Coronavirus continues its spread around the world amid efforts to stem a second surge, with about 37 million confirmed cases and more than one million deaths.
In many countries which had apparent success in handling initial outbreaks, health experts are beginning to express concern as infection rates rise again.
Italy is preparing fresh nationwide restrictions in response to a recent increase in Covid-19 cases.
On Friday, the country recorded over 5,000 infections in a single day for the first time since March. Daily infections remained over the 5,000 mark on Saturday and Sunday.
Health Minister Roberto Speranza said new measures are necessary to curb the spread of the Covid-19 virus and avoid tougher measures later on.
Already last Wednesday, the country made it mandatory to wear face masks outdoors nationwide.
UK
British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is set to announce details of new measures on Monday to deal with the rising coronavirus infection rate after the UK reported about 12,000 cases on Sunday.
The prime minister is expected to outline details of a plan to place areas in England in three tiers of “medium”, “high” and “very high” risk as the government struggles to curb the infection rate.
The three-tiered classification will include shutting down bars, gyms and casinos in areas placed under the “very high” alert level.
India
India’s coronavirus cases rose by over 66,000 on Sunday, making it the second country to cross the seven-million mark.
With the latest spike in Covid-19 cases, India is edging closer to overtaking the United States as the country with the most infections.
Indian health officials have warned about the potential for the virus to spread even more during the upcoming religious festival season which climaxes in October and November with the celebrations of Dussehra and Diwali. These festivities are usually marked by huge gatherings in temples and shopping districts.
US
Coronavirus cases in the US have seen an uptick in recent days as the country recorded over 50,000 new cases daily in the past four days according to the World Health Organization.
The US is currently the world’s most affected country with approximately 7.6 million cases.
In an urgent call for countries to prepare better for all catastrophic events – from earthquakes and tsunamis to biological threats such as the new coronavirus – data from the UN Office on Disaster Risk Reduction (UNDRR) indicates that wealthy nations have done little to tackle the harmful emissions that are linked to climate threats which make up the bulk of disasters today.
“Disaster management agencies have succeeded in saving many lives through improved preparedness and the dedication of staff and volunteers. But the odds continue to be stacked against them, in particular by industrial nations that are failing miserably on reducing greenhouse gas emissions,” said Mami Mizutori, UNDRR chief, and Special Representative of the Secretary-General for Disaster Risk Reduction.
According to the UNDRR report – produced with Belgium’s Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters at UCLouvain – there were 7,348 recorded disaster events worldwide, during the last two decades.
Approximately 1.23 million people died – approximately 60,000 per year – with more than four billion affected in total; many more than once.
These two decades of disaster also caused $2.97 trillion in losses to the global economy, with data also indicating that poorer nations experienced deaths rates more than four times higher than richer nations.
By comparison, the previous 20-year period (1980 to 1999) saw 4,212 reported disasters from natural hazards, with 1.19 million deaths, more than three billion people affected and economic losses totalling $ 1.63 trillion.
Climate danger spike
Although better recording and reporting of disasters may help explain some of the increase in the last two decades, researchers insisted that the significant rise in climate-related emergencies was the main reason for the spike, with floods accounting for more than 40 per cent of disasters – affecting 1.65 billion people – storms 28 per cent, earthquakes (eight per cent) and extreme temperatures (six per cent).
“This is clear evidence that in a world where the global average temperature in 2019 was 1.1 degrees Celsius above the pre-industrial period, the impacts are being felt in the increased frequency of extreme weather events including heatwaves, droughts, flooding, winter storms, hurricanes and wildfires,” UNDRR reported .
Despite the pledge made by the international community in Paris in 2015 to reduce global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, Ms. Mizutori added that it was “baffling” that nations were continuing knowingly “to sow the seeds of our own destruction, despite the science and evidence that we are turning our only home into an uninhabitable hell for millions of people”.
COVID-19 exposure
Turning to the COVID-19 pandemic, which has “laid bare many shortcomings in disaster risk management (despite) repeated warnings”, the UNDRR report recommended urgent action from Governments to better manage such overlapping disasters.
These hazards included known “risk drivers”, such as poverty, climate change, air pollution, population growth in dangerous locations, uncontrolled urbanization and the loss of biodiversity.
Chronic needs
By way of an example of chronic weather risks which should be the focus of better national preparedness measures, the agency pointed that shifting rainfall patterns pose a risk to the 70 per cent of global agriculture that relies on rain and the 1.3 billion people dependent on degrading agricultural land.
Despite the fact that extreme weather events have become so regular in last 20 years, only 93 countries have implemented disaster risk strategies at a national level ahead of the end-of-year deadline, Ms. Mizutori said.
