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- ‘Queen of Tears’ Episode 14 unravels major twist: Kim Ji-won faces memory loss after surgery, while Kim S The Times of India
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Tag Archives: achieve
Study shows how COVID variants evolve to achieve same goal – FierceBiotech
- Study shows how COVID variants evolve to achieve same goal FierceBiotech
- Study Details Immune Cells Vital to Success of Vaccines Against Coronavirus NYU Langone Health
- Efficacy and safety of an inactivated virus-particle vaccine for SARS-CoV-2, BIV1-CovIran: randomised, placebo controlled, double blind, multicentre, phase 3 clinical trial The BMJ
- UCSF QBI, University College London, and Mount Sinai Identify Shared Molecular Mechanisms Across SARS-CoV-2 Variants that Allow Virus to Thrive Despite Vaccination Mount Sinai
- Use of kidneys from SARS-CoV-2 infected donors Nature.com
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Investing is ‘a must’ for women to achieve a secure retirement, advisor says. These 3 steps can help – CNBC
- Investing is ‘a must’ for women to achieve a secure retirement, advisor says. These 3 steps can help CNBC
- Complete Investing Checklist For Women In 2023 – Forbes Advisor INDIA Forbes
- AARP Is Helping Women Retire Securely AARP
- Retirement security is up for single women, down for their married counterparts, study shows CNBC
- ‘Women are most often the ones who make compromises’ — the gender wage gap hasn’t changed much — but women’s retirement fortunes could improve with a little more planning MarketWatch
- View Full Coverage on Google News
ChatGPT-like AI is ‘difficult to achieve’, China’s tech minister says – South China Morning Post
- ChatGPT-like AI is ‘difficult to achieve’, China’s tech minister says South China Morning Post
- China Favors Chips, AI Executives Over Internet Tycoons at Top Political Meetings The Wall Street Journal
- China’s ‘two sessions’ 2023: ChatGPT-like artificial intelligence is ‘difficult to achieve’, China’s tech minister says Yahoo Finance
- Call for Greater Bay Area to become hub for top-tier accounting training South China Morning Post
- Your Evening Briefing: China Leans Into Battle for Tech Supremacy Bloomberg
- View Full Coverage on Google News
Low-carb diet can help achieve full remission
- Studies have shown that weight loss by reducing calorie intake can lead to the remission of type 2 diabetes, involving the return of blood glucose (sugar) levels to prediabetic levels in the absence of medications.
- A recent primary care-based cohort study showed that about 97% of type 2 diabetes patients who adopted a low-carbohydrate diet experienced improvements in blood glycemic control.
- About 51% of the type 2 diabetes patients achieved remission on the low-carbohydrate diet, with individuals diagnosed with type 2 diabetes within the previous year more likely to achieve remission than those who had diabetes for a longer duration.
- These findings suggest that a low-carbohydrate diet could be a viable non-pharmacological option for achieving good glycemic control and potentially remission in people with type 2 diabetes.
A recent study published in BMJ Nutrition, Prevention & Health showed that a low-carbohydrate diet was effective in achieving glycemic control in people living with type 2 diabetes.
Furthermore, more than half of the participants adopting the low-carbohydrate diet achieved type 2 diabetes remission, which meant they were able to eventually stop taking medications.
Study author Dr. David Unwin, of Norwood Surgery, United Kingdom, told Medical News Today:
“Incredibly, 77% of those adopting a low-carb approach in the first year of their [type 2 diabetes] achieved remission. This represents a really important ‘window of opportunity’ for further investigation.”
Dr. Ari Eckman, endocrinologist and medical director of endocrinology services at Holy Name Medical Center in Teaneck, NJ, not involved in this study, noted that the results are “very significant given the fact that many patients with type 2 diabetes mellitus would like to eventually come off of their medications.”
“This article [in The BMJ journal] provides a blueprint for how many patients were successful in controlling their diabetes with diet alone,” he added. “It will be interesting in the future to hopefully see how this diet can be integrated with our own patients in controlling and managing their diabetes.”
