foreign-affairs
Global Covid cases top 193 million
The global Covid-19 caseload has now surpassed 193 million as the highly contagious Delta variant continues to devastate several countries even with mass inoculations underway.
The total caseload and fatalities stand at 193,165,622 and 4,143,105 respectively, as of Saturday morning, according to Johns Hopkins University (JHU).
So far, 3,780,890,033 vaccine doses have been administered across the globe.
The US, which is the world's worst-hit country in terms of both cases and deaths, has so far logged 34,400,655 cases. Besides, 610,720 people have lost their lives in the US to date, as per the JHU data.
Brazil has registered 1,412 more Covid-19 deaths in the past 24 hours, raising its national death toll to 548,340 till Saturday.
As many as 49,757 new cases were detected during the period, taking the total caseload to 19,632,443 the ministry said.
Read: Americas account for 40% global Covid deaths, 25% cases: WHO
Brazil currently has the world's second-highest pandemic death toll after the United States, and the third-largest caseload after the United States and India.
The third worst-hit country, India's Covid-19 tally rose to 31,293,062 on Saturday as 35,342 new cases were registered during the past 24 hours across the country.
Besides, as many as 483 deaths due to the pandemic since Friday morning took the total death toll to 419,470.
According to AP, India’s excess deaths during the pandemic could be a staggering 10 times the official Covid-19 toll, likely making it modern India’s worst human tragedy, according to the most comprehensive research yet on the ravages of the virus in the South Asian country.
Read: India's deaths during pandemic 10X official toll
The report released Tuesday estimated excess deaths — the gap between those recorded and those that would have been expected — to be 3-4.7 million between January 2020 and June 2021. It said an accurate figure may “prove elusive” but the true death toll “is likely to be an order of magnitude greater than the official count.”
Situation in Bangladesh
Although the Covid-related deaths dropped to 166 in Bangladesh on Friday from 231 on July 19, the country’s health system still remained overwhelmed.
The country saw the below 200 fatalities for the third straight day.
Also, Covid-19 infections are at 81% of the peak now, with 9,632 new cases reported on an average each day. The highest daily average was recorded on July 15.
Bangladesh recorded 6,364 new infections in 24 hours till Friday morning after testing 20,493 samples.
With Covid's Delta variant spreading fast, the country's fatalities have been hovering at nearly 200 for the past two weeks. It reported the highest daily Covid fatality figure – 231 – on July 19 and 13,768 infections on the 12th of the month.
There have been 1,146,564 infections and 18,851 coronavirus-related deaths here since the pandemic began, according to the Directorate General of Health Services (DGHS).
Meanwhile, the daily test positivity rate fell to 31.05% from Thursday's 32.19%.
Read: Bangladesh sees 173 more Covid deaths as pandemic eclipses Eid celebrations
Amid growing concerns about the highly infectious Delta variant, Dhaka division reported the highest 60 deaths, Khulna and Chattogram 33 each, Rangpur 12, Barishal 10, Sylhet eight, Rajshahi seven, and Mymensingh three.
However, the death rate stood at 1.64% and the recovery rate rose to 85.35%.
First-ever UN resolution on vision impairment adopted unanimously
The United Nations General Assembly has unanimously adopted the first-ever UN resolution on vision impairment, committing access to eye healthcare for the 1.1 billion people living with preventable sight loss by 2030.
Permanent Representative of Bangladesh to the UN in New York, Ambassador Rabab Fatima introduced the resolution on behalf of the Friends of Vision, an informal like-minded group at the UN that advocates for greater access to eye healthcare for over two billion people currently living with various levels of visual impairment.
The resolution titled 'Vision for Everyone: Accelerating Action to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals' is unique as it is the first agreement among the member states of this highest global body that is designed to tackle preventable sight loss, the Bangladesh Mission at the UN said on Saturday.
READ: Bangladesh, Ireland initiate first-ever UN resolution on 'Global Drowning Prevention'
The other two co-chairs of the group are Antigua & Barbuda and Ireland, who joined Bangladesh in proposing the resolution. A total of 115 member states co-sponsored the resolution adopted on Friday.