“Disaster risk governance depends on political leadership above all, and delivery on the promises made when the Paris agreement and the Sendai Framework for Disaster Risk Reduction were adopted,” she said. “But the sad fact is that we are wilfully destructive. And that is the conclusion of this report; COVID-19 is but the latest proof that politicians and business leaders have yet to tune into the world around them.”
She added: “It really is all about governance if we want to deliver this planet from the scourge of poverty, further loss of species and biodiversity, the explosion of urban risk and the worst consequences of global warming”, in a joint statement with UCLouvain’s Professor Debarati Guha-Sapir.
Although the UNDRR report indicates that there has been some success in protecting vulnerable communities from isolated hazards, thanks to more effective early warning systems, disaster preparedness and response, projected global temperature rises could make these improvements “obsolete in many countries”, the agency warned.
Currently, the world is on course for a temperature increase of 3.2 degrees Celsius or more, unless industrialised nations can deliver reductions in greenhouse gas emissions of at least 7.2 per cent annually over the next 10 years in order to achieve the 1.5 degree target agreed in Paris.
Simon & Schuster Children’s is to publish author and illustrator Beach’s first picture book, secured in a three-title deal.
Simon & Schuster Children’s is to publish author and illustrator Beach’s first picture book, secured in a three-title deal.
Senior commissioning editor Polly Whybrow bought world rights for three picture books from Charlotte Ayeto at Kingsford Campbell. The first in the series, The Dragon with the Blazing Bottom: A Very Firey Fairy Tale, is due to publish in September 2021, with the second book publishing in May 2022, and a third following in 2023.
The picture book’s synopsis explains: “Sir Wayne’s dragon has lost his flame. Are his teeth too clean? Is his tongue too pink? Perhaps his diet is to blame. Not to worry – Sir Wayne has a meal plan of epic proportions, including a heat-seeking rocket, one burning bush, some sparkles and fireworks – the ones that go ‘WHOOOOSH’. Oh, and one very mouldy piece of cheese – almost as green as the snot from a sneeze — what could possibly go wrong?”
Commenting on the acquisition, Whybrow said: “There are only a few books which, when they land in your inbox, make you shout out loud, to the entire office, with lunch still in hand: ‘We have to publish this. We have to publish this RIGHT NOW.’ And so it was with The Dragon with the Blazing Bottom. Fantastically funny, wonderfully frivolous, and hugely farty, there’s not one child out there who won’t fall about laughing for this brilliant new series. Beach is one of the most naturally hilarious and gifted picture book talents there is, and we’re completely thrilled we get to publish him exclusively on our bestselling and award-winning S&S list.”
Beach is the co-author and illustrator of six books under the name Tyers & Beach, who have sold 10,661 books for £88,601 through Nielsen BookScan’s UK TCM. He said: “I feel like I have died and gone to picture book heaven. Polly and the team are quite simply the most effortlessly cool and mind-bendingly inspiring partners in crime I could ever have wished for. I am over the moon to have found such a magical home for my hot-bottomed dragon.”
1. Sixty Somethings recounts the lives of 67 women born shortly after the last war. The generation has been hailed as unique, remarkable, and keen to break with tradition. Now, in the autumn of our years, most of us are still creative and energetic. Writing about our lives seemed a worthwhile thing to do.
2. The Sixties was a key period in our lives. Our teenage and early adult years were exciting times although they weren’t all about sex, drugs and rock ‘n’ roll. More of us than before went to university and we were full of ideas and convinced we would change the world.
3. For the first time ever we, as young people, had a culture of our own. Music of many genres, written and performed by our generation, and telling the world what we thought, was a key feature of the time. Our clothes also attested to our identity. I still look wistfully at my white leather mini-skirt hanging hopefully in my wardrobe.
4. I have always enjoyed finding out about the details of everyday lives. As a child I used to conduct mini-surveys of my friends and families. My first research project during my primary years was investigating whether loo rolls were used up more quickly in our upstairs or downstairs lavatory.
5. The events, both trivial and significant, of my own life are also well charted. I have kept a daily diary for every single day of my life since the age of nine. It is a useful reference document although there is now rather a lot to wade through. Its contents are, however, for my eyes only.
6. My family has had a big influence on my interests in social research. Both my parents were sociologists and helped shape my ideas about social life and the nature of evidence. My uncle, Charles Madge, was one of the founders of Mass Observation in the 1930s that tracked people’s everyday lives through peacetime and war. I have picked up his baton in my current project that looks at older people’s reactions and experiences during lockdown.