Individuals with type 2 diabetes show inadequate control of blood sugar levels due to the inability of the body to effectively use insulin and absorb sugar.
As a result, individuals with diabetes have elevated blood sugar levels and glycated hemoglobin or hemoglobin A1c levels (HbA1c).
Hemoglobin A1c is a form of hemoglobin that is bound to glucose and reflects the average blood glucose levels during the previous 2 to 3 months.
Moreover, type 2 diabetes is associated with a progressive decline in the ability to control blood glucose levels, requiring the use of a greater number of medications with time.
Conventionally, doctors have regarded type 2 diabetes as an incurable and lifelong condition. However, recent research has shown that long-term remission of type 2 diabetes is possible.
Such a remission of diabetes refers to a return to prediabetic HbA1c — below 48 millimoles per mole (mmol/mol) or 6.5% — and blood glucose levels in the absence of medication use for at least 3 months.
However, it must be noted that diabetes remission does not imply that the condition is cured and blood glucose levels can potentially revert to diabetic levels.
Although there is a growing number of medications that can help achieve blood sugar control, a significant number of individuals show poor glycemic control.
For instance, recent estimates indicate that around 2 million individuals in England are at risk of type 2 diabetes.
About 80-90% of individuals with type 2 diabetes have overweight or obesity. Studies have shown that weight loss achieved by bariatric surgery or through restriction of calorie intake can lead to the remission of type 2 diabetes.
Excessive intake of energy leads to the accumulation of fat around the liver. The accumulation of fat is associated with reduced sensitivity of the liver to glucose and, subsequently, reduced secretion of insulin by the pancreatic beta-cells.
Studies suggest that reducing energy intake can induce type 2 diabetes remission by reducing the levels of liver fat and improving the function of pancreatic beta-cells.
Adopting a healthy diet could help individuals with type 2 diabetes achieve remission, but there is conflicting evidence about the effectiveness of the various diets. One of the dietary approaches to weight loss includes reducing the intake of carbohydrates.
A low-carbohydrate diet involves restricting the intake of foods that are high in sugars, those that lead to a surge in blood glucose levels.
Specifically, such a diet involves limiting the intake of carbohydrates such as bread, rice, and potatoes while promoting the intake of green leafy vegetables, fish, meat, nuts, and fruits.
There is evidence to suggest that a low-carbohydrate diet can help people with type 2 diabetes achieve remission in the short term.
Besides improving pancreatic beta-cell function and reducing fat accumulation, a low-carbohydrate diet can also help achieve sustained weight loss by reducing hunger and increasing energy expenditure.
This is important because preventing the return of lost weight is one of the biggest challenges for individuals with type 2 diabetes.
However, there are also studies that suggest that carbohydrate intake may not be a factor in blood glucose control in people with type 2 diabetes. Moreover, there are also concerns that individuals may find it difficult to adhere to a low-carbohydrate diet over longer durations.
In the present study, the authors evaluated clinical data collected from their primary care clinic in the U.K. over the previous 8 years to further assess the ability of a low-carbohydrate diet to induce remission in type 2 diabetes patients.
The study consisted of 186 clinic patients with type 2 diabetes opting for the low-carbohydrate approach for diabetes management over an average follow-up period of 33 months.
During routine visits over the follow-up period, the clinicians provided the patients with advice on maintaining a low-carbohydrate diet and shared information about how this diet could help achieve better blood glucose control.
The clinicians also advised patients on how to identify and avoid trigger foods, which are highly palatable foods that lead to overeating. In addition to one-on-one consultations, the patients also had the option to attend group sessions to gain practical knowledge about choosing and preparing low-carbohydrate foods.
The authors found that the type 2 diabetes patients opting for the low-carbohydrate approach showed an average decline in body weight of about 10 kilograms (22 pounds).
Moreover, about 97% of the patients following a low-carbohydrate diet showed a significant decline in HbA1c levels during the follow-up period.
