LyrArc Article Gist
As this report in WSJ shows underreporting of coronavirus cases is a serious problem for Africa, and the figures from Africa's CDC, part of the African Union, do not show the magnitude of the problem. It shows that health workers in places from Yaounde in Cameroon to Dar es Salaam in Tanzania, to cities in Somalia, are reporting a situation quite different from what the CDC shows, with hotspots emerging in some places with little in the way of resources.

Only 1 million tests have been done and half are in SOuth Africa and Ghana. WIthout the testing it is hard to know how many cases there are. Capetown area in South Africa is emerging as a hotspot and hospitals are expected to be overwhelmed within weeks. Officially Tanzania a country with 56 million has 509 cases and 21 deaths, yet this contrasts with reports from health experts. Cameroon and South Sudan are also possible emerging hotspots in addition to Tanzania says this report in WSJ.

LyrArc Article Gist
In an astonishing contrast to other European countries, including neighbors Norway, FInaland and Denmark, the Swedish government decided to not impose a lockdown, keeping bars, restaurants, hairdressers, gyms, primary and middle schools open. Secondary schools, museums were closed, sports gatherings, gatherings of more than 50 people were not allowed. Social distancing was not enforced, and entirely voluntary. Sweden now has 29000 cases according to Statista and its death rate of 358 per million population is higher than in the U.S. which is 267, and Denmark 93, Finland 53.  Critics such as Lena EInhorn, a virologist, say the Swedish government did not set up a broad testing program, and let a problem develop for elder care in nursing homes. She says a 14 day quarantine of household members of a person infected with the virus would have made a difference. Most action we take for granted was not taken in Sweden. Restaurants that were not required to close spread airborne transmission. Einhorn also says that the government officials have denied it but under their breaths they have acknowledged working on a herd immunity strategy. Denmark has opened schools with social distancing and other measures and reopened its economy. Sweden is in reverse with calls for stricter action and an ongoing debate. No reopening as there was no lockdown, yet considerable and nagging uncertainty. The speed of transmission of coronavirus is the biggest danger, as it can let the numbers grow very quickly if the wrong decisions are taken or something is left out. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
While attention is placed on Brazil for coronavirus, neighboring Argentina has an economic crisis with debt of $324 billion, reaching 90% of GDP. The new Peronist party government in Argentina is supported by the IMF in negotiations with creditors, as it faces the coronavirus and needs to free up resources from debt payments to tackle the crisis. Its proposal to Ad Hoc group of creditors including investment funds Black Rock and Fidelity is for a three year grace period on debt payments, 62% reduction of interest  amounting to $37 billion, and 5% reduction of capital or $3.6 billion. Earlier governments mishandled the economy leading to overborrowing on an unsustainable basis. Argentina has defaulted on debt 20 times in its history. The last being in 2001 with debt of $100 billion. The pattern of overborrowing and mismanagement by administrations modeled on free market economies has continued. Lenders, borrowers, and the government have not acted prudently knowing this history. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Brazil stands out as an exception to the way in which most large nations have responded to the coronavirus taking it seriously. Brazil's health system lacks equipment and is inadequately funded compared to European countries, yet president Bolsonaro has not imposed the strict lockdown and other measures taken in other countries. Brazil is now the country with the second largest cases surpassing Russia- it has 326,000 cases and 3200 deaths.

LyrArc Article Gist
Just as president Trump calls for reopening of churches in the U.S., France says it will reopen churches in the start of June. Required is social distancing of one metre for people attending church, handwashing and wearing masks.

LyrArc Article Gist
After China's economy shrank by 6.8% in the first quarter the outlook is looking increasingly uncertain. Premier Li Keqiang stated at the start of an annual parliament meeting that China will now scrap the annual economic target due to the huge uncertainty from the coronavirus, and the world economic and trading environment. New tensions over Hong Kong's autonomous status are adding to the trade tensions between the U.S. and China, and tensions over early handling of coronavirus by China. China recently announced new national security legislation for Hong Kong, and Mr. Trump says the U.S. would act "very strongly" against any effort to gain more control over Hong Kong.

LyrArc Article Gist
Going outdoors for sunlight which gives Vitamin D and getting exercize is becoming more important today with the coronavirus. Getting out to a park, green spaces or places to walk or run is increasingly important for maintaining good health after a long lockdown. Sunlight adds to our immune system and brings many benefits for mind and body as shown here.  

