A 'crackdown' on journalism is dangerous to democracy: PM on global media freedom

OTTAWA — Prime Minister Justin Trudeau has highlighted the work of journalists working under pressure in Hong Kong and Belarus at an international conference on media freedom.

IRWIN COTLER © Provided by The Canadian Press

Canada has been vocal in condemning the clampdowns on democracy and free expression by the Chinese government in the former British colony of Hong Kong and the fraudulent presidential election in Belarus that has given rise to pro-democracy protests.

"Today, we see citizens calling for change, from Hong Kong to Belarus, only to have the authorities attack the freedom of the press," Trudeau told the conference co-hosted by Canada and Botswana.

Trudeau denounced the imprisonment of Reuters journalists Kyaw Soe Oo and Wa Lone for reporting on military atrocities committed against the Rohingya people in Myanmar, and of Philippine journalist Maria Ressa.

The Reuters journalists have since gained freedom and have been awarded a Pulitzer Prize. In June, Ressa was convicted of "cyber libel" and sentenced to six years behind bars after complaints from her country's strongman president, Rodrigo Duterte, and other officials from his government.

"It is never acceptable for a journalist to be attacked for doing their job," said Trudeau. "A crackdown on the media puts democracy in danger. It puts lives in danger."

At the same event, a coalition of international lawyers, led by a former Canadian attorney general, called for a new global charter to protect the rights of imprisoned journalists in an increasingly hostile world.

Irwin Cotler, the former Liberal justice minister and international human rights lawyer, made the recommendation in a report he authored for a coalition of independent international legal experts.

The new charter would upgrade legal obligations on a country that arbitrarily imprisons a journalist and impose new legal duties on the home country of a journalist who has been rounded up.

Cotler says the new measures are needed because the current international laws designed to protect the diplomatic access to people imprisoned in foreign countries are not adequate.

"We meet today on the occasion not only of a global COVID pandemic, but a global political pandemic, characterized by a resurgent global authoritarianism, the backsliding of democracies and global assaults on media freedom, where journalists are increasingly under threat and under assault," Cotler told the video conference.

"Although some states already do this to some extent, the system is haphazard and weak," said Amal Clooney, an international human rights lawyer who has represented imprisoned journalists

Cotler and Clooney say the COVID-19 pandemic has emboldened authoritarian governments and created new risks to journalists working internationally.

"So the report proposes a new charter of rights for detained journalists and a new code of conduct for governments to be overseen by a newly appointed international commissioner who would be tasked with monitoring states compliance," said Clooney.

Clooney and Cotler are the leading figures on a panel created last year by the Canadian and British governments to find ways to increase protection to journalists and prevent abuses of media freedom.

Trudeau called the work of their committee "a great example of the power of working together — as civil society, government, and global organizations — to stand up for the kind of future we all want to build."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 16, 2020.

Mike Blanchfield, The Canadian Press

How traditional seeds and crops are bringing food independence to Timor-Leste

How traditional seeds and crops are bringing food independence to Timor-Leste

“We hear the voice of the farmers,” explains the acting director of Raebia, an organization in Timor-Leste working for sustainable agricultural development

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© (Creative Commons) A woman in Timor-Leste surveys her chili crop.

David Webster, Associate Professor of History / Professeur Agrégé, Département d’Histoire, Bishop's

I am talking with Mateus and his colleagues Josefa and Leonora in their central office on a side street in Dili, the capital of Timor-Leste, which remains one of Asia’s poorest countries some 20 years after the end of a brutal Indonesian military occupation.

Raebia works to ensure agricultural self-sufficiency through the promotion of crop diversity and seeds in three Timorese villages, with plans to expand to others. At a time when local food sovereignty is increasingly on the global agenda, it shows the way for other places. That’s especially true in the aftermath of this year’s Nobel Peace Prize going to the UN World Food Program.

Ties with a Canadian organization

Unlike many Timorese non-governmental organizations (NGOs), Raebia does not have a permanent overseas partner. However, it retains a link to SeedChange Canada, formerly USC, which supports small-scale farmers around the world.

That Canada-Timor connection has a long history. Canadian officials tried to convince what was then Unitarian Services of Canada to enter the Timor aid field as early as 1978, but an Indonesian military occupation made this impossible.

Canada, as I recount in a new book, supported Indonesian rule until just a year before a United Nations-sponsored referendum set Timor-Leste on the road to independence in 1999.

Read more: Canada's East Timor advocacy 20 years ago paves the way for leadership today

SeedChange entered the field in 1997 through its partnership with Indonesian affiliate Satunama. The Timor operation has been independent since 2000, and now receives foreign assistance directly. In 2013, it changed its name to Raebia (Resilient Agriculture and Economy through Biodiversity in Action), a name evoking sustainability in local languages.

