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Mali Teachers Strike Over COVID-19 Concerns As Schools Resumes
Teachers in the West African state of Mali went on strike Tuesday, the first day schools resumed after two months of closure, over fears of the spread of coronavirus.
Details of the number of students affected were not disclosed, but seven teachers’ unions are striking, officials said, in a move that will hit public primary and secondary schools, as well as teacher-training colleges involved.
The government shut schools to tackle coronavirus in late March. The reopening on Tuesday is made only for final year students who are facing exams.
Sambou Diadie Fofana, the general secretary of Mali’s National Union of Secondary School Teachers, told AFP that the strike was triggered by a “lack of measures (taken) in schools to protect everyone”.
Authorities have confirmed 1,351 coronavirus cases in the country to date, with 78 deaths.
Source___Channels TV
Brazil confirms another 1,000-added daily coronavirus deaths
Brazil has confirmed more than 1,000 new deaths from the coronavirus in the past 24 hours.
The 1,086 casualties, revealed on Wednesday, brought the toll of deaths to 25,598. With 20,599 new cases, the number of infected people has reached a stand of 411,821.
Brazil is the second highly affected country after the United States, which has 1,698,581 cases and 100,276 deaths, according to US-based Johns Hopkins University.
In spite of being one of the hardest-hit states, Sao Paulo, the biggest hotspot for cases in Brazil, will start to gradually reopened its economy on Monday.
Sao Paulo Governor Joao Doria made known on Wednesday that the state will enter a new phase of quarantine as of June 1.
“We will maintain the quarantine until June 15, but with the resumption of some economic activities,” Doria said at a news conference.
Conflicting to what President Jair Bolsonaro has said, Sao Paulo authorities have emphasized that without the quarantines put in place, the toll of victims would be much higher.
Source___Aljazeera
US Limits Travel from Brazil Amid escalates of coronavirus outbreak
The White House has make known a ban on travel to the United States from Brazil amid the escalation of coronavirus in Latin America’s hardest-hit country.
Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said in a briefing on Sunday evening that the ban pertain to all foreign nationals who have been in Brazil in the 14 days before coming back to the US.
McEnany flip it as a move by US President Donald Trump “to protect our country”. Trump notified last week that he was taking into consideration to cut back Brazil.
The President Trump has already banned travel from the United Kingdom, Europe and China, all of which have been hit hard by the virus. The US has the world’s highest number of cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, and has confirmed not much less than100,000 deaths.
‘The travel ban was a blow to right-wing Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who has shadowed Trump in his approach to the pandemic, fighting calls for social distancing and touting unproven drugs. The Brazilian president’s office did not respond to a request for comment.’
“The US maintains a strong partnership with Brazil and we work closely to mitigate the socioeconomic and health impacts of COVID-19 in Brazil,” the US Embassy in Brasilia said in a statement.
The new restraint come into play on May 28, the embassy said.
Brazil’s foreign ministry called it a technical decision in the context of “important bilateral collaboration” to tackle the COVID-19 pandemic, highlighting US helping of $6.5m and a new White House promise of 1,000 respirators.
McEnany further enlightened that the new limitations would help ensure foreign nationals do not bring more Covid-19 infections to the US, but would not affect the commercial activities between the two countries.
Source___Aljazeera
Nigeria Confirms 284 More COVID-19 Cases, Toll of Infections Hit 6,677
Coronavirus cases in Nigeria increased further on Wednesday with 284 cases confirmed by the country, in spite of efforts out in place by authorities to drastically drag the curve of the pandemic.
The new cases, recorded by specialist agency the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control on Twitter took the country’s total infections to 6,677 out of which 1,840 have been discharged with 200 losing their lives
Data from the NCDC showed that the cases were escalatimh across 12 states and the FCT with their capital city Lagos are the highest number of infections for the day with 199 cases.