In addition, the patients following a low-carbohydrate diet also showed lower cardiovascular disease markers at the end of the follow-up period.
Specifically, the patients showed a significant reduction in average blood pressure, triglyceride levels, and low-density lipoprotein cholesterol (LDL cholesterol) levels during the follow-up period.
In the entire cohort of 186 individuals, 94 patients (51%) showed sustained remission, achieving HbA1c levels below the remission threshold of 48 mmol/mol for more than 3 months.
The patients who achieved remission showed greater weight loss than those who did not achieve remission. In addition, all patients who achieved sustained diabetes remission showed at least some weight loss.
Although individuals with higher HbA1c levels at the onset of the low-carbohydrate diet showed larger reductions in HbA1c levels, the patients with lower HbA1c were more likely to achieve remission. This was likely due to the more recent diabetes diagnosis of patients who had lower HbA1c at the start of the diet.
Consistent with this, further analyses revealed that 77% of patients who adopted a low-carbohydrate diet within the first year after their type 2 diabetes diagnosis achieved remission.
In contrast, 35% and 20% of patients adopting the low-carbohydrate diet between 1-5 years and more than 15 years after their diabetes diagnosis, respectively, achieved remission.
Although a lower proportion of patients with a longer duration of type 2 diabetes achieved remission, these results suggest that a low-carbohydrate diet could help achieve clinically significant improvements in glycemic control in these patients with poorly controlled type 2 diabetes.
The study authors acknowledged that medications could also be necessary for the management of longer-duration type 2 diabetes.
Although other studies have also examined the effectiveness of a low-carbohydrate diet for achieving blood sugar control, most have failed to achieve similar levels of weight loss. The authors attributed these differences to patient-physician trust, open discussion of the merits of weight loss for long-term health, and ongoing support.
For instance, the physicians regularly monitored the patient’s weight and HbA1c levels and provided reminders over the telephone when these parameters increased. This was generally due to an increase in carbohydrate intake, and the phone call was sufficient to ensure adherence to the low-carbohydrate diet.
The study also found that the clinic spent half as much on drugs for diabetes per patient than other local practices.
Dr. Unwin noted: “People with established long-term [type 2 diabetes], which may be poorly controlled, could benefit from looking carefully at reducing sugar and starchy carbohydrates, often, they may not need expensive drugs. Our practice saves £68,000 [approximately $80,637] each year on our diabetes drug budget partly because of this.”
Dr. David Cutler, family medicine physician at Providence Saint John’s Health Center in Santa Monica, CA, not involved in this study, told MNT that “[p]hysicians who have been discouraged from aggressively pursuing diet therapy with their patients because so few adhere to these regimens might be more enthusiastic about encouraging their patients to pursue diet therapy even if they are initially reluctant.”
The authors noted that there was a risk of bias because only the patients who were motivated to improve their health may have opted for the low-carbohydrate diet. Moreover, only 186 out of the 473 type 2 diabetes patients opted for the low-carbohydrate diet, indicating a reluctance to follow this dietary regimen.
Dr. Cutler said: “It is very difficult to get patients to follow a low carbohydrate weight loss program for a long enough period of time to achieve significant health benefits. […] The degree of improvement here, with over half of patients resolving their diabetes, could be enough to encourage some who might have been reluctant to pursue such a diet to do so.”
The study was also observational in nature and lacked a control group. Dr. Srujana Yada, a board-certified endocrinologist with Texas Diabetes and Endocrinology in Austin, TX, not involved in the research, noted that the lack of a control or comparison group precludes any conclusion about the superiority of the low-carbohydrate diet over other diets.
Dr. Yada said: “HbA1c improved significantly in both remission and non-remission groups with improvement in cholesterol and blood pressure as well. This would make me recommend low-carb diet. But this study cannot really say if low carb diet is superior.”
