about it and I'm going to get (Chief Medical Officer) Chris Whitty to inject me live on TV with coronavirus... that would not help," Cummings was quoted as telling lawmakers by news agency Reuters. It appears that Johnson only understood the severity of coronavirus after contracting it himself, for which he required intensive care in April 2020. Also read: Nurse who played key role in Boris Johnson's Covid recovery has quit. Here's what happened With over 128,000 deaths, the United Kingdom has the world's fifth worst official COVID-19 toll. Boris Johnson was accused of being slow in addressing the significance of the threat from the virus in early 2020 while it made its way from China to the rest of the world. Dominic Cummings is responsible for strategising the 2016 Brexit campaign, followed by Johnson’s election win in 2019. Cummings was quizzed by British lawmakers on the lessons the country and its administration could learn from COVID-19. After leaving the government in late 2020, Cummings has referred to the collective failures on the part of British government multiple times. He said that the British health ministry was a “smoking ruin” and claimed that Western governments had failed in responding actively to the crisis. Cummings also added that the UK was highly unprepared for the pandemic. Also read: Former aide accuses UK PM Boris Johnson of lying over Covid response

Virus-sceptic Boris Johnson considered injecting himself with Covid, says former aide Cummings

Falling COVID-19 case numbers and more vaccinations will permit Greece to open its vital tourism sector next week, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Wednesday, adding he was "very, very sure" the situation would be much better in a month`s time. 
 
On May 15 Greece plans to lift travel restrictions on foreign visitors who have been vaccinated or have negative test results. Tourism accounts for about a fifth of Greece`s economy and jobs market, and after the worst year on record for the sector last year the country can ill afford another lost summer. 
 
Mitsotakis said a combination of widespread testing, immunisation, and the fact that many activities would take place outdoors gave authorities confidence that tourists would be able to visit safely. 
 
"I do expect the situation to improve dramatically over the next months," he told a digital conference organised by the Financial Times. 
 
Mitsotakis said he was optimistic about the prospects for post-pandemic recovery and expected a significant rebound after an 8.2% fall in GDP last year, helped by the European Union`s Recovery and Resilience Fund. 
 
"I`m very, very confident it will add additional firepower to turbocharge our recovery once the pandemic is over," he said. 
 
The programme, featuring a mix of digital and green investments and spending on social cohesion and training measures, is expected to lift Greece`s GDP by 3.6% this year and 6.2% in 2022. 
 
Mitsotakis said reforms of labour laws and supplemental pensions would continue, but he said Greece had clearly left behind the decade-long financial crisis and the harsh austerity measures imposed by international creditors. 
 
"I would clearly distinguish between reforms and austerity. We are no longer in an austerity phase," he said.

Falling COVID-19 case numbers and more vaccinations will permit Greece to open its vital tourism sector next week, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Wednesday, adding he was "very, very sure" the situation would be much better in a month`s time.

Falling COVID-19 case numbers and more vaccinations will permit Greece to open its vital tourism sector next week, Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said on Wednesday, adding he was "very, very sure" the situation would be much better in a month`s time. On May 15 Greece plans to lift travel restrictions on foreign visitors who have been vaccinated or have negative test results. Tourism accounts for about a fifth of Greece`s economy and jobs market, and after the worst year on record for the sector last year the country can ill afford another lost summer. Mitsotakis said a combination of widespread testing, immunisation, and the fact that many activities would take place outdoors gave authorities confidence that tourists would be able to visit safely. "I do expect the situation to improve dramatically over the next months," he told a digital conference organised by the Financial Times. Mitsotakis said he was optimistic about the prospects for post-pandemic recovery and expected a significant rebound after an 8.2% fall in GDP last year, helped by the European Union`s Recovery and Resilience Fund. "I`m very, very confident it will add additional firepower to turbocharge our recovery once the pandemic is over," he said. The programme, featuring a mix of digital and green investments and spending on social cohesion and training measures, is expected to lift Greece`s GDP by 3.6% this year and 6.2% in 2022. Mitsotakis said reforms of labour laws and supplemental pensions would continue, but he said Greece had clearly left behind the decade-long financial crisis and the harsh austerity measures imposed by international creditors. "I would clearly distinguish between reforms and austerity. We are no longer in an austerity phase," he said.

