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- Romania-Kosovo soccer game in Euro 2024 qualifying stopped because of home fans’ pro-Serbia chants The Associated Press
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Tag Archives: discriminatory
‘We’re paying twice for the same experience’: Plus-size travelers hit out at ‘discriminatory’ airline seat policies – CNN
- ‘We’re paying twice for the same experience’: Plus-size travelers hit out at ‘discriminatory’ airline seat policies CNN
- Passenger gets revenge on woman for putting down the armrest on a flight – but it’s really divided opi… The US Sun
- ‘Armrest war’ breaks out on plane with ‘battle’ over space as man spreads himself out Express
- I paid extra for reclining seat on seven hour flight but mum with baby on her lap behind shouted at me for… The Irish Sun
- Outrage at passenger’s man-spreading on flight after armrest flashpoint Devon Live
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COVID travel curbs against Chinese visitors ‘discriminatory’ -state media
BEIJING, Dec 30 (Reuters) – Chinese state-media said COVID-19 testing requirements imposed around the world in response to a surging wave of infections were “discriminatory”, in the clearest pushback yet against restrictions that are slowing down its re-opening.
Having kept its borders all but shut for three years, imposing a strict regime of lockdowns and relentless testing, China abruptly reversed course toward living with the virus on Dec. 7, and a wave of infections erupted across the country.
Some places have been taken aback by the scale of China’s outbreak and expressed scepticism over Beijing’s COVID statistics, with the United States, South Korea, India, Italy, Japan and Taiwan imposing COVID tests for travellers from China.
Malaysia said it would screen all international arrivals for fever.
“The real intention is to sabotage China’s three years of COVID-19 control efforts and attack the country’s system,” state-run tabloid Global Times said in an article late on Thursday, calling the restrictions “unfounded” and “discriminatory.”
China will stop requiring inbound travellers to go into quarantine from Jan. 8. But it will still demand a negative PCR test result within 48 hours before departure.
Italy on Thursday urged the rest of the European Union to follow its lead, but France, Germany and Portugal have said they saw no need for new restrictions, while Austria has stressed the economic benefits of Chinese tourists’ return to Europe.
Global spending by Chinese visitors was worth more than $250 billion a year before the pandemic.
The United States have raised concerns about potential mutations of the virus as it sweeps through the world’s most populous country, as well as over China’s data transparency.
The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention is considering sampling wastewater from international aircraft to track any emerging new variants, the agency told Reuters.
China, a country of 1.4 billion people, reported one new COVID death for Thursday, same as the day before – numbers which do not match the experience of other countries after they re-opened.
China’s official death toll of 5,247 since the pandemic began compares with more than 1 million deaths in the United States. Chinese-ruled Hong Kong, a city of 7.4 million, has reported more than 11,000 deaths.
UK-based health data firm Airfinity said on Thursday around 9,000 people in China are probably dying each day from COVID. Cumulative deaths in China since Dec. 1 have likely reached 100,000, with infections totalling 18.6 million, it said.
‘EXCESS MORTALITY’
China’s chief epidemiologist Wu Zunyou said on Thursday that a team at the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention will measure the difference between the number of deaths in the current wave of infections and the number of deaths expected had the epidemic never happened. By calculating the “excess mortality”, China will be able to work out what could have been potentially underestimated, Wu said.
China has said it only counts deaths of COVID patients caused by pneumonia and respiratory failure as COVID-related.
The relatively low death count is also inconsistent with the surging demand reported by funeral parlours in several Chinese cities.
The lifting of restrictions, after widespread protests against them in November, has overwhelmed hospitals and funeral homes across the country, with scenes of people on intravenous drips by the roadside and lines of hearses outside crematoria fuelling public concern.
Health experts say China has been caught ill-prepared by the U-turn in policies long championed by President Xi Jinping.
In December, tenders put out by hospitals for key equipment such as ventilators and patient monitors were two to three times higher than in previous months, according to a Reuters review，suggesting hospitals were scrambling to plug shortages.