“But I would like to have it compared with other diets with the same number of calories. Is it a change in diet type or decreased total calorie intake that has led to an improvement in HbA1c? There is no mention of hypoglycemia events which is concerning for patients on a low-carb diet. I would like to know if the drop in HbA1c is not due to those unwanted hypoglycemia events,” added Dr. Yada.
Dr. Christopher DuCoin, director of digestive diseases at Tampa General Hospital, FL, noted that medications and surgery are also other vital options for achieving diabetes remission.
Dr. DuCoin said:
“We need to look at this dietary approach as a step in the right direction, but not the definitive solution. Diet is a tool in our toolbox to treat diabetes, but it is not our only tool. Right now, we are seeing amazing advances in the pharmacological treatment of the chronic disease obesity.”
Dr. DuCoin noted that studies have shown that medications such as GLP-1 receptor agonists can facilitate weight loss, and 6-8 months of treatment can result in the normalization of HbA1C levels in a majority of people with type 2 diabetes.
44% of Americans think they can achieve billionaire status
Michael Bloomberg, (right) founder of Bloomberg LP, and Lloyd Blankfein, chairman and CEO of Goldman Sachs Group, at the 10,000 Small Businesses (1OKSB) Partnership Event in London on Dec. 14, 2016.
Chris Ratcliffe | Bloomberg | Getty Images
Mixed feelings about extreme wealth
At the same time, most Americans have a love-hate relationship with extreme wealth.
“There is a mounting disconnect,” the Harris report found: Six in 10 adults want to become a billionaire one day. Meanwhile, 40% said they despise billionaires. Many also said that billionaires have the responsibility to better society but aren’t doing enough.
As the rich get richer, 66% of adults see wealth inequality as a serious national issue, and nearly half of Americans, or 47%, believe that there should be a limit to wealth accumulation, the report also found.
A mobile billboard in Washington, D.C., calling for higher taxes on the ultra-wealthy depicts an image of billionaire Jeff Bezos on May 17, 2021.
Drew Angerer | Getty Images
Of those polled, 24% said personal wealth should be capped at less than $1 billion, while 20% said it should be capped somewhere between $1 billion and $10 billion.
There are roughly 200 people in the U.S. who are currently worth more than $10 billion, according to Forbes’ annual ranking of the richest people. Among the top five, Jeff Bezos, Warren Buffett, Bill Gates and Elon Musk are all worth more than $100 billion.
Meanwhile, extreme wealth inequality was exacerbated by the Covid pandemic, other reports also show.
The richest Americans have continued to benefit from owning equities and real estate, particularly last year when both the stock market and home values soared. As of the end of 2021, the top 1% owned a record 32.3% of the nation’s wealth.
On the flipside, the share of wealth held by the bottom 90% of Americans fell since before the pandemic, to 30.2% from 30.5%.
In the Harris poll, 58% of Americans were resentful of wealth accumulation over this period, when others suffered from the financial fallout brought on by the sudden economic downturn.
Taxing the ultra-rich gains support
“Right now, the average billionaire — there are about 790 of them or so in America — has a federal tax rate of 8%,” Biden tweeted.
The Billionaire Minimum Income Tax would assess a 20% minimum tax rate on U.S. households worth more than $100 million. Over half the revenue could come from those worth more than $1 billion.
But despite growing public support for higher taxes on the ultra-wealthy, billionaire tax proposals have failed to gain traction.
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Europe will need help from US, Asia to achieve goals
A technologist inspects a computer chip.
Sefa Ozel | E+ | Getty Images
European Union lawmakers have laid out ambitious plans to significantly ramp up production of semiconductors in the bloc and become a global leader in the industry.
To do that, it will need some of the key players from Asia and the U.S. to invest heavily in the continent, given the EU’s lack of technology in critical areas like manufacturing, analysts said.
On Tuesday, the European Commission, the executive arm of the EU, launched the European Chips Act — a multi-billion euro attempt to secure its supply chains, avert shortages of semiconductors in the future, and promote investment into the industry. It still requires approval from EU lawmakers to pass.