Ambassador Fatima dedicated the resolution to all people around the world who are visually impaired or handicapped.
She urged all countries in the world to set a target for vision for everyone by 2030 by ensuring full access to eye care services for their populations.
This resolution has a strong mandate and is expected to send a strong message of hope to the millions of visually impaired.
Ambassador Fatima said the adoption of the resolution on vision is a watershed moment in global efforts for vision care.
“1.1 billion people live with preventable sight loss. Preventable sight loss is a global challenge that needs a global solution – and that is what we have agreed today. What we agreed today will make a world of a difference to the lives of billions and their families and communities”.
Referring to a global survey data, the Bangladesh Ambassador said that vision impairment and blindness pose an enormous global financial burden with the annual global costs of productivity losses estimated to be US$ 411 billion.
However, access to eye care can not only reduce children’s odds of failing in the class by 44%, but it can also increase the odds of obtaining paid employment by 10%.
This is also an equity issue as 55% of the blind people are women and girls; and they are 8% more likely to be blind than men, she added.
READ: It’s a strategic decision: FM about UN resolution on Rohingyas
Ambassador Fatima said millions of people globally lose their visions, needlessly. “And this phenomenon largely impedes their ability to contribute to their full potentials to the socio-economic development of their societies. The resolution before us has the potential to reverse this situation”.
The resolution called upon the member states to make eye health integral to their nation’s commitment to achieving the sustainable development goals.
The resolution also asked for international financial institutions and donors to provide targeted finances, especially to support developing countries in tackling preventable sight loss.
It called on relevant UN institutions to support global efforts to achieve vision for everyone to achieve the sustainable development goals. The resolution also called for new targets on eye care to be included in the UN’s sustainable development goals at its next review.
About 90% of the people who do not have access to proper eye healthcare live in low- and middle-income countries.
In Bangladesh, according to a 2018 estimate, the number of blind people aged 30 and above is 750,000 and more than six million people in Bangladesh need vision correction.
READ: Bolton says N. Korea missile tests violated UN resolutions
The government of Bangladesh is one of the signatories to the global initiative launched in 1999 known as Vision 2020.
Floods & landslides in India kill over 100
More than 100 people have died in landslides and floods triggered by heavy monsoon rains in the western Indian state of Maharashtra over the last two days, officials said on Saturday.
Maharashtra is experiencing the heaviest July rains in four decades. Raigad district, some 70 kms from state capital Mumbai, is the worst hit.
Of the over 100 deaths, some 36 occurred in three landslides in Raigad district alone on Thursday, where several houses were swept away by the floodwaters rendering hundreds homeless.
"While 32 people died in Taliye village, four people were killed in Mahad city. Rescue operations are still on," Raigad district collector Nidhi Chaudhary told the media.
In the neighbouring rain-hit Satara district, some 27 bodies have been recovered in the past 24 hours.
READ: Momen mourns loss of lives in deadly floods in Germany
"The Indian Army has been called out to assist in rescue operations and military choppers have been pressed into action to ferry the stranded to safer locations," said Satara's police chief Ajay Kumar Bansal.
Local TV channels reported that over 84,000 people, including 40,000 in Kolhapur district, have been shifted to safer places.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday took to Twitter to offer condolences to the families of the deceased. "Anguished by the loss of lives due to a landslide in Raigad, Maharashtra. My condolences to the bereaved families. I wish the injured a speedy recovery."
"The situation in Maharashtra due to heavy rains is being closely monitored and assistance is being provided to the affected," the PM added.
Barely a week back, some 30 people were killed in house collapses triggered by heavy monsoon rains in Mumbai. The deaths occurred in the hilly Chembur area, a suburb, and neighbouring Vikhroli area.
READ: China blasts dam to divert floods that killed at least 25
The Indian PM then announced a compensation of Rs 2 lakh each to the families of the deceased.
Building collapses are common in India, particularly during the monsoon months of June, July and August. Poor construction quality is often blamed for such collapses.