Experts say the elderly in rural areas may be particularly vulnerable because of inadequate medical resources. Next month’s Lunar New Year festival, when hundreds of millions travel to their hometowns, will add to the risk.
ECONOMIC WOES
The world’s second-largest economy is expected to slow down further in the near term as factory workers and shoppers fall ill. Some economists predict a strong bounce back from a low base next year, but concerns linger that some of the damage made by three years of restrictions could be long-term.
Consumers may need time to recover their confidence and spending appetite after losing income during lockdowns, while the private sector may have used its expansion funds to cover losses incurred due to the restrictions.
Heavily indebted China will also face slowing demand in its main export markets, while its massive property sector is licking its wounds after a series of defaults.
China’s factory activity most likely cooled in December as rising infections began to affect production lines, a Reuters poll showed on Friday.
Chinese airlines, however, look set to be the early winners of the re-opening.
Writing by Marius Zaharia. Editing by Gerry Doyle
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.
Monkeypox name is ‘discriminatory,’ scientists say
“In the context of the current global outbreak, continued reference to, and nomenclature of this virus being African is not only inaccurate but is also discriminatory and stigmatizing,” the researchers wrote, pointing to the media’s use of photos of African patients from previous epidemics to depict the pox lesions commonly associated with the disease.
This year, more than 1,600 monkeypox cases have been confirmed, and nearly 1,500 more are suspected, according to data that 39 countries sent to the WHO. Most of those countries — 32 — had not previously reported infections, raising concern among the global health community that the virus is not behaving as it normally has in the past.
Last week, the White House said that there were at least 45 cases identified in 15 states and the District of Columbia so far, and that the numbers are expected to surpass those of a 2003 outbreak, which would make it the biggest the United States has faced.
Monkeypox is known to spread through human contact with animals such as rodents or primates, but the virus has spread further this year through human-to-human transmission than previously reported.
A number of U.S. patients are men who have sex with men, leading officials to warn about a suspected link to such contact. The risk to the public remains low, authorities say.
The scientists suggest the name hMPXV, which begins with an “h” to denote the human version of the virus.
The group also proposed classifying the lineage of monkeypox by letters and numbers based on when outbreaks are discovered rather than location, which stigmatizes some countries or regions for finding and reporting a virus that could have originated elsewhere.
In Europe, where the virus has gained a foothold, cases have been reported in Britain, Germany and Portugal.
Infections typically last two to four weeks, beginning with flu-like symptoms and swollen lymph nodes. Fluid-filled bumps — or “pox” — then surface on the skin. The recent monkeypox cases often involve genital rashes that can be confused for syphilis or herpes, officials say.
There have been 72 reported deaths this year, all in countries that previously have had bouts of monkeypox transmission. The U.N. health agency is looking into news reports from Brazil of a monkeypox-related death, Tedros said.
The agency is also recommending against mass vaccination for the virus, which can be treated with antiviral medicines and vaccines stockpiled in the event of a smallpox outbreak, due to limited clinical data and an insufficient global supply. The WHO is developing a plan to make vaccines and treatments more accessible.
“The global outbreak of monkeypox is clearly unusual and concerning,” Tedros said.
WHO renaming monkeypox virus after scientists voice concern that it is ‘discriminatory and stigmatizing’
Monkeypox: What you need to know
Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security senior scholar says what people should do if they contract the virus on ‘Special Report.’
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The World Health Organization announced Tuesday that it will rename the monkeypox virus, which has infected more than 1,600 people in 39 countries this year, after a group of scientists voiced concerns that the name could be stigmatizing.
“WHO is also working with partners and experts from around the world on changing the name of monkeypox virus, its clades and the disease it causes,” World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said at a press briefing on Tuesday. “We will make an announcement about the new names as soon as possible.”
The announcement comes after a group of more than 30 international scientists urged the health community to change the name of the virus last week.
“The prevailing perception in the international media and scientific literature is that MPXV is endemic in people in some African countries. However, it is well established that nearly all MPXV outbreaks in Africa prior to the 2022 outbreak, have been the result of spillover from animals to humans and only rarely have there been reports of sustained human-to-human transmissions,” the scientists wrote on June 10.