Chips are critical for products from refrigerators to cars and smartphones, but a global crunch has impacted industries across the board causing production standstills and shortages of products.
Semiconductors have become a national security issue for the U.S., and has even become a point of geopolitical tension between the U.S. and China. That clash over semiconductors has led to sanctions on China’s biggest chipmaker SMIC and the world’s second-largest economy doubling down on efforts to boost self-sufficiency.
The EU is now trying to mitigate some of those risks with its latest proposal.
“Faced with growing geopolitical tensions, fast growth in demand, and the possibility of further disruptions in the supply chain, Europe must use its strengths and put in place effective mechanisms to establish greater leadership positions and ensure security of supply within the global industrial chain,” the European Commission said.
Manufacturing challenge
The EU Chips Act looks to plough 43 billion euros ($49 billion) of investment into the semiconductor industry and help the bloc to become an “industrial leader” in the future.
Specifically, the EU wants to boost its market share of chip production to 20% by 2030, from 9% currently, and produce the “most sophisticated and energy-efficient semiconductors in Europe.”
Part of its plan involves reducing “excessive dependencies,” though the EU notes the need for partnerships with “like-minded partners.”
As it looks to become more self-sufficient, the EU will still rely heavily on the U.S. and in particular, Asia. That’s because of the quirks of the semiconductor supply chain and the changing nature of the industry.
Over the last 15 years or so, companies have begun shifting to a fabless model — where they design chips but outsource the manufacturing to a foundry.
In the actual manufacturing of chips, Asian companies now dominate, led by Taiwan’s TSMC which has about a 50% market share in terms of foundry revenue. South Korea’s Samsung is the next biggest, followed by Taiwan’s UMC.
U.S. firm Intel, which was once a key player, has fallen behind in recent years. However, it is now focusing on the foundry business and plans to make chips for other players. But its technology still remains behind the likes of TSMC and Samsung which can make the most cutting-edge chips that go into the latest smartphones, for example. Intel said last year it plans to spend $20 billion on two new chip plants in Arizona, in a bid to catch up.
The EU, however, has no companies that can manufacture the latest chips.
“The primary area the EU will need to partner is in bleeding edge wafer manufacturing. EU players today are stuck at 22nm and it’s unrealistic to think that local EU players can catch up from 22nm (nanometers) to 2nm,” Peter Hanbury, a semiconductor analyst at research firm Bain, told CNBC.
The nanometer number indicates the size of the transistors on the chip. A small number means a higher number of transistors can fit, leading to potentially more powerful chips. The chip in Apple’s latest iPhone, for example, is 5nm. These are considered the leading-edge chips.
EU companies may also rely on semiconductor design tools from the U.S.
Boosting chip production to 20% market share is an “an extremely tall order” for the EU, according to Geoff Blaber, CEO of CCS Insights. “The focus on manufacturing is the biggest challenge there,” Blaber told CNBC.
Is the EU attractive enough?
As countries and regions around the world look to secure their semiconductor supplies, there is growing competition to secure talent and convince companies to invest.
As part of a $2 trillion economic stimulus package, U.S. President Joe Biden earmarked $50 billion for semiconductor manufacturing and research. A bill known as the CHIPS for America Act is also working its way through the legislative process.
Countries like Japan, South Korea and China are all boosting investment into semiconductors too.
“The primary challenge will be in attracting new players to the EU. Specifically, the EU must become a more attractive location than other geographies,” Hanbury said.
The EU has been trying to woo leading-edge chip manufacturers. Intel is planning to build a new chip fab in Europe, although a specific site has not yet been chosen. TSMC is in the early stages of assessing its own production facility in Europe.
“The EU (or any geography) doesn’t need to outspend the semiconductor players but rather to influence their spend to occur in their geography,” Hanbury said.
EU strengths
Even though European firms are behind in the latest manufacturing technology, the EU still has some key players in the semiconductor industry.
