US pharmaceutical company Moderna on Wednesday agreed to deliver 25 million Covid-19 vaccine shots to Australia by the end of next year as the country deals with a lagging immunization campaign.Moderna will deliver 10 million doses this year and by 2022 deliver 15 million booster shots that are still being tested but meant to neutralize variants of Covid-19, the company and the Australian government said in a statement.”We appreciate the partnership and support from the government of Australia with this first supply agreement for doses of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine and our variant booster candidates,” Moderna CEO Stephane Bancel said…
Author: Mike Harrison
The Biden administration can enforce a congressional ban on tax cuts by states that tap almost $200 billion in Covid stimulus money while a lawsuit over the provision proceeds, a judge ruled.The ruling on Wednesday denying Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost’s request for an injunction against the ban is the first legal test of the restriction, which triggered five legal challenges in mostly Republican-led states after it was added to the $1.9 trillion American Rescue Plan Act.U.S. District Judge Douglas R. Cole’s decision is a positive early sign for Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen, who argued in court papers that the…
Nearly 3,000 inmates at two prisons in Thailand’s capital have tested positive for Covid-19, the Corrections Department said Wednesday, as the country battles a new wave of the coronavirus.The department said 1,785 of the 3,274 inmates tested positive at Bangkok Special Prison, which holds detainees ahead of trial. At the Central Women’s Correctional Institution, 1,040 of the 4,475 inmates were infected, it said.The Corrections Department announced the infections after a prominent political activist released on bail last week announced Wednesday that she had tested positive for the virus. Panusaya “Rung” Sitthijirawattanakul and fellow members of a student-led pro-democracy movement are…
The upcoming lunar eclipse Blood Moon would be an astonishing display in the night sky. Because of its unusual appearance, many people will try to snap a photo of it or just watch it at night. (Photo : Photo by Ulet Ifansasti/Getty Images)A view full moon during a ‘blood moon’ eclipse on July 28, 2018 in Yogyakarta, Indonesia. Stargazers viewed Friday’s total lunar eclipse, which was the longest blood moon visible this century, until 2123. As of the moment, there has not been a solar or lunar eclipse yet this 2021. Although this is the case, various space experts and…
The golden mirror of the James Webb Space Telescope will soon have its final test. NASA’s JWST is the successor of the current Hubble Space Telescope. (Photo : Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)Engineers and technicians assemble the James Webb Space Telescope November 2, 2016 at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland. The telescope, designed to be a large space-based observatory optimized for infrared wavelengths, will be the successor to the Hubble Space Telescope and the Spitzer Space Telescope. It is scheduled to be launched in October 2018. This new technology is expected to be more advanced compared to…
Mourners left toys and flowers on Wednesday in tribute at a Russian school where nine people, including seven children, were killed after a teenage gunman opened fire at a school.The attack on Tuesday in the city around 450 miles (725 km) east of Moscow was the deadliest school shooting since 2018 when a student at a college in Russian-annexed Crimea killed 20 people.”(I came here) because this is such a disaster … It’s impossible to just remain indifferent,” a woman who gave her name only as Albina said after coming to pay her respects at School Number 175.The head of…
Johnson’s finances have been the subject of extensive scrutiny in recent weeks, with electoral authorities investigating the funding of refurbishments to his flat, and parliament investigating the declaration he made relating to a donor-funded foreign trip. Reuters | PUBLISHED ON MAY 12, 2021 08:02 PM IST British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, whose personal finances have come under the spotlight over the renovation of his Downing Street apartment, has an unpaid debt of 535 pounds ($756.12) court records showed on Wednesday.The court judgement seen by Reuters did not name the other party in the case, but listed Boris Johnson and the…
The U.K. has reconsidered plans to buy one million doses of AstraZeneca Plc’s Covid-19 antibody treatment, according to two people with knowledge of the situation.While the first data from the treatment’s trials are expected in the coming weeks, the UK has no orders for it and is still evaluating the role antibody cocktails may play in Britain’s response to the pandemic, according to one of the people, who didn’t want to be identified because details of the discussions are private. Alok Sharma, the U.K.’s former business secretary, said in November that the country had procured the doses pending trial results.The…
Wednesday’s vote by House Republicans over whether to oust anti-Trump conservative Liz Cheney from her leadership role will almost certainly confirm that the party out of power in Washington is casting its lot with the former US president.Eighteen months before crucial midterms and three years before the next presidential race, the Republican Party appears intent on punishing one of its own because she refuses to embrace Donald Trump’s false claim that Democrats stole the 2020 election.Republicans argue it’s about unity, and that Cheney hammering on about Trump and what she calls his “dangerous and anti-democratic cult of personality” has done…
A full, independent public inquiry into the British government’s handling of its response to the coronavirus pandemic will be held early next year, Prime Minister Boris Johnson said on Wednesday.The country had “found itself in the teeth of the gravest pandemic for a century” and the state has “an obligation to examine its actions as rigorously and as candidly as possible and to learn every lesson for the future”, he told lawmakers.Britain has been hit hard by the outbreak, with more than 127,000 deaths since March last year — the world’s fifth highest official toll, according to data collected by…