7. Similarities and differences across generations have always interested me. The Sixty Something women saw themselves as very different from their grandmothers in both what they did and what they thought. I am now wondering if my own young granddaughter will have similar things to say about me in years to come.
8. Writing has always been a key part of who I am. I wrote very long stories as a child, produced many academic books and articles throughout my career, and I’m still going. Recently, however, I have also had a go with a novel and (hopefully) wry poems about the human condition.
9. The countryside is a wonderful inspiration for ideas. I live in a rural setting and go for long walks most days. Often I come home with a new idea for something I’m writing. As I’m usually with my partner, and don’t take a notepad, my best thoughts do unfortunately sometimes get forgotten.
10. The journey is important. Most of the time I take pleasure in what I do for its own sake. The destination is a bonus. So while I have found it fascinating talking to the Sixty Somethings and telling their stories, it will be all the more worthwhile if readers too enjoy what they have to say.
Despite legislation and initiatives aimed at preventing them, around three in every five workers suffer from MSDs and they remain the most common work-related health complaint in Europe, affecting workers in all jobs and sectors. Repetitive movements, prolonged sitting and heavy lifting are just some of the risk factors that contribute to these conditions, which can affect the muscles, joints, tendons or bones. The negative impact that they have on workers’ quality of life is clear.
At a press conference in Brussels to mark the official launch of the campaign, Nicolas Schmit, European Commissioner for Jobs and Social Rights, highlighted the urgent need to take action:
The Commission wholeheartedly supports the campaign launched today by the European Agency for Safety & Health at Work (EU-OSHA) to tackle the issue of work-related musculoskeletal disorders. Ensuring the best possible work environment is critical for the health and wellbeing of the workforce, and therefore a duty of all employers. Many of us – 3 in 5 – have experienced backache, stiff muscles or a sore neck as a result of our work. This can severely affect our everyday lives, our productivity, and it can be detrimental to our physical and mental health. With the pandemic affecting how we live and work, we can all benefit from the guidance and resources published today.
The support of social partners and European institutions is also invaluable, with the German Presidency of the Council of the EU recognising the need to act on MSDs and pledging its commitment. Hubertus Heil, German Federal Minister of Labour and Social Affairs, commented:
MSDs affect every country in Europe. It affects all of us in different ways. Therefore, it must be managed in every European workplace –– from factory floors and hairdressing salons to hospital wards and offices. Therefore we give our full backing to the Healthy Workplaces Lighten the Load campaign.
MSDs also incur significant costs for employers and national health systems. Christa Sedlatschek, EU-OSHA Executive Director, emphasised that:
In addition to the human suffering caused, workers miss out on so many fulfilling aspects of their private and working lives. Those workers with MSDs are absent from work more often and for longer periods, are likely to be less productive while at work and often take early retirement. This is bad news for businesses and a huge burden on national economies. This campaign will highlight that early intervention and rehabilitation are vital and entirely possible. By working together and adopting good practice now, we can prevent MSDs in future generations of workers.
Measures to prevent and manage MSDs are often simple and inexpensive, and this is one of the key messages of the Healthy Workplaces Lighten the Load campaign. The campaign will reach out to workers and employers across all sectors, with a particular focus on high-risk sectors, such as health care and early education.
Supporting workers with chronic MSDs to remain in work will also be a key focus, along with the need to consider psychosocial risks and worker diversity, and to adopt collaborative approaches to MSD management — involving workers, employers, healthcare providers and other stakeholders.
Special attention will be given to emerging risks, arising from, for instance, digitalisation and new technologies and ways of organising work. This is particularly timely in light of COVID-19, which has forced many workers out of offices and into working from home. MSDs and home-based teleworking is a priority area for the campaign.
Finnish operator Elisa has announced the winners of the 2020 Finnish Books of the Year award, run by its Elisa Kirja e-book arm. Elisa had chosen a list of titles for the public to vote from. The exception was the newcomer category, in which Elisa Kirja itself picked the winner.
In the fiction category, the winner was Tommi Kinnunen’s “Defiance”. In the Information/biography category, the winner was Jari Tervo for his book about actor Veta-Matti Loiri. The winner of the crime category was Lenna Lehtolainen for “The Ripple Effect”. In the audiobook category, the winner was actor and author Ville Tiihonen. Elina Backman was named best newcomer for “When the King Dies”.
“There is no television, newspaper or radio. There is paper, pen, one book and the voices of comrades coming from the air well and hall. Sleeping for six hours, I try to spend the remaining 18 hours in the best way possible with my means. If I read more than 100 pages a day, I finish my book before I have to return it. Today’s war is about trying to read less.