LyrArc Article Gist
Vietnam has an excellent record in the coronavirus epidemic with zero deaths and 324 cases. No locally originated cases are seen. The country has an astounding 792 tests per confirmed case compared to 144 for Taiwan and 57 for South Korea. Vietnam acted quickly to close its borders, quarantine foreign travelers in camps, close schools, and imposed an early lockdown.  This gives Vietnam an opportunity to restart its economy and maintain its growth. With the reallocation of supply chains away from China underway, Vietnam sets an ambitious growth rate of 5% for 2020, down only slightly from 7% for 2019.  The coronavirus also had some positive effects including the digital transformation that is taking place-  the rate of online transactions in public services increased from 12% to 24% during the 2 month lockdown. The discipline showed in Vietnam for tackling the crisis contrasts with other countries in Europe and America. This report says some small businesses and export industries in clothing and shoes are affected, yet even a 3% growth rate in 2020 makes Vietnam a winner, as the future in 2021 looks good. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
This report in DW.com shows pictures and podcasts from Africa's National Parks and Wildlife Centers. Africa's tourism industry brings in billions of dollars from international visitors with each traveler bringing in about $7000 to the local economy. Most affected are hotels, tour companies and small business. There is a sense that government could do more to protect small business in Uganda, Kenya,Tanzania, South Africa, Ghana and other countries. Also being considered is finding ways to shift focus from high paying foreign tourists to a a larger local visitor population in African countries. Today Serengeti National Park in Tanzania, Amboseli National Park in Kenya at the foot of Mt. Kilimanjaro, Kruger National Park in South Africa, Victoria Falls National Park in Zimbabwe, Sanganeb Marine National Park in Sudan, and Tassili n'Ajjer National Park in Algeria with Tuareg nomads in the desert deep in the Sahara, are some of the National Parks with few international visitors. Local are working in alternative occupations. There is a sense that a better focus would be to a less paying but dependable tourist influx from within African countries.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
The CDC Africa says Africa has recorded over 100,000 confirmed cases for a continent of 1.3 billion people, but as the WSJ reports on May 23 there is a high degree of underreporting. The number of cases the CDC says is about the same this week on May 22, as the cases were last week.The most cases are in South Africa at 19,000. 

Three countries have an increase of 100%, making it a situation that will need vigilance. So far 1.3 million tests were conducted. This report in DW.com contrasts with the WSJ report on May 23 which sees major problems developing in hotspots in Africa from Tanzania to Cameroon, in South Sudan to the Cape town area in South Africa. Cape Town hospitals are expected to be overwhelmed in weeks.

LyrArc Article Gist
The U.S. is moving quickly to gain access to an effective vaccine by September or October 2020. It is doing this by providing the money for companies to conduct trials and ramp up manufacturing in a big way. The U.S. government has agreed to give Astra Zeneca upto $1.2 billion to secure supply of a Oxford University developed vaccine which could be ready by October. Astra Zeneca has agreed to make the vaccine under a licensing deal with Oxford University's Jenner Institute and promised it will not make a profit on this. U.S. has also given $483 million to Moderna in Cambridge, Massachusetts, for making the vaccine. Both Oxford and Moderna are testing the vaccine on humans. Oxford uses a tested older technology, Moderna a new technology. UK has given Astra Zeneca $79 million to secure 100 million doses of the vaccine, with 30 million ready by September. Oxford is also in negotiations with Gavi the international vaccine alliance, and Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations on further deals to boost production. Oxford began a 1100 person study in April, and is  doing a 5000 person trial in late May.  ...

LyrArc Article Gist
With 3.7 million workers in the informal economy Italy is one of the worst hit European countries. Italy's south, including Naples and its capital Campania is one of the hardest hit. Italy's lockdown ended May 18, with some restrictions. Affected worst are small business owners such as shopkeepers, restaurant owners and market vendors, also hit are workers employed in tourism and entertainment. The Italian government has made a 600 euro emergency payment to self employed or part time workers, and 12 million workers have applied so far for these payments, about half of the workforce. A new payment by the government will cover workers in the informal economy with a55 million euro additional aid package by the government of prime minister Conte. Italy's economy will decline by 9.5% in 2020, exceeded in Europe only by Greece. The country is seeing a further erosion of the lower middle class after the difficult period following both the financial crisis of 2008, the eurozone crisis, austerity cuts which hurt people across southern European countries, Spain, Portugal, Greece, and Italy. It is also true that Italians came together during this difficult period in a way not seen since World War II and prime minister Conte provided much needed leadership for Italy, with growing confidence in his leadership. This provides a new sense of hope that Italy can come to grips with many problems it has faced in the last 2 decades, similar to that in other parts of Europe where investment in  infrastructure and manufacturing has fallen behind. ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Berlin Brandenburg Airport or BER was supposed to open in 2011 or 2012,instead it will open in October 2020, nine years behind schedule, three times over budget. There were 2 parliamentary probes into what went wrong. The planning was faulty and plans were changed, blueprints were not finalized, resulting in a long sequence of problems with such basic items such as the fire safety system, and shoddy electrical wiring, faulty smoke extractions systems. A technical manager was jailed for three years for accepting a bribe from a contractor who then went bankrupt.  The airport CEO Mr. Daldrup says his job was to mop up problems like a "crime scene cleaner." It may be an example of how German values in hard work and good engineering declined as the country lost its focus in the period after reunification and the austerity years under chancellors Schroeder, Merkel, a period when new infrastructure and public services suffered neglect.