“In the context of the current global outbreak, continued reference to, and nomenclature of this virus being African is not only inaccurate but is also discriminatory and stigmatizing.”
In this Centers for Disease Control and Prevention handout graphic, symptoms of the monkeypox virus are shown on a patient’s hand.
(CDC/Getty Images)
The WHO lists two known clades of monkeypox on its website, “one identified in West Africa (WA) and one in the Congo Basin (CB) region.”
The group of scientists wrote that using this nomenclature is “counter to the best practice of avoiding geographic locations in the nomenclature of diseases and disease groups.”
WHO: MONKEYPOX BECOMING ‘ESTABLISHED’ IN NON-ENDEMIC COUNTRIES IS ‘REAL’ RISK
According to the CDC, scientists first found monkeypox during two outbreaks of a pox-like disease in monkeys at a research facility in Denmark in 1958. The first human case was found in the Democratic Republic of the Congo in 1970.
In this photo provided by the Unidad de Microscopía Electrónica del ISCIII in Madrid, on Thursday May 26, 2022, an electronic microscope image shows the monkeypox virus.
(Unidad de Microscopía Electrónica del ISCIII, via AP)
The biggest current outbreak is in the United Kingdom, where health officials have detected 470 cases.
Human-to-human transmission of the virus occurs primarily through direct contact with infected people or surfaces that are contaminated.
HAWAII REPORTS THIRD CASE OF PROBABLE MONKEYPOX
Ghebreyesus also said that the WHO will convene an emergency meeting next week to determine whether the spread of monkeypox should be considered a public health emergency worldwide.
A healthcare worker prepares a syringe at a monkeypox vaccination clinic run by CIUSSS public health authorities in Montreal, Quebec, Canada, June 6, 2022.
(REUTERS/Christinne Muschi)
“The outbreak of monkeypox is unusual and concerning,” Ghebreyesus said Tuesday. “For that reason, I have decided to convene the emergency committee under the international health regulations next week to assess whether this outbreak represents a public health emergency of international concern.”
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The CDC has reported 65 monkeypox cases in the U.S., including 15 in California and 11 in New York.
Monkeypox has similar symptoms to smallpox, but is milder. Infected individuals typically develop flu-like symptoms followed by a rash that turns into lesions.
The WHO has had a troubled run in recent years, facing accusations that it failed to keep China transparent as the COVID pandemic swept from Wuhan to the world, and then accusations that it skipped over the Greek letter Xi when naming variants of the virus to avoid offending China’s communist leader, President Xi Jinping.
England to remove another ‘discriminatory’ barrier to blood donation
By the end of this year, potential donors will no longer be asked if they have recently had sex with a partner who may ever have been sexually active “in parts of the world where HIV/AIDS is very common”, which includes most of sub-Saharan Africa.
Currently those who answer “yes” are deferred for three months after the last sexual contact with that partner.
“In practical terms, this current rule in England means that someone who is in a long-term, monogamous relationship with someone from or who has ever lived in Africa would most probably be unable to donate blood,” British lawmakers Taiwo Owatemi, MP for Coventry North West, and Sarah Owen, MP for Luton North, wrote in a letter to Health Secretary Sajid Javid last month.
Owatemi and Owen’s letter, published on the website for British HIV and sexual health charity the Terrence Higgins Trust, said the question acted “as a significant barrier for many people who may wish to donate blood, and this comes at the expense of the NHS [National Health Service] Blood and Transplant’s current push to get more Black people to give blood.”
The NHS website says: “At the moment we need Black donors because of a rise in demand for some rare blood types that are more common in people of Black heritage.”
“People who are Black African, Black Caribbean and of Black mixed ethnicity are more likely to have the rare blood sub-group, such as Ro, that many Black sickle cell patients need. This change will provide more opportunities for people to donate for the ongoing need for rarer blood types,” the UK’s Department of Health said in a news release.
The health department said that the question will be removed from the donor safety check in England following research by the Fair (For the Assessment of Individualised Risk) steering group and supported by the Advisory Committee on the Safety of Blood, Tissues and Organs (Sabto).
