International News Of The Week : 2020/10/16

ASIA

-Coronavirus

Total Cases: Cross 12 million

Total Deaths: At least 219K

-Pakistan  [Source: Aljazeera]

     Pakistan has banned Chinese social media app Tiktok for failing to filter out 'immoral and indecent' content, the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority (PTA) said in a statement. "Keeping in view the complaints and nature of the content being consistently posted on Tiktok, PTA issued a final notice to the application", the statement said. "However, the application failed to fully comply with the instructions. Therefore, directions were issued for blocking of Tiktok application in the country."

     The decision was taken after Prime Minister Imran Khan took a keen interest in the issue and has directed the telecommunication authorities to make all efforts to block content regarded vulgar in the conservative country. Dating app Tinder has also been blocked in recent months by Pakistani authorities.

     In 2016, Pakistan's parliament passed the Pakistan Electronic Crimes Act to regulate content on the internet. It gave the PTA broad powers to block considered to be against "the glory of Islam or the integrity, security or defense of Pakistan or ....public order, decency or mortality". PTA had blocked more than 800,000 websites and platforms from being accused within the country . The list of blocked websites includes pronographic platforms but has also included news outlets considered critical of the country's security and foreign policies, some social media, and some political parties websites.

(Note: Tiktok, owned by China-based Byte Dance, has been caught in a firestorm globally due to security and privacy concerns. It has already been blocked in India and it faces scrutiny in countries from Australia to the United States.) 

-Kyrgyzstan  [Source: RussiaNews.Net]

     After parliamentary elections in Kyrgyzstan were declared invalid, several political groups have been competing to fill in the positions which has brought the Kyrgyzstani government to standstill this week. Kyrgyzstani President Sooronbay Jeenbekov locations has been unknown since the opposition forces broke into the parliamentary building and seized other government complexes as well. Some speculate that he has fled the country. However, Jeenbekov said that irrespective of his location, he still remains in power. He dismissed Prime Minister Kubatbek Boronov and his cabinet and claimed that he is ready to resign once the new leadership is appointed.

     The political deadlock in Kyrgyzstan has been encouraged by a divided opposition which has failed to agree upon the new leader of the provisional government, which in turn has made it ambiguous whether a seamless transfer of power is possible. Lawmakers fragmented into factions and met at separate locations to decide the new Prime Minister. However, they could not gather enough votes for a quorum.

(Note: Following the political uprising in Belarus and the territorial conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan, the turbulence in Kyrgyzstan has created greater concerns regarding the instability on the Russian periphery.)

NORTH AMERICA

-Coronavirus

Total Cases: Cross 9.8 million

Total Deaths: At least 331K

-USA  [Source: DW]

Johnson & Johnson ( J & J ) said on Monday that it has temporarily halted the clinical trials of its COVID-19 vaccine candidate, after an 'unexplained illness in a study participant'. J & J said that illness was being evaluated by an independent data and safety monitoring board and its clinical physicians. The company said that such temporary halts were common in big trials, which include thousands of people.

(Note: In September, AstraZeneca halted late-stage trials of its vaccine being developed with the University of Oxford after an unexplained illness in a participant.)

SOUTH AMERICA

-Coronavirus

Total Cases: Cross 8.8 million

Total Deaths: At least 276K

-Argentina  [Source: MercoPress]

     Human Rights Watch (HRW) wants the city of Buenos Aires to stop using live facial recognition to identify children accused of committing crime. New York-based Human Rights Watch said Buenos Air started using the technology in 2019, making Argentina only country in the world to deploy it against people under the age of 18. HRW sent a letter to the city and national government calling on them to stop using live facial recognition in train stations to identify suspects, particularly children, because the technology often makes mistakes in identifying children.

     "Kids accused of having committed a crime are having their personal information published online, which is against international law and a national standards. Anyone with an internet connection can download that data", said Hye Jung Han, a child rights and technology researcher for HRW. "What's worse is that Buenos Aires government is feeding that data into a facial recognition system that operates in the city's train stations, to help police go search for them", Han said.

     Using facial recognition to identify child suspects is especially problematic because the appearance of young people can change in a matter of months as they mature, Han said. Similarly, this method is riddled with misidentifications that could unjustly limit jobs and educational opportunities for kids wrongly accused of theft and other crimes. Under international human rights law, children accused of crime have the right to privacy curing criminal proceedings, the HRW statement said.