“There are several things that remind one of modern life. Warm water flowing from the faucet 24/7 and electrically powered water heater…
“On the second day of my imprisonment, I caught myself dreaming of a vacuum cleaner to remove the spider’s webs on the wall. Then, I have forbidden myself from having small dreams.”
Discharged from public service by a Statutory Decree, academic Nuriye Gülmen has shared her story of arrest with bianet.
This letter, in fact, left her prison cell five days after she was arrested on August 11; however, it was brought back to her prison cell without any reasons. The letter could reach bianet a month later.
Nuriye Gülmen says, “I know that these attempts of terrorization, these imprisonments will pass. What will remain is our struggle that we have woven together in blood, sweat and tears and that we have been keeping up inside and outside and under any circumstances.”
She ends her letter in following words: “Don’t forget me. I am waiting for your friendly greetings and letters.”
Nuriye Gülmen was taken into custody on August 5 in the İdil Cultural Center, where Grup Yorum music band has been conducting its activities in İstanbul. Held in detention for seven days, Gülmen was arrested. She is now in Silivri No. 9 Prison at the outskirts of the city.
Referring to her detention in the İdil Cultural Center, Gülmen says, “The fact that we were taken into custody and arrested just because we were in a cultural center any day will come as no surprise to anyone who -more or less- keeps up with the political developments in Turkey.”
Gülmen also adds in her letter: “One does not help thinking that if I had left the İdil Cultural Center 10 minutes earlier, I would be now moving on with my ordinary life. In fact, my ordinary life is full of extraordinary things brought about by the system. If I had managed to leave the İdil Cultural Center on August 5, I would have first attended the press statement to be held for my dear attorneys Ebru Timtik and Aytaç Ünsal, then I would have paid the visits that I could not during the feast and I would have gone to see one of the families of Çorlu Train massacre.
“At night, I would have welcomed Şerif Mesutoğlu’s dear wife Saime, who came from Mardin for the justice watch that we would keep in front of the Çağlayan Courthouse the next day. My ordinary life was interrupted by special operations police who came up against me with long-barreled weapons in their hands and called on me to ‘lie on the ground’.”
‘Why am I in detention?’
During her interrogation at court, the first question the judge asked her was why she was in the İdil Cultural Center:
“It can be said that it was a good first question to be asked to a person who had been detained because she was in a cultural center. But, actually, it is not. The right question should be this:
“Why was I detained with weapons pointed to my face, forced to lie on the ground and dragged on the floor by special operations police and why do I now have to explain my reasons for being in a legal institution?
“Because the political police saw it fit to do it. Because they saw it fit to raid the institution as ‘some wanted persons might have been there’, ‘some ammunition was possibly there’ and ‘a call was made for a banned concert.’
“I think the political police themselves would admit that it was a bad plot. They do not need a good plot after all. They write the script themselves and perform it themselves anyway and they have several channels that are eagerly waiting for this play and would cover it with pleasure.
“The ammunition and the wanted persons could not be found in the end. The preparations for the banned concert were ongoing at full pace. Then, why am I in detention?”
‘They have both the test booklet and answer key’
During the interrogation, Gülmen talked about “the Resistances Assembly, how it was founded and ‘We Demand Justice’ Platform.” She said that she was in the İdil Cultural Center for an interview before the Grup Yorum concert and the preparation for a radio program:
“Then the past was raked up. The irrational allegation that I staged a hunger strike upon the instruction of the organization and ended it in the same way…. The familiar question of ‘men’ in official clothes and gowns who do not know what it means to reject food for the sake of a demand and have probably never been hungry in their lives…
“I do not know for how many times I said that it was not possible to go hungry upon instruction and talked about my own experience with hunger.
“When the question is wrong, the answer cannot be right no matter which option you choose. Because both the test booklet and answer key are in their hands. The interrogation ended and I was arrested due to flight risk abroad…” (AS/SD)
The faces of doctors treating patients infected with COVID-19 are marked by goggles, longing for loved ones and hope for victory. One of those doctors is Ana Coeva, a paediatrician at the Emilian Coțaga Children’s Hospital in the Republic of Moldova.
What preoccupies Ana the most is being away from her family – particularly her five-year-old daughter, whom she has chosen not to see for the last month out of fear of infecting her, while she continues to work at the hospital.
“I am grateful that my daughter can stay with her grandparents so I do not risk infecting her with the coronavirus. Her grandmother is very patient, explaining the situation and answering questions – of which there are many: ‘Where is my mother? What is my mother doing? Why isn’t she visiting?’ – but I try to stay in touch online as much as possible. I miss my family dearly.