Greek PM Mitsotakis sees Covid situation improving 'dramatically'

As the World in general and India, in particular, are&nbsp;grappling to overcome the COVID-19 crisis of monstrous proportions, the National Security Advisor (NSA) of the United States of America, Jake Sullivan called up (April 25) his Indian counterpart, Ajit Doval expressing deep sympathy for the people of India amid an unprecedented surge in the cases. This telephonic conversation, high in quality and substance, saw Jake Sullivan assuring that India and the US will work jointly for the already existing, seven-decade-old health partnership between the two big democracies.

This talk between the two NSAs, followed up by a call by President Joe Biden clearly demonstrated that the US was inclined to help India at this critical juncture.&nbsp;

The US President, the NSA and other US officials holding key positions assured India rather convincingly that the US was sending specific raw material urgently required in India for the manufacture of Covishield vaccine.&nbsp;

For this, the US administration further said that it had already identified supplies of therapeutic and diagnostic test kits, Personal Protection Equipment (PPE), Oxygen generation equipment and allied supplies like ventilators and linked items of life-saving nature.&nbsp;

The US DFC (United States International Development Finance Corporation), in the meantime, has also disclosed funding to India, a substantial expansion of the scheme for manufacture at Bio E, the vaccine manufacturer in India to produce at least one billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines by the end of the year 2022.&nbsp;

In addition to this, the US is also deploying an expert team of public health advisors from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and USAID to extend support.

This support notwithstanding, NSAs of both India and the US will remain in close touch.&nbsp;

Jake&nbsp;Sullivan even tweeted about the US’s determined support to India. President Biden also used social media pledging support to India to tide over the ongoing health crisis.&nbsp;

Such a development marks a visible move by the US to help India in an all-out manner. Apart from this, US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin has directed his defence department to extend maximum support to India to overcome the prevailing monumental health challenges. Meanwhile, US Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi and Representative Pramila Jayapal have also urged for extended all-out support to India, both moral and material, to meet the Corona menace.

In a related development, the European Union (EU), the United Kingdom (UK), several European countries including Denmark have assured all possible help.&nbsp;

However, most significantly, a loud call for help to India from Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has caught the attention of many who have also expressed his country’s solidarity in helping India at this moment of serious challenge.&nbsp;

Similar offers of help are also seen in the social media from Pakistan to extend a helping hand. Some knowledgeable quarters reckon that this is a golden opportunity for Pakistan to warm up to India as in the past, India too had offered help to Pakistan in a slew of natural calamities and catastrophe in Pakistan.&nbsp;

Pakistan and India are already believed to be engaged in a thaw through backchannel diplomacy restoring the status of ceasefire. There has been some restraint seen in criticising each other in recent times or any belligerent stance with any aggressive tenor. These think tanks believe that both India and Pakistan can jointly combat this health crisis as the iron is hot and opportunity doesn’t merit to be missed.&nbsp;

In sum, Pakistani gestures noticed recently, could be capitalised for the larger interest of peace bringing down temperatures. On its part, Pakistan can give up its stand on Kashmir for restoration of pre-August 5, 2019 status as it looks to be bereft of reality. An understanding on both sides, displaying maturity could usher in peace, good health and prosperity on both sides of the border.

The US help to India, triggered initially by the talks between the two NSAs, and now the offer by Pakistan offering solidarity, raises a ray of hope in these depressing times.

Amid these developments, China has visibly stepped up its presence in the South Asian region as seen from the recent visit of its Defence and People's Liberation Army Minister Wei Fenghe.