Canada pledged long-term development support to Timor-Leste as it emerged from Indonesian military rule after 1999. Canadian aid peaked in 2004 at $7.3 million. But under Paul Martin and Stephen Harper governments, Ottawa broke its promise, dropping the newly independent Timor-Leste.

Canadian aid now flows only through the Canada Fund of the Canadian Embassy in Indonesia, and through the continuing support of SeedChange.

Reducing aid dependency

Though among Asia’s poorest countries, Timor-Leste is reducing aid dependency and is a world leader in combating COVID-19 with only 29 total cases and no deaths. Moderate government investments in agriculture and the work of groups like Raebia have resulted in progress, but one-quarter of adults remain undernourished and half of children under age five suffer from stunting, the third-highest rate in the world.

A visit to Fadabloko, one of three villages where Raebia currently operates, illustrates both the need and the progress made.

© (Author) Fadabloko village centre, late in the dry season, is seen in July 2020.

The village was the centre of Timorese resistance to the Indonesian invasion in the early 1970s. At the time, those military operations led to an enormous famine. War and famine cost more than 100,000 lives in a country that previously had a population of only 680,000.

The Remexio subdistrict, where Fadaboloko is located, was at the heart of the famine zone, as recounted by survivor Constancio Pinto in a memoir. He wrote:

“It was a time of incredible suffering. Food shortages, diseases and killing were all around us. The Indonesian army was always hunting us…. We walked among the dead bodies.”

Famine grew worse because people were barred from farming in traditional locations. One Canadian diplomat, visiting Remexio in 1978, called this a “food denial policy” on the part of the Indonesian army. Some 10 to 15 people died daily from starvation and diarrhea, dysentery and tuberculosis at this time. The long-term effects of that famine linger in today’s local food challenges.

‘Wild crops’

Much traditional knowledge of “wild crops” — plants such as yams and beans that grow in forested areas — was lost in the famine years. The work in Fadabloko aims in part to retrieve that knowledge. It catalogues both cultivated and uncultivated crops, reviving traditional knowledge and boosting the low biodiversity of many farmed crops.

© (Author) Crops on display in Fadabloko, Timor-Leste.

A key element is local seed banks, where farmers can contribute and withdraw seeds.

“Without good seed, we will not have good food,” Mateus of Raebia explains. No special technology is required, making the seed bank a sustainable approach without any need for ongoing technology. The seed banks, in effect, promote local food sovereignty.

Local control is furthered by including all farmers in Fadabloko in a local co-operative. Demonstration farm plots create examples that individual farmers can implement on their own land. Terracing has moved from stone and wood construction to new techniques using natural grasses to shore up soil against erosion, a sustainable process with both ecological and labour-saving benefits

..

© (Author provided) Fababloko residents and Raebia staff in the local seed bank

Rather than burning forest or grassland to create new fields fertilized by ash, farmers are instead using a double-pit manure fertilizer system, with goats kept to provide the raw materials that are then processed in the pits (again without the need for technological inputs or artificial fertilizer, and with added benefits for air quality).

The Timor-Leste government is focused on infrastructure and relies on limited oil reserves for revenue. But Raebia’s work offers an alternative vision grounded in local sustainable agriculture, control, biodiversity and the revival of Indigenous environmental knowledge. Stronger local communities, ultimately, help to build a stronger nation.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

David Webster receives funding from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. He is affiliated with the Centro Nacional Chega! in Timoe-Leste and the East Timor and Indonesia Action Network (ETAN).

IN THE NINETIES I WAS PART OF THE ALBERTA LABOUR SOLIDARITY COMMITTEE THAT WORKED WITH THE ETAN SUPPORT NETWORK AS PART OF WIDENING THE SOLIDARITY OF THE LABOUR MOVEMENT

Research sheds light on Alexander Hamilton as slave owner

ALBANY, N.Y. — A new research paper takes a swipe at the popular image of Alexander Hamilton as the abolitionist founding father, citing evidence he was a slave trader and owner himself.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

“Not only did Alexander Hamilton enslave people, but his involvement in the institution of slavery was essential to his identity, both personally and professionally,” Jessie Serfilippi, an interpreter at a New York state historic site, wrote in a paper published last month.


Hamilton is almost universally depicted as an abolitionist in popular modern works, from Ron Chernow’s 2004 biography, “Hamilton,” to Lin-Manuel Miranda’s Tony Award-winning show, “Hamilton: An American Musical.”