Momen mourns loss of lives in deadly floods in Germany
Bangladesh Foreign Minister Dr AK Abdul Momen has expressed grief over the loss of lives in heavy floods in western Germany.
Dr Momen wrote a letter to German Foreign Affairs Heiko Maas, conveying his deep condolences over the loss of lives and heartfelt sympathies to all those who have lost their loved ones.
READ: Russia agrees to co-produce its vaccine in Bangladesh, says Dr. Momen
"Our prayers are with those who are still missing, and those who suffered injuries or loss of homes," he said.
Dr Momen hoped that with the intensive efforts launched by the German federal and state governments, "the affected people will soon be able to overcome this difficult time".
READ: Momen, Jaishankar discuss vaccine, Rohingya issues in Tashkent
Bangladesh High Commission organises tree plantation programme in Brunei
Bangladesh High Commission has organised a tree plantation programme at Taman Riadah, Jalan Pusat Persidangan, Bandar Seri Begawan with the support of the Department of Forest of Brunei Darussalam.
The tree plantation programme was undertaken to celebrate the birth centenary of the Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman, and the Golden Jubilee of the Independence of Bangladesh, said the high commission Friday.
More than a hundred trees including 41 Ru Runag, 59 Ubah and one Neem were planted.
'Haribhanga’ also goes to Imran Khan as Hasina's gift
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has sent the Haribhanga variety of mango to Pakistan Prime Minister Imran Khan as her “mango diplomacy” continues.
The mangoes were handed over to the Pakistan Prime Minister’s Protocol at the Prime Minister’s Office on the Eid-ul-Adha day, said the Bangladesh High Commission in Islamabad.
Read: Mango diplomacy: PM sends mangoes to the Maldives president
Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina has sent this delicious Bangladeshi premier quality ‘Haribhaga’ variety of mango as a goodwill gesture to her Pakistan counterpart, the High Commission said.
Bangladesh High Commission in Delhi celebrates Eid
High Commissioner of Bangladesh to India Muhammad Imran has said Bangladesh is their "soul" no matter where they are in the world and emphasised working together.
"We have to work from our respective places to implement the vision of Prime Minister Sheikh Hasina," he said while exchanging Eid greetings with the officials and staff of the high commission and their families.
Addressing the officials and staff of the mission, Muhammad Imran said: "Your children should be present at all the national functions of the mission. In this way, they will be able to know about the history and tradition of Bangabandhu, the great hero of Bangladesh's independence."
Also read: Muslims in Bangladesh celebrating another Eid-ul-Azha amid pandemic
Food systems that ignore needs of poor are doomed to fail: IFAD
President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) Gilbert F Houngbo on Friday said their attempts to create more equitable and sustainable food systems are doomed to fail if they ignore the challenges and needs of rural people in the world’s poorest countries.
“Rural people have long been sidelined in food value chains. While they toil to produce much of our food, too often they receive a pittance for their efforts and are left vulnerable to shocks,” said the President of IFAD, the UN agency which leads on tackling rural poverty and hunger.
READ: IFAD President lauds Bangladesh for significant projects implementation capacity
Ahead of the UN Food Systems pre-Summit that begins in Rome on Monday, he said this is a critical moment to address the inequity of food systems.
“Without concrete actions that result in real changes for rural producers, hunger and poverty will only grow, and increased instability and migration will follow,” he added.
Rural small-scale farmers produce about a third of global food, and supply up to 80 per cent of food in parts of Africa and Asia.
Although they play a major role in keeping food systems functioning, they themselves often go hungry.
In 2020, this was exacerbated by climate change, conflict, and the impacts of the Covid-19 pandemic, resulting in a dramatic increase in global hunger, according to a report jointly released by five UN agencies including IFAD last week.
One in 10 now go hungry
At the pre-Summit (26-28 July), IFAD will join thousands of governments, companies, development agencies, farmers and civil society organisations to discuss ways to transform how we grow, process, sell and consume food to make it more sustainable and equitable.