The question has already been removed in the devolved nations of Scotland and Wales. Northern Ireland has not announced a change.
National AIDS Trust chief executive Deborah Gold said in a statement: “We are delighted that the Secretary of State has confirmed this outdated, unnecessary and actively discriminatory question will be removed from blood donor screening forms.
“The science is clear that this is unnecessary and does nothing to improve safety. Instead, it actively prevents much needed donors coming forward to give blood, particularly from Black communities. The change is long overdue, and we warmly welcome today’s announcement.”
UK Health Secretary Sajid Javid called it “another progressive step forward, focusing on individual behaviours, rather than blanket deferrals, and reducing limitations for people to donate blood.”
“This will make it easier for Black donors in particular to donate blood, ultimately saving lives,” Javid said.
India slams UK’s new travel rules as ‘discriminatory,’ warns of retaliation
Travelers at Indira Gandhi International Airport in New Delhi, India, on Tuesday, Aug. 24, 2021.
T. Narayan | Bloomberg | Getty Images
India slammed the U.K.’s decision to exclude vaccinated Indian travelers from its new travel guidelines, calling it “discriminatory” and warning of reciprocal measures.
The British government will next month allow fully vaccinated travelers from a list of countries to skip quarantine upon arrival — but Indians who are fully vaccinated will still need to be quarantined.
The U.K. last week eased travel restrictions for fully vaccinated individuals from 17 countries and territories, including Japan and Singapore, saying they would not have to stay in quarantine for 10 days after arriving in England.
From Oct. 4, travelers from those destinations would have to show that they received a full course of one of the Covid vaccines currently approved in the U.K., at least two weeks prior to their arrival. The approved vaccines are: Oxford/AstraZeneca, Pfizer-BioNTech, Moderna or Janssen.
India’s main vaccine is the one from Oxford University and British-Swedish pharma giant AstraZeneca — but it is manufactured locally by the Serum Institute of India under the name Covishield. It has been approved for emergency use by the World Health Organization.
If we don’t get satisfaction, we would be within our rights to impose reciprocal measures.
Harsh V Shringla
India’s foreign secretary
“The basic issue is that here is a vaccine, Covishield, which is a licensed product of a U.K. company, manufactured in India,” India’s Foreign Secretary Harsh V Shringla said Tuesday at a press briefing. “We have supplied 5 million doses to the U.K., at the request of the government of the U.K. We understand that this has been used in their national health system.”
“Therefore, non-recognition of Covishield is a discriminatory policy and does impact on those of our citizens traveling to the U.K.,” he added.
Under the new rules, Indian travelers will be required to quarantine after arriving in England and must undergo three rounds of testing, regardless of their vaccination status. Many Indian nationals typically travel to the U.K. for work, study, leisure travel or to visit family.
India’s External Affairs Minister Subrahmanyam Jaishankar, who is in New York for the United Nations General Assembly, raised the issue “strongly” with U.K. Foreign Secretary Elizabeth Truss, according to Shringla.
“I am told that certain assurances have been given that this issue would be resolved,” he said.
Jaishankar tweeted that during his meeting with Truss in New York, he “urged early resolution of quarantine issue in mutual interest.”
Indian opposition lawmaker Shashi Tharoor said he pulled out of a debate engagement at the University of Cambridge due to the quarantine order.
“It is offensive to ask fully vaccinated Indians to quarantine, he said.
Another lawmaker, Jairam Ramesh, said the decision “smacks of racism.”
“We will have to see how it goes, but if we don’t get satisfaction, we would be within our rights to impose reciprocal measures,” Shringla added, without elaborating what some of those measures could be.
Government data showed India has so far administered more than 825 million vaccine doses in one of the world’s largest inoculation drives — roughly 15% of the country’s eligible population has received the two doses required to be considered fully vaccinated, according to online publication Our World In Data.
The country’s home-made vaccine from Bharat Biotech, called Covaxin, has yet to be approved by the World Health Organization. It will likely to further complicate international travel plans for many Indian nationals.