One of the most important is ASML, a Dutch firm that makes a machine used by the likes of TSMC, and is used to make the most cutting-edge chips. Apple suppliers STMicro and NXP are also both based in Europe.
“[The] EU has several key assets in the industry,” Hanbury said.
The EU’s focus could be on securing chip supply for sectors where European firms have a large presence such as the automotive industry. Semiconductors that go into cars are often less advanced and don’t require the latest manufacturing technology.
“Think about some of those sectors where we’re going to see the demand for the technology in the coming years and automotive is one big opportunity in Europe and I think that’s something I’d expect the EU to be focusing on,” Blaber said.
Why China is still trying to achieve zero Covid
Around the world people are getting used to post-lockdown life with vaccines doing the heavy lifting against Covid-19 as restrictions are eased. In China however, a hard elimination policy remains where the pandemic first began.
A person walks into a five-star hotel to ask briefly for directions and ends up in two weeks quarantine because a guest had some coronavirus contact. One crew member on a high-speed train has close contact with an infected person, and a trainload of passengers is sent to quarantine for mass testing. In Shanghai Disneyland, 33,863 visitors suddenly have to undergo mass testing because a visitor the day before got infected.
Welcome to life in the country which now feels like a perpetual, back-to-zero-Covid world.
China was the first country to impose restrictions to combat this pandemic and it will be one of the last to ease them.
When you speak to ordinary Chinese people in the street, you will find that many do not seem to mind the continued strict anti-virus measures as long as they are kept safe.
I asked one woman whether China should open faster and she said it would be best to wait until the pandemic is sorted out properly because safety is number one.
Another woman heading home from work told me the virus is not completely understood, that vaccines would improve and so, for the sake of social stability, it would be best to hold off opening up.
Not so long ago, other countries like Australia, New Zealand and Singapore were also approaching each outbreak of the coronavirus as something that had to be completely stamped out in the community, sending cities into lockdown until the virus stopped spreading.
The goal was to reach zero local transmissions.
The two things that changed this approach were the emergence of the much tougher to control Delta variant of the disease and, more crucially, reaching high vaccination levels.
High vaccination rates meant people might still contract Covid-19, but not have to go to hospital.
As a result, borders elsewhere are opening to international travel. In China however, visas for foreigners remain hard to come by and Chinese people are still not having their passports renewed after they expire.
Elsewhere, people are “living with the virus”. Not in China, where yet another Delta outbreak is being attacked with the same zeal as before the vaccine.
If the official figures are accurate, over 1,000 local transmissions have been recorded since October. The figure is not that high, but the spread is significant, hitting 21 provinces. This matters because even a couple of cases in China will trigger the same strict measures as hundreds or thousands of new infections.
‘Not a single infection is acceptable’
The authorities have shown no inclination to alter this approach, even as some Chinese scientists urge a re-think.
Professor Guan Yi, a virologist from Hong Kong University and adviser to the government, has called for a switch from mass nucleic acid tests (which find infections) to mass antibody tests (which might help scientists understand the effectiveness of vaccines).
In an interview with Phoenix TV he said that in the long run, there is no chance that a zero-Covid strategy could work in terms of achieving complete elimination.
“The virus is permanent now,” he said. “It’s the same as influenza, which will circulate in humans for a long time”.
This concept will not come as a surprise to people in other countries. In China however, the government has drilled the population to mobilise to get back to zero cases with each new surge of the virus. Changing this message will be hard.
Asked how much protection China’s vaccines might offer against mutant strains of the coronavirus, Prof Guan said that this is something the vaccine producers would have to answer.
He is not alone amongst academics who are now questioning Beijing’s direction.
Dr Haung Yanzhong, from the New-York based Council on Foreign Relations, says a key problem is that vaccines cannot achieve what the Chinese government would like them to, making Beijing wary.
“They’re not confident about the effectiveness of the vaccines – the ability to prevent infections,” he told the BBC, “because actually even the best vaccines can’t prevent infections – but the zero-tolerance strategy says we can’t accept even one single infection.”