Arriving in Sri Lankan capital Colombo on April 27, the visiting Chinese minister met Sri Lanka President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and held wide-ranging talks signalling that China and Sri Lanka are further warming up to each other.&nbsp;

Barely six months ago a high level Chinese foreign policy official Yang Jiechi had paid a visit to Colombo. The Chinese Defence Minister, during his most recent visit to this region, had called for resisting powers from outside the region setting up military alliances in South Asia.&nbsp;

He was obviously referring to the Quad formation comprising India, the US, Australia and Japan. The Chinese defence minister also met Bangladesh President Abdul Hamid in Dhaka and called for renewed cooperation at a high level between China and Bangladesh in the areas of vaccine, defence, technology etc.&nbsp;

Also, General Secretary of Bangladesh's ruling Awami League, Obaidul Quader disclosed that Bangladesh is open to receiving vaccines from any country.&nbsp;

In the meantime, Bangladesh Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen indicated that China will gift five lakh doses of corona vaccine to Bangladesh. He further averred that Bangladeshis engaged in business with China prefer getting vaccines from China.&nbsp;

It would appear from these happenings unfolding in the region that China is trying to play a more proactive role in further befriending countries in South Asia focusing on Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Pakistan, Nepal and Afghanistan in an apparent bid to prove that it is alive and kicking in the region and can’t be ignored despite the Quad and emerging bonhomie between the US and India in the light of the coronavirus pandemic bringing them closer.&nbsp;

How far will China succeed in such geopolitical endeavours?&nbsp;

Only time will testify.

(Disclaimer: The views of the writer do not represent the views of WION or ZMCL. Nor does WION or ZMCL endorse the views of the writer.)

As the World in general and India, in particular, are grappling to overcome the COVID-19 crisis of monstrous proportions, the National Security Advisor (NSA) of the United States of America, Jake Sullivan called up (April 25) his Indian counterpart, Ajit Doval expressing deep sympathy for the people of India amid an unprecedented surge in the cases.