The pre-Summit aims to establish a common vision, launch commitments and mobilize partnerships for financing.
“If we want to fix food systems, listen to the people who work in them,” said Houngbo. “Rural small-scale producers are the ones who understand their own challenges and can guide what solutions are needed.”
To gather input from rural producers across the world, IFAD launched its Rural Voices platform this week. Shirley Casachagua, from a remote area in Peru, is one of the contributors.
“No matter what continent, country or republic you live in, we are all children of the earth and we live off it,” she said. “I would like to ask world leaders to be a watchdog to large industries because they contribute more to climate change and this hurts all of us who live on the land.”
READ: IFAD names new country director for Bangladesh
IFAD has also collaborated with Farm Radio International to conduct surveys with remote rural people through radio programmes, and it has supported the organization of over 40 independent dialogues led by farmers’ organizations and Indigenous Peoples’ groups which will feed into the Summit process.
IFAD is calling for a number of key changes to food systems, including to commit financing and political will to ensure rural people can access the inputs, markets, financial services, technology and information they need to grow their businesses, adapt to climate change, protect the environment and biodiversity, and be more resilient to economic, health and weather shocks and to make food systems fairer and more equitable. Food systems depend on people’s labour, and those who work in them must earn decent livelihoods.
IFAD is also leading an initiative to unlock the potential of public development banks across the world to finance food systems transformation and help shift investments to more environmentally sustainable and fairer systems, and is hosting the official session at the pre-Summit: Mobilizing trillions for food systems transformation — financing for impact, leveraging the pivotal role of public development banks.
READ: IFAD to provide US$18.07mn to Bangladesh for COVID-19 recovery activities
Following the Food Systems Summit in September, countries will develop their own pathways to transform food systems, and IFAD will support its Member States to develop their strategies and put them into action.
Vaccine inequity undermining global economic recovery, shows new data
An acceleration in scaling up manufacturing and sharing enough vaccine doses with low-income countries could have added $38 billion to their GDP forecast for 2021, according to new data released on Thursday.
Covid-19 vaccine inequity will have a lasting and profound impact on socio-economic recovery in low- and lower-middle income countries, according to data jointly released by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the World Health Organization (WHO) and the University of Oxford.
They called for urgent action to boost supply and assure equitable access for every country, including through dose sharing.
At a time when richer countries have paid trillions in stimulus to prop up flagging economies, now is the moment to ensure vaccine doses are shared quickly, all barriers to increasing vaccine manufacturing are removed and financing support is secured so vaccines are distributed equitably and a truly global economic recovery can take place, said UNDP, WHO and University of Oxford.
A high price per COVID-19 vaccine dose relative to other vaccines and delivery costs – including for the health workforce surge – could put a huge strain on fragile health systems and undermine routine immunization and essential health services and could cause alarming spikes in measles, pneumonia and diarrhea.
Also read: Challenges remain despite Europe meeting 70 pct vaccine delivery goal
There is also a clear risk in terms of foregone opportunities for the expansion of other immunization services, for example the safe and effective rollout of HPV vaccines.
Lower income countries need timely access to sustainably priced vaccines and timely financial support.
These insights come from the Global Dashboard for COVID-19 Vaccine Equity, a joint initiative from UNDP, WHO and the University of Oxford’s Blavatnik School of Government, which combines the latest information on COVID-19 vaccination with the most recent socio-economic data to illustrate why accelerating vaccine equity is not only critical to saving lives but also to driving a faster and fairer recovery from the pandemic with benefits for all.
“In some low- and middle-income countries, less than 1 per cent of the population is vaccinated – this is contributing to a two-track recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic”, said UNDP Administrator Achim Steiner.
“It’s time for swift, collective action – this new COVID-19 Vaccine Equity Dashboard will provide Governments, policymakers and international organizations with unique insights to accelerate the global delivery of vaccines and mitigate the devastating socio-economic impacts of the pandemic.”
