First COVID-19 case could have emerged in China in Oct 2019 – study
The virus that causes COVID-19 could have started spreading in China as early as October 2019, two months before the first case was identified in the central city of Wuhan, a new study showed on Friday.
Shocked by COVID deaths, young Indians rush for life insurance
BENGALURU, June 16 (Reuters) – Like many other twenty-somethings in India, Beverly Coutinho kept postponing buying a life insurance policy, until a surge in COVID-19 cases and deaths made her confront her own mortality. “I saw people my own age dying, which prompted me to get life insurance immediately,” says Coutinho, a 24-year-old senior executive […]
How can water utilities in the Pacific use the pandemic to become more resilient?
By Vivian Castro-Wooldridge Protecting and managing the water supply, even in the face of threats and challenges, is a key responsibility for utility companies and governments across the Pacific region. For many people in the Pacific, COVID-19 presents yet another challenge in a region familiar with natural hazards and the accompanying disruptions to everyday life. […]
3 ways Asia can inspire learning through skills, tech, artificial intelligence
Developing world that it will displace human workers with automation and artificial intelligence (AI)
Analysis: India’s vaccine inequity worsens as countryside languishes
Urban Indians are getting COVID-19 shots much faster than the hundreds of millions of people living in the countryside, government data shows, reflecting rising inequity in the nation’s immunisation drive. In 114 of India’s least developed districts – collectively home to about 176 million people – authorities have administered just 23 million doses in total. […]
Australia’s Victoria COVID-19 cluster swells to 51, next few days ‘critical’
Australia’s second-most populous state of Victoria, the epicentre of the country’s latest coronavirus hotspot, reported 11 new cases of community transmission on Monday and authorities warned the situation could worsen in coming days. The state officially reported five new cases in the 24 hours to midnight. At a press conference on Monday, authorities announced a […]
Myanmar COVID-19 outbreak hits health system shattered after coup
Breathless, fevered and without the extra oxygen that could help keep them alive, the new coronavirus patients at a hospital near Myanmar’s border with India highlight the threat to a health system near collapse since February’s coup.
Why school closure is a last resort
By Hyuncheol Bryant Kim, Sungsup Ra, Ryotaro Hayashi School reopening should be done on a risk-based approach – with situations closely monitored, particularly for the effect of COVID-19 variants – and school closure be used as a last resort. Schools have been fully or partially closed for more than a year in many developing countries. The world’s longest […]
India records more than 4,000 daily COVID-19 deaths
India reported a smaller rise in daily COVID-19 cases for the third straight day on Sunday, but the number of deaths in 24 hours was higher than 4,000, taking the country’s death toll to 270,000.
Germany’s 2021 election and why it matters to markets
It’s rare for German elections to be exciting, market-moving events but the one on Sept. 26 may prove the exception if its outcome completes the transformation of a nation long wedded to austerity into a big spender. The election will end Angela Merkel’s 16-year stint at the helm of Europe’s biggest economy, and the Greens […]