As the World in general and India, in particular, are grappling to overcome the COVID-19 crisis of monstrous proportions, the National Security Advisor (NSA) of the United States of America, Jake Sullivan called up (April 25) his Indian counterpart, Ajit Doval expressing deep sympathy for the people of India amid an unprecedented surge in the cases. This telephonic conversation, high in quality and substance, saw Jake Sullivan assuring that India and the US will work jointly for the already existing, seven-decade-old health partnership between the two big democracies. This talk between the two NSAs, followed up by a call by President Joe Biden clearly demonstrated that the US was inclined to help India at this critical juncture. The US President, the NSA and other US officials holding key positions assured India rather convincingly that the US was sending specific raw material urgently required in India for the manufacture of Covishield vaccine. For this, the US administration further said that it had already identified supplies of therapeutic and diagnostic test kits, Personal Protection Equipment (PPE), Oxygen generation equipment and allied supplies like ventilators and linked items of life-saving nature. The US DFC (United States International Development Finance Corporation), in the meantime, has also disclosed funding to India, a substantial expansion of the scheme for manufacture at Bio E, the vaccine manufacturer in India to produce at least one billion doses of COVID-19 vaccines by the end of the year 2022. In addition to this, the US is also deploying an expert team of public health advisors from the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) and USAID to extend support. This support notwithstanding, NSAs of both India and the US will remain in close touch. Jake Sullivan even tweeted about the US’s determined support to India. President Biden also used social media pledging support to India to tide over the ongoing health crisis. Such a development marks a visible move by the US to help India in an all-out manner. Apart from this, US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin has directed his defence department to extend maximum support to India to overcome the prevailing monumental health challenges. Meanwhile, US Congressman Raja Krishnamoorthi and Representative Pramila Jayapal have also urged for extended all-out support to India, both moral and material, to meet the Corona menace. In a related development, the European Union (EU), the United Kingdom (UK), several European countries including Denmark have assured all possible help. However, most significantly, a loud call for help to India from Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan has caught the attention of many who have also expressed his country’s solidarity in helping India at this moment of serious challenge. Similar offers of help are also seen in the social media from Pakistan to extend a helping hand. Some knowledgeable quarters reckon that this is a golden opportunity for Pakistan to warm up to India as in the past, India too had offered help to Pakistan in a slew of natural calamities and catastrophe in Pakistan. Pakistan and India are already believed to be engaged in a thaw through backchannel diplomacy restoring the status of ceasefire. There has been some restraint seen in criticising each other in recent times or any belligerent stance with any aggressive tenor. These think tanks believe that both India and Pakistan can jointly combat this health crisis as the iron is hot and opportunity doesn’t merit to be missed. In sum, Pakistani gestures noticed recently, could be capitalised for the larger interest of peace bringing down temperatures. On its part, Pakistan can give up its stand on Kashmir for restoration of pre-August 5, 2019 status as it looks to be bereft of reality. An understanding on both sides, displaying maturity could usher in peace, good health and prosperity on both sides of the border. The US help to India, triggered initially by the talks between the two NSAs, and now the offer by Pakistan offering solidarity, raises a ray of hope in these depressing times. Amid these developments, China has visibly stepped up its presence in the South Asian region as seen from the recent visit of its Defence and People's Liberation Army Minister Wei Fenghe. Arriving in Sri Lankan capital Colombo on April 27, the visiting Chinese minister met Sri Lanka President Gotabaya Rajapaksa and held wide-ranging talks signalling that China and Sri Lanka are further warming up to each other. Barely six months ago a high level Chinese foreign policy official Yang Jiechi had paid a visit to Colombo. The Chinese Defence Minister, during his most recent visit to this region, had called for resisting powers from outside the region setting up military alliances in South Asia. He was obviously referring to the Quad formation comprising India, the US, Australia and Japan. The Chinese defence minister also met Bangladesh President Abdul Hamid in Dhaka and called for renewed cooperation at a high level between China and Bangladesh in the areas of vaccine, defence, technology etc. Also, General Secretary of Bangladesh's ruling Awami League, Obaidul Quader disclosed that Bangladesh is open to receiving vaccines from any country. In the meantime, Bangladesh Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen indicated that China will gift five lakh doses of corona vaccine to Bangladesh. He further averred that Bangladeshis engaged in business with China prefer getting vaccines from China. It would appear from these happenings unfolding in the region that China is trying to play a more proactive role in further befriending countries in South Asia focusing on Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Pakistan, Nepal and Afghanistan in an apparent bid to prove that it is alive and kicking in the region and can’t be ignored despite the Quad and emerging bonhomie between the US and India in the light of the coronavirus pandemic bringing them closer. How far will China succeed in such geopolitical endeavours? Only time will testify. (Disclaimer: The views of the writer do not represent the views of WION or ZMCL. Nor does WION or ZMCL endorse the views of the writer.)

Opinion: Depressing Covid times and rays of hope

US State Department spokesperson Ned Price has said that United States is "very closely" tracking the course of the COVID-19 outbreak in India.

"There are protocols in place, requiring testing for international travel. What is true is that we are tracking the course of the COVID outbreak in India very closely as I mentioned before, Secretary Blinken and Foreign Minister Jaishankar did discuss it yesterday," Price said in a statement on Tuesday.

"We are committed to doing what we can both at the present. And going forward, to see to it that this virus is brought under control and I spoke again of our engagement with the who are funding to COVAX, the Quad arrangement that of course implicates. What we're seeing in India," he added.

On the COVID-19 vaccine, Price said, "Our priority is ensuring the distribution of a safe and effective vaccine to millions of Americans to all Americans who can take advantage of it. But we also know that we need to continue to demonstrate that leadership."

"When it comes to countries beyond our borders and that's precisely what we've done, as I mentioned before, we've re-engaged. The who we've committed USD 2 billion to Kovacs another USD 2 billion over time, we've spoken to our partnership with Canada and Mexico," he added.

