The Ukrainian parliament on Tuesday sacked health minister Maksym Stepanov after he was heavily criticised for his poor handling of the coronavirus crisis.One of the poorest countries in Europe with an ageing healthcare system, Ukraine was hard-hit by the pandemic and is slow in its vaccine roll-out.Some 292 lawmakers, with 226 required, voted for the dismissal of Stepanov who was appointed health minister in March 2020.Prime Minister Denys Shmygal, who initiated Stepanov’s sacking, told the parliament that Stepanov was responsible for the “unsatisfactory pace of vaccination” against Covid-19 and failures in vaccine procurement.Since the start of the pandemic the country…
Author: Mike Harrison
A top White House aide made his pitch for young people to get vaccinated personal, sharing the struggles his own son has dealt with on an ongoing basis since contracting Covid-19 last fall.Andy Slavitt, President Joe Biden’s senior advisor for the coronavirus, revealed during a White House briefing Tuesday that one of his sons came down with the virus late last year and continues to suffer lingering side effects. He used it to appeal to younger Americans to roll up their sleeves, even if they feel they’re at relatively lower risk than older Americans to serious consequences from the virus.“Unfortunately,…
Japan on Tuesday registered another record high number of severe coronavirus cases as more than 1,200 patients are now using ventilators or receiving treatment at intensive care units across Japan.This comes as a state of emergency was declared in the capital Tokyo, Osaka, and seven other prefectures, NHK World reported.According to the Japanese broadcaster, citizens are being asked to stay home as much as possible until the end of this month.In the wake of rising cases, Japan is set to impose stricter restrictions for those who have been in Bangladesh, Maldives, and Sri Lanka in the 14 days before arrival…
An extended halt to exports of Covid-19 vaccines from India, where authorities are battling a wave of domestic infections, risks derailing vaccination efforts already underway in Africa, one of the continent’s top health officials said on Tuesday.India stopped vaccine exports a month ago and, according to a Reuters report earlier on Tuesday, is now unlikely to resume major exports before October, dealing a major setback to the global COVAX initiative on which many poor countries rely.Africa has lagged far behind other regions due to supply issues and meagre financial resources but had planned to vaccinate 30-35% of its population by…
(Photo : 7 of the Greatest Challenges Faced by Cryptocurrency Exchanges) Messari describes cryptocurrency exchanges as the industry’s 800-pound gorillas: entities that make all the money, interact with all the users, and have their fingers in pretty much every pie. Centralized or decentralized, these digital trading platforms represent the fulcrum of the cryptoconomy, the industry’s Central Station where users alight to buy, sell, bet, swap, lend, borrow, stake and save. According to The Block, the total volume across recognized exchanges in 2020 exceeded a cool $1 trillion. As successful as many exchanges are though, they face serious challenges in the form…
Housing costs are surging across the US, adding to concerns about rising inflation as vaccination campaigns and falling Covid-19 cases stoke the economy. Bloomberg | PUBLISHED ON MAY 18, 2021 08:57 PM IST Rents for single-family homes in the U.S. climbed to the highest level since September 2006 as the pandemic pushes Americans to seek out more space.Rent jumped 4.3% in March compared with a year earlier, according an index from CoreLogic Inc., led by double-digit increases in Phoenix and Tucson, Arizona.Housing costs are surging across the U.S., adding to concerns about rising inflation as vaccination campaigns and falling Covid-19…
A consortium of Indian banks led by the State Bank of India (SBI) on Tuesday moved a step closer in their attempt to recover debt from loans paid out to Vijay Mallya’s now-defunct Kingfisher Airlines after the High Court in London upheld an application to amend their bankruptcy petition, in favour of waiving their security over the embattled businessman’s assets in India.Chief Insolvencies and Companies Court (ICC) Judge Michael Briggs handed down his judgment in favour of the banks to declare there is no public policy that prevents a waiver of security rights, as argued by Mallya’s lawyers.At a virtual…
The uncontrolled re-entry of a China Long March rocket into Earth’s atmosphere has spurred the calls for new policies to help mitigate the growing problem of space junk.Early this month, the remnants of the Chinese rocket plunged into the Indian Ocean near the Maldives.Most of the huge Long March 5B rocket, however, burned up on reentering the atmosphere, the China Manned Space Engineering Office said in a post on WeChat, before it landed just west of the Maldives.The rocket, which was about 108 feet tall and weighs nearly 40,000 pounds, had launched a piece of a new Chinese space station…
China is resisting bilateral talks with the United States on nuclear weapons, the U.S. disarmament ambassador told a U.N. conference on Tuesday, as Washington seeks to advance efforts to reduce nuclear arms stockpiles.”Despite the PRC’s dramatic build-up of its nuclear arsenal, unfortunately it continues to resist discussing nuclear risk reduction bilaterally with the United States,” said Robert Wood, referring to the People’s Republic of China.”To date Beijing has not been willing to engage meaningfully or establish expert discussions similar to those we have with Russia. We sincerely hope that will change,” he added.In an apparent rebuttal, China’s envoy later told…
China says it hopes to see a “moderate Muslim” leadership in Afghanistan in the future and has assured the country of help in strengthening its anti-terrorism capacities as Kabul prepares for the departure of US troops later this year.In two phone calls to Afghanistan’s senior leadership on Monday, China’s state councillor and foreign minister Wang Yi laid out what Beijing sees on the road ahead for China-Afghanistan ties.“China hopes that Afghanistan’s future leadership will pursue a moderate Muslim policy, promote a foreign policy of peace, maintain friendship with neighbouring countries, and firmly combat all forms of terrorism. China will continue…