“I want the people to truly understand the gravity of the situation and to act responsibly. Health care workers risk their own health by going to work. By respecting national health measures, the general population can help significantly,” she explains.
In her early thirties, Ana has four years of experience in the public health system. In the last month she has been wearing protective overalls while providing daily assistance to children suspected of having or confirmed to have COVID-19.
“My work has changed significantly, one important new factor being the low predictability of the disease evolution, the other being the personal protective equipment and the physical distancing measures we need to take.
“Although effective, the protective equipment we wear when treating patients is uncomfortable. It is painful from the moment you put it on, and by the time you take it off, you have marks on the skin left by the goggles. Because we also care for newborns, one-to-two months old, the room must be kept warm, which makes wearing protective overalls even more burdensome. It feels like being in a sauna.
“I am willing to take the risk of treating COVID-19 patients because I cannot turn my back on children who are sick. Like my colleagues, I am determined to provide care to all who need it.
“When we first choose to study medicine, we may not always know what awaits us. I don’t come from a family of doctors who could have helped me prepare for the realities of practicing, but along the way I have come to realize that I could not have chosen any other path for myself.”
WHO collaborated closely with national experts to train paediatricians like Ana in the management of COVID-19 cases among children. Health care professionals were trained in oxygen therapy, chronic lung disease and asthma, management of long-term cough and fever, rehydration methods, psychomotor health and stress management in children and parents, supportive care, and monitoring of condition and deterioration signs in the context of COVID-19. Training modules included simulation exercises on mannequins for remote practice of essential crisis management interventions.
PUBLISHED: 12:19 12 October 2020 | UPDATED: 12:19 12 October 2020
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<a class="email" href="mailto:[email protected]" rel="nofollow"> <!-- Author Start -->Bridget Galton<!-- Author End -->
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<p class="article-image-caption">Sam Devami and James Hutchinson launch Readr - a new subscription book service.</p>
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<!--PSTYLE=SF Web Summary--><h2>James and Sam’s Readr mails out a monthly paperback to subscribers then holds a virtual book club to discuss it </h2>
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<div id="1.6879483" class="object-465"> <em>James Hutchinson and Sam Devami launch Readr - a new subscription book service.</em></div>Two childhood friends have started a book club and subscription service to encourage people who don’t read to get into the habit.
Twenty years after they became pals at primary school, James Hutchinson and Sam Davami have launched Readr together – coming up with the idea during lockdown.
Sam, an ex primary teacher who now works in management consultancy, and advertising exec James both noticed they had developed a passion for reading in their 20s.
“We had a similar experience,” says James who lives in Kentish Town. “We didn’t do much reading when we were younger but we independently started to read more and more over time and realised it had become a big part of our lives.”
After getting into book clubs, Holloway resident Sam felt it was “a shame that people find it hard to get started”.
“We thought it would be nice if people got into it too and wondered how to get the ball rolling.”
Thinking of his own experience of wishing he had read more books, James could see many felt the same way but asked “what are the barriers to that?”
Their idea was to curate a subscription service, mailing out one paperback a month then inviting members to a virtual book club to discuss it.
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<!-- JWPlayer CAM: End Config > Contextual Article Video Code -->“A bit like Netflix there’s so much choice it’s daunting,” says James.
“We wanted something as simple as possible to share recommendations and make it manageable and fun. For those who read already it could diversify their bookshelf.
Launched in August, the feedback been “really enthusiastic” with members signing up from as far afield as Sweden and Holland.
The first two titles Aravind Adiga’s The White Tiger and Brit Bennett’s The Mothers have gone down well and they have future plans for a range of international authors and contemporary and classic titles.
“We want to bring people brilliant books from different genres they might not try themselves and make reading a habit to build into their life,” says James.
“We hope to create a community of people who are passionate about reading because doing it as a group is encouraging.”
Sam adds: “The first book club was a success, with many saying it was not a book they would have picked themselves but they loved it. For some it was the first book they had read in years.
“People seem to love having a book to hold that’s delivered to their door, there’s something exciting about having something to unwrap”.
They have kept the monthly fee “affordable” and with their first 100 members already signed up, James pledges to “see where it takes us.”
The monthly subscription is £8.99 but Readr are currently offering 50 percent off the first three months membership with the code READRPROMO
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Chineme Noke, African-British Lawyer, Coach and Author, Included in the Largest Book Ever on Entrepreneurial Habits – Book Publishing Industry Today – EIN Presswire
-132.jpg?w=696&resize=696,0&ssl=1 "Letter from prison: ‘Today’s war is about trying to read fewer books’")