A further breakdown of the figures showed that Rivers had 26 new cases, Oyo 19 cases, the FCT and Borno eight each, Plateau seven, Jigawa six, Kano, five, Abia two, and the quartet of Ekiti, Delta, Kwara, and Taraba each confirmed one case
Meanwhile, Bauchi State Government make known the elevating of the ban on religious activities in the state, suggesting that parts of the country are now choosing to return to their normal activities.
Source___Channels TV
World Bank alert 60m at risk of ‘extreme poverty’
Up to 60m people will be at risk of “extreme poverty” by the coronavirus alerts the president of the World Bank.
David Malpass said the bank contemplates global economic growth to diminish by 5% this year as nations overcome this pandemic.
This has so far led to millions losing their jobs and businesses losing profits, with poorer countries feeling the impact.
“Millions of livelihoods have been destroyed and healthcare systems are under strain worldwide,” he said.
“Our estimate is that up to 60 million people will be pushed into extreme poverty – that erases all the progress made in poverty alleviation in the past three years,” Mr Malpass warned on Tuesday.
The World Bank defines “extreme poverty” as living on less than $1.90 (£1.55) per person per day.
The Washington-based usurer is giving $160bn in grants and low-interest loans to help poor countries overcome the crisis. Mr Malpass said that 100 countries, home to 70% of the world’s population, had already been given emergency finance.
“While the World Bank is providing sizeable resources, it won’t be enough,” he added.Mr Malpass said he was also frustrated with commercial lenders dragging their heels on offering debt relief to poor nations. “I have been somewhat frustrated by the slow pace. Commercial creditors are still, by and large, taking payments from even the poorest countries and there needs to be faster movement.”
“It is my fervent hope that we use this crisis as a catalyst to rebuild an economy that creates and sustains opportunity for dramatically more people, especially those who have been left behind for too long,” he wrote ahead of the bank’s annual shareholder meeting on Tuesday.
Source___BBC News
Brazil confirms third-highest Covid-19 infection level
Brazil has become the country with the third-highest number of recorded coronavirus infections in the world, after reaching a total of more than 250,000 cases.
Experts say inadequate testing might mean that the real figure in Brazil could be 15 times higher than it is.
The country’s ‘far-right’ president, Jair Bolsonaro, has abandoned the risks and compared Covid-19 to “a little flu”.
His handling of the Covid-19 escalation- which has included calls for lockdowns put forward by state governors to be lifted – has led to backlash and the resignation of Health Minister Nelson Teich last week.
Mr Teich’s predecessor, Luiz Mandetta, was dismissed by President Bolsonaro after the two men clash over social distancing measures.
But Mr Bolsonaro’s attention is on lessening economic disruption has been welcomed by many supporters who have put forward anti-lockdown rallies, some of which the president attended.
Brazil now has not less than a quarter of a million recorded cases. More than 16,000 Covid-19 patients have died, the sixth-highest number of deaths in the world.
Source___BBC News
US Says WHO ‘Non-performance’ On COVID-19 ‘Cost Many Lives’
The United States on Monday condemned the World Health Organization’s “failure” to secure and provide significant information on COVID-19 that could have help stop the pandemic and saved many lives.
“We must be frank about one of the primary reasons this outbreak spun out of control: there was a failure by this organisation to obtain the information that the world needed, and that failure cost many lives,” US Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar said in a video address to the WHO’s main annual meeting.
Azar hold out that the WHO had to change and become more clear, as he reverse an independent review of “every aspect” of the UN health agency’s response to the escalates pandemic.
The escalation, which first started in China late last year, has killed and infected more people in the United States than in any other country by far.
Washington has adjourned its funding to the WHO, indicting it of being too close to Beijing, and covering up and mishandlng of the pandemic.
“In an apparent attempt to conceal this outbreak, at least one member state made a mockery of their transparency obligations, with tremendous costs for the entire world,” said Azar.
“We saw that the WHO failed at its core mission of information sharing and transparency when member states do not act in good faith.
“This cannot ever happen again. The status quo is intolerable. WHO must change, and it must become far more transparent and far more accountable.”