Dr Haung added the Chinese government has found itself in a political and ideological bind when trumpeting its successes to its people.
“The zero-tolerance strategy is also part of the official narrative, to claim the success of the Chinese pandemic response model, the superiority of the Chinese political system. So if you give up that strategy, and then you saw the cases increasing significantly, you know that would lead people to question the model.”
‘A million reasons’
Add to the mix that Beijing has some big events coming up and there is great desire amongst officials to hold them in an environment free of any Covid outbreak.
Most immediately there is the Winter Olympics in February. Tickets have not gone on sale but the goal is to have spectators in the stands.
Next October is the Communist Party’s five-yearly Congress, when Xi Jinping is expected to begin a historic third term in office.
Of course, there will always be something on the horizon.
Another rather bleak interpretation is that General Secretary Xi Jinping and his administration like the idea of reducing foreign influence in China, and the pandemic has provided an excellent excuse to move in this direction.
On social media, some posts by nationalists have decried international influence on “China’s” way of doing things.
The emphasis of governance here has certainly shifted from a “reform and opening up” philosophy to one that places the Communist Party at the centre of everything and its leader Xi Jinping at its very core.
Given that other countries have been opening their borders, the BBC asked Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin when his country might do the same.
He replied that China has been watching the experience of other countries and would follow science to make its decisions in light of new variants that were emerging.
Either way, experts close to those in power here are not signalling an imminent end to zero-Covid. In fact, it is quite the opposite.
‘Too high’ a cost
Dr Zhong Nanshan is seen as something of a medical hero in China. The specialist in respiratory medicine shot to global fame in 2003 for challenging the then-government’s line that the Sars outbreak was not so severe.
These days, people – including officials – listen to what he has to say.
In a recent interview, he said China’s strict Covid amelioration measures would remain for “a rather long time”.
He added that a global Covid-19 mortality rate of 2% was too high for China to accept even with vaccines in place. The cost of opening too quickly was not worth it, he said, adding that China would be watching the experience of other countries under their “living-with-Covid” plans.
It is also important to consider that China’s officials can be quite conservative in their approach. It is possible that they plan to “re-open” the country again and are simply in no great rush to do so.
For many of those wanting to enter China or to leave it, they have no choice but to wait and see.
While middle and upper class people may be lamenting the lack of freedom to move about internationally, many ordinary Chinese citizens seem content to allow the government to manage the situation if it keeps them healthy.
In the meantime, mass testing, centralised quarantine, transport controls, high-level surveillance, delivering track and trace as well as strict, localised lockdowns will remain a big part of life in China.
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Biden fails to achieve unity on climate as China, Russia avoid COP26 summit
A disappointed President Biden condemned China and Russia — the world’s biggest and fourth-biggest carbon emitters — for not showing up to the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, referred to as COP26, in Glasgow this week.
“I indicated that China and Russia not showing up — and Saudi Arabia — is a problem,” Biden said.
Saudi Arabia participated in the conference, but some have faulted its allegedly lackluster commitment to fighting climate change. Observers also faulted the commitments from Russia and China.
Critics have argued that international efforts to combat climate change, like COP26, are insufficient or unserious because they often fail to hold some of the top emitters accountable. As of 2019, China was responsible for 27.92% of global emissions, according to Statistica. The United States accounted for 14.5%, while India accounted for 7.17%, Russia for 4.6%, and Saudi Arabia for 1.59%.
HELEN RALEIGH: KERRY AND CHINA HAVE MAJOR ETHICS PROBLEMS AND CAN’T BE TRUSTED ON CLIMATE
“We showed up, and by showing up, we’ve had a profound impact on the way I think the rest of the world is looking at the United States and its leadership role,” Biden said of COP26.
(PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP via Getty Images)
“I think it’s been a big mistake, quite frankly, for China, with respect to China, not showing up,” the president added. “The rest of the world will look to China and say, ‘What value-added are they providing?’ And they’ve lost an ability to influence people around the world and all the people here at COP. The same way, I would argue, with regard to Russia.”