EUROPE

-Coronavirus

Total Cases: Cross 6.5 million

Total Deaths: At least 235K

-Netherland  [Source: CNN]

     An elderly Dutch woman has become the first known person to die from catching COVID-19 twice, according to experts, raising serious questions about how long immunity and antibodies can last. The woman, 89, suffered from a rare type of bone marrow cancer. However, the researchers said her natural immune response could still have been 'sufficient' to fight off COVID-19, as the type of treatment she received for cancer. The patient was initially admitted into hospital earlier this year with a severe cough and fever, testing positive for COVID-19. She was discharged five days later when besides some fatigue her symptoms subsided completely, according to the report. But two days into chemotherapy treatment --59 days after the start of the first COVID-19 episode-- the woman developed fever, cough and difficulty breathing. She once again tested positive for coronavirus, and no antibodies were detected in her blood system when tested on days four and six. Her condition deteriorated on day eight. Two weeks later, the woman died. Upon examining the samples from both cases they found the genetic makeup of the two viruses to be different. They therefore concluded that 'it is likely that the second episode was a reinfection rather than prolonged shedding'.

     There have been some reported cases of reinfection worldwide, most recently a 25 year old man in Nevada in the United States is the first in the US documented to have been re-infected. The man developed a sore throat, cough, headache, nausea and diarrhoea after catching the virus in late March. He fully recovered by April 27, but fell ill a second time in late May with similar symptoms that worsened. He was given emergency oxygen to treat breathing difficulty. Scientists said his case, and others like it, prove it will not be possible to attain herd immunity through natural infection.

AFRICA

-Coronavirus

Total Cases: Cross 1.6 million

Total Deaths: 39K

-Zimbabwe  [Source: AllAfrica]

     415 school going girls dropped out of exam classes in Manicaland province during the COVID-19 lockdown period mainly due to marriage and pregnancy. However, only five boys dropped out of school for marriage reasons in the province. Provincial education director Edward Shumba said there was need to intensify guidance and counselling in schools in the province while urging parents to give children a second chance. "We all want to enhance guidance and counselling where things are happening", he told the media. "And for the parent, if the child has become pregnant, let those deliver, give them a second chance."

     Munyaradazi Rubaya, the provincial development officer in the Minister of Women's Affairs, said schools have to accommodate the girls to ensure their continued learning. Rubaya said there was need to make the school environment accommodative to the returning girls. "Since the education policy was amended to allow pregnant girls to continue attending schools, we are encouraging education institutions especially secondary schools to accommodate these girls and create an environment which is conducive for their continued learning, because in most cases, these girls are stigmatized", he said.

(Note: In 2019, 7000 girls dropped out of school due to pregnancy countrywide. Out of these drop-outs, 367 were from primary school and 6,419 were from secondary school. In August, parliament passed a legal amendment criminalising the expulsion of pregnant students.)

OCEANIA

-Coronavirus

Total Cases: Cross 33K

Total Deaths: At least 950

-Australia  [Source: BBC]

     The findings from Australia's national science agency suggest SARS-COV-2 can remain infectious such as plastics, bank notes, phone screens and stainless steel for 28 days, when kept at 20C(68F), which is about room temperature, and in the dark. 

     The coronavirus is mostly transmitted when people cough, sneeze or talk. But there is also evidence that it can also be spread by particles hanging in the air. It is also possible someone could get COVID-19 by touching infected surfaces such as metal or plastic, according to the US Centres for Disease Control.

     "COVID-19 spreads primarily through the air studies have shown that virus can remain infectious in airborne particles for more than three hours. What's less certain is the degree to which it can spread through surfaces such as banknotes and touchscreens.

     Previous studies have assessed its survivability on stainless steel and their results have varied wildly, ranging from between three and 14 days at room temperature. The new study looked at how long the virus could survive on glass, paper and plastic notes as well as steel. They found that they could detect if after 28 days on all these surfaces at 20C significantly longer than the earlier studies had indicated.

     The experiments were, however, carried out in the virus friendly conditions -in a dark room with stable temperatures and humidity -so the virus may well not do so well in the real world.

     Even so, these results highlight the need to wash hands as well as touchscreens regularly and to avoid touching one's face in order to minimise the risk of infection", said Pallab Ghosh, a science correspondent. 

     "Establishing how long the virus really remains viable on surface enables us to more accurately predict and mitigate its spread, and do a better job of protecting our people", said

CSIRO chief executive Dr. Larry Marshall.

(Note: The ability of SARS-COV-2 to persist on stainless steel at cooler temperatures could explain outbreaks of COVID-19 at meat processing and cold storage facilities. Thousands of workers have tested positive at meat processing factories and abattoirs around the world)