Azar said that while countries were concentrating on the sudden response to the pandemic, they US Says WHO ‘Failure’ On COVID-19 ‘Cost Many Lives’
Source___Channels TV
Health Minister enunciates disappointm over the country’s bad system
The Minister of Health on Saturday make known to the national Assembly members that the Gambia has a very bad system which requires some significant changes.
Dr. Ahmed Lamin Samateh was speaking before lawmakers on Saturday afternoon on the condition of COVID-19 in the country and why the payment of allowances to the salient workers was not made on time.
He said rather than dealing with the overcoming of COVID-19, putting in place what needs to be done, developing the strategies, people were thinking on how to amass money through the guarantee allowances.
He said there were people who were known for bungling the fund meant to fight COVID-10 as they did with the Ebola fund
“I think we inherited a bad system. That is the bottom line. The same old people are there. They got used to the same bad system. We talk about Ebola, unfortunately, Ebola funds were wasted in this country and that is what they want to do with this and we say no.”
“That is why some of them are up and against. The Ebola funds were wasted here. What that would have done, today, our health system wouldn’t have been like this. There were equipment which were said to have been procured which never got to this country. Nobody sees them. Allowances were put together – then allowances were paid as impress and I was told they put it in bags and they went and paid selected people and the rest only God and they know where the rest went to. Some people were left as a response team for three months and they never get a dime paid to them. They are still here.”
He said the same people are still around and now that they don’t have the access, they are vandalizing the system.
“To them, things won’t work. To them, things will fail. This is the frustration I am facing as a health minister.”
He added: “Unfortunately, people started forgetting about COVID 19, all they talk about is money, money, money. That is why I said our work is very difficult.”
He said there is a great number of health workers who are on daily bases sacrificing their lives for the country, but there are one or two substandard elements too.
Source___Foroyaa
Nigeria Confirms 338 New COVID-19 Cases, Toll of Infections Near 6,000
Nigeria has confirmed 338 new cases of the novel coronavirus, according to the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control.
In a tweet on its official handle late Sunday, the NCDC said Lagos had recorded 177 new cases, while Kano posted 64 cases.
Other regions with latest cases include the FCT with 21, Rivers with 16, Plateau with 14, Oyo 11, Katsina nine, Jigawa and Kaduna with four each, and three cases from the trio of Abia, Bauchi, and Borno.
Gombe, Akwa Ibom, and Delta states also confirmed two new cases each, while Kebbi and Sokoto shared two cases between them.
Meanwhile, earlier on Sunday, national coordinator of the Presidential Task Force (PTF) on COVID-19, Sani Aliyu, said President Muhammadu Buhari is set to address Nigerians on Monday over the Corona Virus pandemic.
While some are anticipating for the President to further relax lockdown measures caused by the virus, COVID-19 cases have continued to increase across the country.
Source___Channels TV
Hospitals in Brazil’s city São Paulo is near collapsing
The mayor of Brazil’s biggest city, São Paulo, has said its health system could could fall in as demand grows for emergency beds to deal with coronavirus pandemic.
Bruno Covas said the city’s public hospitals has get as far as 90% and could run out of space in about two weeks.
São Paulo is one of the country’s worst-hit regions, with almost 3,000 deaths so far.
On Saturday, Brazil surpass Spain and Italy to become the nation with the fourth largest number of infections.
The health ministry confirmed 7,938 new cases in the past 24 hours, taking the toll above 241,000. Only the US, Russia and the UK have higher numbers.
The number of death in the Latin American nation over 24 hours was 485, meaning that the toll of deaths is 16,118 – the world’s fifth-highest figure.
Health experts in Brazil have alerted that the real number of recorded infections in the country may be far higher than the official records, due to a lack of testing.
Mr Covas said he was now in calamity talks with the state governor over bringing forward a strict lockdown to try to slow the contagion before hospitals were overwhelmed.
The governor of São Paulo state controls the police, and his support will be of great importance if a lockdown is to be victorious.
São Paulo has the population of about 12 million, and official figures show that the majority of inhabitants have been going against social distancing rules.
Source___BBC News
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