But after poring over ledgers and correspondence of Hamilton and his wife, Eliza Schuyler Hamilton, Serfilippi, who works at the Schuyler Mansion State Historic Site in Albany, concluded that image falls short.






“It is vital that the myth of Hamilton as ‘the Abolitionist Founding Father’ end,” Serfilippi writes in the paper, entitled, “‘As Odious and Immoral a Thing’: Alexander Hamilton’s Hidden History as an Enslaver.” Her research was published on the New York state park system website.

The paper adds to a concern voiced by many academics that the fictitious Hamilton of the musical, who attacks slavery in a rap battle with Thomas Jefferson, is just that: fictitious.

“Fascinating article,” tweeted Harvard Law professor and historian Annette Gordon-Reed, who has criticized the Broadway show in the past. “Reminds of the ubiquitous nature of slavery in the colonial period and the early American republic. Alexander Hamilton as an enslaver broadens the discussion.”

Chernow called the paper a “terrific research job that broadens our sense of Hamilton’s involvement in slavery in a number of ways.” But he questioned her claim that slavery was “essential to his identity,” and said Serfilippi omitted information that would contradict her conclusions.

For example, Chernow noted Hamilton’s work with the Manumission Society to abolish slavery in New York and defend free Blacks when slave masters from out of state tried to snatch them off New York streets.

“Had she tried to reconcile these important new findings with a full and fair statement of Hamilton’s anti-slavery activities, we would have gotten a large and complex view of the man and her paper would have been far more persuasive,” Chernow said via email.

Miranda declined to comment through his publicist. In past interviews, he's said he welcomes discussion of both Hamilton's role in slavery and criticism of his show's handling of that part of his life.

When Hamilton married into the powerful Schuyler family in 1780, slavery was common among New York state’s elite. More than 40 people were enslaved at the Schuyler family’s Albany mansion and another estate over the years. The historic site has done extensive research into the family’s so-called “servants” and incorporates it into its tours.

Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan ordered the removal of the Maj. Gen. Philip Schuyler statue earlier this year in part because he was “reportedly the largest owner of enslaved people in Albany during his time,” according to the mayor’s office.

Serfilippi challenges the often repeated claim that Hamilton’s exposure to the brutalities of slavery during his childhood on St. Croix instilled a hatred of slavery. She said “no primary sources have been found to corroborate” that.

Biographers have noted that Hamilton helped legal clients and family members buy and sell slaves, but they’ve been less clear on whether he enslaved people himself. Serfilippi said notations in his cash books and in family letters clearly show he did.

For example, Hamilton’s cash books record a payment of $250 to Philip Schuyler in 1796 for “2 Negro servants purchased by him for me.” Another entry records receiving $100 for lending a “Negro boy” to another person. And Serfilippi notes an inventory made of Hamilton’s property to settle his affairs after his death in the duel with Aaron Burr in 1804 includes “servants” valued at 400 pounds.

Joanne Freeman, Yale history professor and editor of the Library of America edition of Hamilton's writings, said via email that, “It’s fitting that we are reckoning with Hamilton’s status as an enslaver at a time that is driving home how vital it is for white Americans to reckon — seriously reckon — with the structural legacies of slavery in America."

Serfilippi said her research interest goes beyond debunking myths about Hamilton.

“The truth revealed in Hamilton’s cash books and letters must be acknowledged in order to honour the people he enslaved,” she writes. “Through understanding and accepting Hamilton’s status as an enslaver, the stories of the people he enslaved can finally take their rightful place in history.”

Mary Esch, The Associated Press

Recordings reveal WHO's analysis of pandemic in private

GENEVA — As the coronavirus explodes again, the World Health Organization finds itself both under intense pressure to reform and holding out hope that U.S. President-elect Joe Biden will reverse a decision by Washington to leave the health agency.  

© Provided by The Canadian Press

With its annual meeting underway this week, WHO has been sharply criticized for not taking a stronger and more vocal role in handling the pandemic. For example, in private internal meetings in the early days of the virus, top scientists described some countries' approaches as “an unfortunate laboratory to study the virus” and a “macabre” opportunity to see what worked, recordings obtained by The Associated Press show. Yet in public, the U.N. health agency lauded governments for their responses.

Biden has promised to overturn President Donald Trump's decision in June to cut off funds to WHO and withdraw the U.S. WHO has also bowed to demands from member countries for an independent panel to review its management of the pandemic response, and WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Monday that the agency welcomed “any and all attempts” to strengthen it “for the sake of the people we serve.”

One of the central dilemmas facing the WHO is that it has no enforcement powers or authority to independently investigate within countries. Instead, the health agency relies on behind-the-scenes talks and the co-operation of member states.