On climate change, critics have accused China of breaking its promises. While Xi signed the Paris climate agreement and has pledged to make the Middle Kingdom carbon-neutral by 2060, China has built more new coal plants domestically and internationally.
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Biden went on to say that he is “not” “worried about an armed conflict” with China. He said he has told Chinese President Xi Jinping, “This is competition; it does not have to be conflict.” He also said he told Xi, “We expect them to play by the rules of the road.”
Steve Milloy, a former Trump-Pence EPA transition member and founder of JunkScience.com, mocked Biden’s warning to Xi.
“Biden’s slam of Chinese President Xi and Russian President Putin for not showing up at COP26 is a sad indication of Biden’s failure to grasp or accept real-world realities,” Milloy told Fox News. “China wants to be the lone global superpower by 2049. Russia wants to get Europe hooked on its natural gas. So neither country has any interest in hamstringing its own economy with destructive climate regulations.”
“Rather, Xi and Putin seem have taken to heart the Napoleonic principle of never interfering with your opponent while he is in the process of destroying himself, which is exactly what the U.S. and Europe are doing with their suicidal embrace of climate idiocy,” Milloy added.
(Associated Press/Evan Vucci)
Alibaba invests $15.5 billion to help China achieve ‘common prosperity’
The tech giant announced Friday that it would spend the staggering sum by 2025 with an eye on five priorities: innovation in technology, economic development, the creation of “high-quality employment,” supporting vulnerable communities, and setting up a special development fund.
The company also laid out 10 specific goals it plans to tackle, from increasing technological investment in the country’s less developed regions to improving the welfare of gig economy workers to working to speed up the growth of small businesses and agriculture.
Alibaba is also setting up what it’s calling the “Prosperity Advancement Working Committee,” which will be helmed by Chairman and CEO Daniel Zhang.
“Alibaba is a beneficiary of the strong social and economic progress in China over the past 22 years. We firmly believe that if society is doing well and the economy is doing well, then Alibaba will do well,” he said in a statement Friday.
“We are eager to do our part to support the realization of common prosperity through high-quality development.”
Alibaba’s shares closed slightly down in New York on Thursday, after the news was first reported by state-run newspaper Zhejiang Daily. The company’s shares in Hong Kong slumped 3.5% on Friday.
Alibaba’s pledge came just a week after another major Chinese e-commerce firm, Pinduoduo (PDD), vowed to hand over its entire profit for the last quarter to rural development projects in the country.
It said last Tuesday that it would donate $372 million to the development of China’s agricultural sector and rural areas, with plans to give away 10 billion yuan ($1.5 billion) toward similar causes overall.
The decision was significant for the US-listed firm, which had posted a profit for the first time as a public company in the quarter ended June.
Similarly, Tencent (TCEHY) announced last month that it would dedicate 50 billion yuan ($7.7 billion) toward achieving Beijing’s goal of “common prosperity.” The company said it would aim to help increase income for the poor, and address education inequality, among other initiatives.
The end goal
President Xi has repeatedly emphasized the importance of “common prosperity” as a goal for the Chinese Communist Party, with state media increasingly highlighting the importance of wealth redistribution.
The phrase itself is a historically significant one in China, and Xi’s mention of the term echoes its use by Chairman Mao Zedong during the last century.
Back then, the former Communist leader also advocated for “common prosperity” as a way to mobilize peasants and take power away from the rural elites, including rich landlords and farmers.
In recent years, one of Xi’s own major policy goals has been to alleviate poverty across China. His latest edict has piled even more pressure on the country’s richest citizens and businesses, which are already facing tougher regulations as Beijing continuously reins in the power of the private sector.
Earlier this year, Alibaba itself was hit with a record $2.8 billion fine for acting like a monopoly. Since then, the company has continued to face questions about regulatory scrutiny, though executives have sought to convey that the matter has been resolved.
— CNN’s Beijing bureau and Laura He contributed to this report.