Yesterday, The Biden administration has conveyed to New Delhi that it understands India's pharmaceutical requirements and promised to give the matter due consideration, observing that the current difficulty in the export of critical raw materials needed to manufacture COVID-19 vaccines is mainly due to an Act that forces American companies to prioritise domestic consumption.

President Joe Biden and his predecessor Donald Trump had invoked the war-time Defence Production Act (DPA) that leaves US companies with no option but to give priority to the production of COVID-19 vaccines and Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) for domestic production to combat the deadly pandemic in America, the worst-hit nation.

Since the US has ramped up the production of COVID-19 vaccines mostly by Pfizer and Moderna to meet the goal of vaccinating its entire population by July 4, the suppliers of its raw material, which is in high demand globally and sought after by major Indian manufacturers, are being forced to provide it only for domestic manufacturers.

(With inputs from agencies)

US State Department spokesperson Ned Price has said that United States is "very closely" tracking the course of the COVID-19 outbreak in India. "There are protocols in place, requiring testing for international travel.

US State Department spokesperson Ned Price has said that United States is "very closely" tracking the course of the COVID-19 outbreak in India. "There are protocols in place, requiring testing for international travel. What is true is that we are tracking the course of the COVID outbreak in India very closely as I mentioned before, Secretary Blinken and Foreign Minister Jaishankar did discuss it yesterday," Price said in a statement on Tuesday. "We are committed to doing what we can both at the present. And going forward, to see to it that this virus is brought under control and I spoke again of our engagement with the who are funding to COVAX, the Quad arrangement that of course implicates. What we're seeing in India," he added. On the COVID-19 vaccine, Price said, "Our priority is ensuring the distribution of a safe and effective vaccine to millions of Americans to all Americans who can take advantage of it. But we also know that we need to continue to demonstrate that leadership." "When it comes to countries beyond our borders and that's precisely what we've done, as I mentioned before, we've re-engaged. The who we've committed USD 2 billion to Kovacs another USD 2 billion over time, we've spoken to our partnership with Canada and Mexico," he added. Yesterday, The Biden administration has conveyed to New Delhi that it understands India's pharmaceutical requirements and promised to give the matter due consideration, observing that the current difficulty in the export of critical raw materials needed to manufacture COVID-19 vaccines is mainly due to an Act that forces American companies to prioritise domestic consumption. President Joe Biden and his predecessor Donald Trump had invoked the war-time Defence Production Act (DPA) that leaves US companies with no option but to give priority to the production of COVID-19 vaccines and Personal Protective Equipment (PPEs) for domestic production to combat the deadly pandemic in America, the worst-hit nation. Since the US has ramped up the production of COVID-19 vaccines mostly by Pfizer and Moderna to meet the goal of vaccinating its entire population by July 4, the suppliers of its raw material, which is in high demand globally and sought after by major Indian manufacturers, are being forced to provide it only for domestic manufacturers. (With inputs from agencies)

We are tracking the course of the COVID outbreak in India very closely: US

Throughout January 2020, WHO kept praising China's response publicly. But, audio recordings of internal WHO meetings show how senior officials were complaining about not getting enough information from China. WION's Molly Gambhir brings you the revelations.

Gravitas: Wuhan Virus Pandemic: Leaked audio featuring WHO officials reveal China's lapses

Relatives of the victims in Wuhan are demanding a meeting with the WHO investigators. They say Chinese authorities have deleted a WeChat group they were using to build support and hold officials accountable for the pandemic. WION's Molly Gambhir tells you more.

Gravitas: Wuhan: Families of victims demand a meeting with the WHO team

Coronavirus wrecks havoc around the world, many things are still continued to be pointed at the World Health Organisation (WHO) along with the Chinese authorities, for failing to act promptly during the initial days of the outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan.

China & WHO, both unsuccessful in taking prompt action against COVID-19 pandemic

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