According to the new Dashboard, which builds on data from multiple entities including the IMF, World Bank, UNICEF and Gavi, and analysis on per capita GDP growth rates from the World Economic Outlook, richer countries are projected to vaccinate quicker and recover economically quicker from COVID-19, while poorer countries haven’t even been able to vaccinate their health workers and most at-risk population and may not achieve pre-COVID-19 levels of growth until 2024.
Meanwhile, Delta and other variants are driving some countries to reinstate strict public health social measures.
Also read: Vaccine inequity: Inside the cutthroat race to secure doses
This is further worsening the social, economic and health impact, especially for the most vulnerable and marginalized people.
Vaccine inequity threatens all countries and risks reversing hard won progress on the Sustainable Development Goals.
“Vaccine inequity is the world’s biggest obstacle to ending this pandemic and recovering from COVID-19,” said Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, Director-General of the World Health Organization.
“Economically, epidemiologically and morally, it is in all countries' best interest to use the latest available data to make lifesaving vaccines available to all.”
Designed to empower policy makers and development partners to take urgent action to reduce vaccine inequity, the Global Dashboard breaks down the impact of accessibility against a target for countries to vaccinate their at-risk populations first to reduce mortality and protect the health system and then move on to vaccinating larger shares of the population to reduce disease burden and re-open socio-economic activity.
The Dashboard is facilitated by the Global Action Plan for Healthy Lives and Well-being for All (SDG3 GAP), which aims to improve collaboration across the multilateral system to support an equitable and resilient recovery from the pandemic and drive progress towards the health-related SDGs.
“Closing the vaccine gap is required to put this pandemic behind us. The dashboard can help scale up and accelerate global delivery of vaccines by providing accurate, up-to-date information on not just how many vaccines have been given, but also the policies and mechanisms through which we get them into arms,” said Dr. Thomas Hale, Associate Professor of Global Public Policy, Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford.
The Dashboard will be updated in real-time as new data becomes available, filling a critical gap to help guide the international community's understanding of what can be done to achieve vaccine equity. Users are able and encouraged to download all data sets in full from the website.
MoU signed to promote health and sport for everybody ahead of Paralympic Games
The World Health Organization (WHO) and the International Paralympic Committee (IPC) on Thursday signed an agreement to work together to foster diversity and equity through global initiatives promoting health and sport for everybody, everywhere.
The two partners will collaborate to improve global access to quality rehabilitation and assistive technology as part of universal health coverage; and mitigate existing inequalities in relation to access to these life-changing services -- a prerequisite for equal opportunities and participation in sports for persons with disabilities, including for Paralympians and Para athletes.
IPC President Andrew Parsons and WHO Director General Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus signed the MoU in Tokyo.
The Paralympic Games will be held in Tokyo between on Aug. 24 and and Sept. 5.
“Sport and health are natural allies, with mutually reinforcing benefits,” said Dr Tedros.
More than that, he said, the Paralympic Games are an inspiring statement of what persons with disabilities can achieve.
"We hope this partnership between WHO and IPC will provide a platform for more persons with disabilities to participate in sport, but also for demonstrating why universal health coverage is so important, by ensuring all persons have the care and technologies they need to fulfil their potential.”
Andrew Parsons said this new partnership is one that will greatly benefit society, as sport is a tremendous tool for ensuring that persons lead active and healthy lifestyles.
"The IPC’s partnership with the WHO goes beyond promoting physical and healthy lifestyles and will also focus on highlighting the role assistive technology plays in the creation of an inclusive world, especially for the over 1 billion persons with disabilities.”
Disability is a global public health issue but with a higher prevalence in lower-income countries with even less access to health care and assistive technology.
The WHO estimates about 15% of the world’s population live with a disability – and this number is growing due to demographic changes including population ageing and the global increase in chronic health conditions.
Only 1 in 2 persons with disabilities can afford health care, including rehabilitation services; and 1 in 10 have access to life-changing assistive technology.
The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed persons with disabilities to increased risks of contracting COVID-19 and having poorer health, as health information and care have not been provided in ways easily accessible to them.