Critics say WHO’s traditional aversion to confronting its member countries has come at a high price. As COVID-19 spread, WHO often shied away from calling out countries, as big donors such as Japan, France and Britain made repeated mistakes, according to dozens of leaked recordings of internal WHO meetings and documents from January to April obtained by The Associated Press.

Some public health experts say WHO’s failure to exert its influence lent credence to countries adopting risky outbreak policies, possibly compromising efforts to stop the virus.

“We need WHO to be bold and to use their political power to name and shame because the consequences are so devastating,” said Sophie Harman, a professor of international politics at Queen Mary University in London. “This is their Spanish flu moment … By not speaking up when countries are doing questionable things, WHO is undermining its own authority while the planet burns.”

Others said it would be politically unwise for WHO to be too outspoken unless countries give the agency more power and the ability to censure countries — an option that Germany and France have recently proposed.

“If Tedros was to take a very aggressive stance toward member countries, there would be repercussions,” said Suerie Moon, co-director of the Global Health Centre at the Graduate Institute of Geneva, referring to WHO's director-general.

WHO spokeswoman Farah Dakhlallah said that since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, “WHO officials have had and continue to have, frank and open discussions with government counterparts … We are proud of an organizational culture that fosters candid discussion with the aim of reaching life-saving solutions.”

One of the scientists in the meetings, emergencies chief Dr. Michael Ryan, also laid out WHO’s approach in answer to a media question March 11 on whether the agency was willing to say which countries weren't doing enough.

“The answer to that question is, you know who you are,” Ryan said. “The WHO doesn’t interact in public debate or criticize our member states in public. What we try to do is work with our member states constructively.”

It's not unprecedented, however, for WHO to publicly question its member states. It threatened to close its China office when the country was hiding cases during the SARS outbreak, loudly called for Nigeria to reverse its boycott of the polio vaccine in 2003 and accused Tanzania of not sharing enough information about an Ebola epidemic last year.

The review of WHO’s role in the pandemic comes at a critical time because the agency is now tasked with helping to buy and distribute coronavirus vaccines around the world once any prove effective, especially to poorer nations. Some countries, including the U.S. and Russia, have refused to join the effort, but on Sunday, WHO chief scientist Dr. Soumya Swaminathan said she hoped Biden's election would “open the door” to U.S. inclusion.

WHO's reticence to call out countries started with China, as the AP earlier reported. Despite a January meeting between Tedros and Chinese President Xi Jinping, information on the outbreak was still sparse throughout February. Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s technical lead for COVID-19, noted that the agency lacked “enough detail to say what has worked and what hasn’t.”

Yet at a media briefing shortly afterwards, Tedros said, “China is doing many good things that are slowing the virus and the facts speak for themselves.”

Also in February, WHO scientists were concerned about Japan. On Feb. 1, a passenger who disembarked the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Hong Kong tested positive for the coronavirus. At the ship’s next stop in Yokohama, 10 more cases were found and authorities put all 3,711 people on board under lockdown.


Ryan told reporters at the time: “Let’s be careful here not to overreact.” But on Feb. 10, the case count nearly doubled overnight.

“(That’s) not surprising given the nature of the response of the investigation,” Ryan said at an internal meeting, saying only a small number of epidemiologists had been assigned to the outbreak. “If you double the number of cases in a ship in a day, something is not right.”

Dr. Thomas Grein, WHO’s chief of acute events management team, reported to his colleagues that WHO had discussed the outbreak with their Japanese counterparts, but failed to glean much useful information.

“It’s a very, very sensitive issue and we need to tread carefully,” he warned.

Although WHO was keenly aware the situation was deteriorating, scientists said the outbreak could help in understanding COVID-19 transmission patterns.

“(It’s) unfortunate, but a useful opportunity to study the natural history of the virus,” Ryan said.

Several days later, Japanese outbreak specialist Dr. Kentaro Iwata went aboard the Diamond Princess and called the response “completely chaotic.” Soon afterward, WHO announced more than half of the world’s known COVID-19 cases outside China were aboard the Diamond Princess.

“It was very obvious on that cruise ship that things were going badly wrong and WHO should have said something,” said Lawrence Gostin, director of the WHO Collaborating Center on Public Health Law and Human Rights at Georgetown University. “When what countries are doing is flat-out wrong, we need WHO to say so.”

While WHO wasn't specific, Tedros said on Feb. 26: “One of the biggest challenges we face is that too many affected countries are still not sharing data with WHO.”

