MOSCOW (Reuters) – Moscow began distributing the Sputnik V COVID-19 shot via 70 clinics on Saturday to the most exposed groups, marking Russiaβs first large-scale vaccination against the disease, the cityβs coronavirus task force said.
Month: December 2020
British PM Johnson and EU chief seek to break Brexit impasse
LONDON/BRUSSELS (Reuters) – British Prime Minister Boris Johnson will speak to European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on Saturday to try to break an impasse in trade talks with time running out to avoid a chaotic end to the Brexit saga.
Covid-19 has already exhausted the US. And it’s only the start of a dark and deadly winter
(CNN)For weeks, experts have warned Americans in increasingly dire terms that this winter will be one of the darkest periods in the nation’s public health history.Now that time isΒ upon us.From California to Kansas, Massachusetts to Florida, and everywhere in-between, doctors, nurses, funeral home directors and food bank organizers are bracing for a devastating season. They’re already stretched thin and exhausted after months of confrontingΒ the deadly Covid-19 pandemic, but they fear the worst is stillΒ yet to come.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/12/04/us/covid-19-winter-doctors-nurses-funeral-food/index.html
Pentagon blocked Biden’s intelligence transition team from meeting with agencies
The Trump administration preventedΒ President-elect Joe Biden’s transition teamΒ from meeting with its counterparts at Pentagon intelligence agencies this week, according to a former senior intelligence official familiar with intelligence transition discussions.The slowdown means theΒ Biden team has not yet been ableΒ to meet with officials from the military intelligence agencies within the Defense Department — including the Defense Intelligence Agency and the National Security Agency — even as all other meetings by Biden review teams appear to be happening smoothly now after weeks of delay.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/12/04/politics/pentagon-biden-transition-intelligence/index.html
Iran extends restrictions as COVID-19 death toll passes 50,000
Tehran, Iran β Iran has extended many coronavirus-related restrictions across the country as its COVID-19 death toll went past 50,000 on Saturday.
Iran, the worst affected country in the Middle East, is battling its third wave of the epidemic.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2020/12/5/iran-extends-restrictions-as-covid-19-deaths-surpass-50000
British index provider to drop eight Chinese corporations after US blacklisting
FTSE Russell, an arm of the London Stock Exchange, announced plans to delete shares of eight Chinese firms from certain products shortly after Washington added them to a blacklist of companies with alleged Chinese military ties.
The international index provider will remove shares of the eight enterprises from its FTSE Global Equity Index Series (GEIS), its FTSE China A Inclusion indices, and associated indices beginning on December 21 following the quarterly index review.
β2021 going to be catastrophic,β UN warned it faces worst crises in its history
The head of the World Food Programme has made a dire forecast about the months to come, slating βcatastrophicβ humanitarian crises for 2021, in what could be the worst year seen in the better part of a century.
WFP chief David Beasley sounded the alarm at a United Nations General Assembly meeting on Friday, convened to discuss the coronavirus pandemic and worldwide efforts to blunt its impact. He warned that some 270 million people are now βmarching toward starvationβ and that, in some countries, famine is βaround the horizon.β