LyrArc Article Gist
The knowledge that the virus  caused human to human transmission and that it spreads to wide parts of the population very quickly were critical pieces of information that remained with Chinese epidemiologists, doctors and medical researchers, and were suppressed by local authorites in Wuhan.  Yet China's version of the U.S. CDC, China's Centre of Disease Control and Prevention, modeled on the U.S. control efforts worked effectively to identify the problem. Virologist Gao Fu, heads China's CDC. This report in Germany's Der Spiegel says Mr. Fu made it a habit to scan China's internet before bedtime for any signs of possible disease outbreaks. On the night of December 30 he came across rumors of an internal memo from the Wuhan Health Commission of an outbreak of a vaguely worded lung disease. When he called the Wuhan health authority he found their answers to be evasive which alarmed him. The next morning December 31 Mr. Fu sent the first of three teams to Wuhan which is how China was able to identify the problem, in the sense that Chinese authorites in Beijing were to rely on Dr Gao Fu to overcome the problem of Wuhan provincial authorites. He informed the World Health Organization Beijing office on that day. The Der Spiegel report says "shortly afterward," the Seattle Times in its report says this was about New Years Day 2020- Mr Fu made a call to Dr. Redfield, head of the U.S. Centre for Disease Control, who was on vacation. Redfield is deeply disturbed on hearing this from Fu and they have conversations over the next few days to the point that Dr. Gao Fu is in tears about what has happened. On January 1 Taiwanese public health authorites shared the information with WHO that the cornonavirus was a human to human transmission, would the Taiwanese authorites not have shared it with the U.S. the same week during calls from the U.S. CDC or other public health authorites alarmed about the situation. (The WHO was proving useless by Jan 14 when it contradicted Taiwan's more reliable assessment  on Jan 14 going by the letter from president Trump to WHO). On January 6 a few days later Dr Redfield and Dr. Azar head of Health and Human Services ask China for permission to send a team of CDC U.S. experts to China. This is cited in the U.S. letter to the World Health organization- the lack of human to human transmission information being given to the U.S. officially early by China. A risk that could have been a topic of conversation between the U.S. and China heads of CDC. That letter from president Trump also points out that the team of experts the U.S. planned to send was not accepted by China till Feb 16, one and half months after that series of conversations between Dr. Gao Fu of China CDC and Dr. Redfield of U.S. CDC in an alert message.  In effect removing one of the key defences for the U.S. and Europe in making their own defensive actions and plans, laying the basis of the worldwide coronavirus pandemic affecting millions of people. Dr Redfield is a AIDS researcher at the University of Maryland who spent most of his life trying to control spread of HIV and was appointed by president Trump to head CDC agency in 2018. He set a goal of eliminating AIDS by 2030 and is more comfortable with aids patients and research than the bureaucratic nature of agencies- CDC has about 11,000 employees. Once it was clear that a team of U.S. experts was not given permission to make its own assessment in Wuhan in the few days after January 6 offer to sent the team to China by Redfield of U.S. CDC and Dr. Azar, would it have alerted the U.S. that something was seriously heading the wrong way for a epidemic risk. That letter of president Trump cites how the head of WHO during the first SARS crisis in 2003, Dr. Harlem Brundtland acted when she faced China's lack of cooperation during that crisis by saying openly that this was a danger to world public health and millions. Could CDC in the U.S. and the other connected health authorites have taken the responsibility and filled Dr Brundtland's role in this crisis, that the WHO failed to perform?    ...

LyrArc Article Gist
Prof. John Ashton, regional director of public health for the northwest of England offers this advice on pitfalls to avoid in the testing and contact tracing systems of the UK and other countries. He says there is a problem in sending testing kits through the mail or postal service. He points out that the swabs needed for testing correctly are quite invasive, the risk of an inadequate sample taken in high, resulting in a false negative report. 

On contact tracing he says the current recruiting system has pitfalls of contact tracing people not having local knowledge. Needed are people who know the local population and are able to fully engage with these people.