Throughout February and March, COVID-19 triggered outbreaks in South Korea, Singapore, Iran and elsewhere. The virus also gained a foothold in Italy, turning Europe into the epicenter of the pandemic.

At WHO, officials worried in internal meetings about the lack of information from European member states. Grein said WHO’s efforts to get more detail about the spiraling outbreaks had “spectacularly failed.”

Yet on March 8, Tedros tweeted that “the government & the people of Italy are taking bold, courageous steps aimed at slowing the spread of the #coronavirus & protecting their country & world.” Three days later, Tedros declared COVID-19 to be a pandemic, saying the announcement was made partly due to “alarming levels of inaction” by countries, which he didn't name.

Georgetown University’s Gostin said WHO should be obligated to publicly report when countries aren't sharing enough data.

“If a country is not providing vital epidemiological or biological information, then WHO and the world are flying blind in an outbreak and we can’t have that,” he said.

WHO also complained in private about Western countries hoarding scarce pandemic supplies.

“We had the terrible situation yesterday with (protective personal equipment) where all the supplies were requisitioned in France and we lost access,” Ryan told his colleagues. He said WHO needed to pressure countries and companies to avoid similar situations.

As countries across Europe moved to adopt social distancing measures and cancel mass gatherings in early March, Ryan noticed one country didn't: Britain.

“There isn’t a single sports event in Europe and yet all of the Premier League matches in the U.K. are to go ahead as normal,” he said. Ryan described Britain’s pandemic strategy as “problematic” after hearing the U.K.’s chief scientific officer publicly say the country was aiming for herd immunity.

“For that to happen, hundreds of thousands and millions of older people are going to become infected and there is just going to be so much death,” Ryan said. Still, he said, the different approaches to tackling COVID-19 globally could prove to be “a massive ecological study” that would allow WHO to document what worked best.

“It’s macabre in some ways, but it’s reality,” he said.

Going forward, WHO’s role in the continued unfolding of the pandemic will depend in part on the panel review. Harman, the expert from Queen Mary University, sympathized that WHO had enormous responsibility in the early months of COVID-19, but said even greater challenges loom now.

“This is not an experiment for WHO to learn lessons for the future, the stakes are too high for that,” she said. “With the next wave of the pandemic, I think the time for quiet diplomacy has passed.”

___

Jamey Keaten in Geneva, and Dake Kang, in Beijing contributed to this report.

Maria Cheng, The Associated Press

Quebec to ban sale of gas-powered cars by 2035

as part of $6.7-billion climate plan


MONTREAL — Quebec will ban the sale of new, gasoline-powered cars and SUVs by the year 2035 as part of a $6.7-billion plan to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, Premier Francois Legault announced Monday.

Legault said the new policy will help the province meet its pledge to reduce emissions by 37.5 per cent over 1990 levels by 2030. But the premier admitted that the new measures will only move Quebec 42 per cent of the way to its goal. He said he hopes technological advances and added investment from Ottawa will help close the gap.

"We have a duty to the next generations," Legault told a news conference alongside Environment Minister Benoit Charette. "As I said when I was getting sworn in as premier, I could not look my two sons in the eye if I didn’t make efforts to meet this enormous challenge that all of us on the planet have."

Legault's $6.7-billion plan -- to be spread over five years -- depends heavily on the province's hydroelectric resources powering large swaths of the economy. More than half the funding announced Monday -- about $3.6 billion -- will be invested in the transportation sector, for such things as subsidies to encourage individuals and businesses to purchase electric cars, trains and taxis.

Legault dismissed criticism that electric vehicles are costly, have a limited range and can be problematic for people who live in apartments and don't have access to a wide supply of charging stations. He said the state will continue to offer subsidies and that he expected battery technology to improve over the next 15 years.

The government's investment will also pay for more electric charging stations and to convert buildings to electric heating, he said.

Legault said Quebec's previous target -- reducing greenhouse gases by 20 per cent over 1990s levels by 2020 -- has been missed. Data from 2015 to 2017 indicated emissions were increasing -- a sign Quebec is "going in the wrong direction," the premier said.

Legault blamed that failure on previous governments. "For the first time in Quebec," he said, "we have a plan that is costed, both in terms of costs and impact in terms of greenhouse gas reduction."

The Opposition quickly seized on the fact the government's plan meets fewer than half the state's climate goals, calling Monday's announcement "neither realistic nor ambitious."

"Hard to agree when only 42 per cent of the path forward is known," Liberal climate change critic, Carlos Leitao, wrote on Twitter. He also denounced what he said was as a lack of commitment to ensuring Quebec is carbon-neutral by 2050.

Quebec Solidaire, the second opposition party, said the government isn't doing enough to discourage private vehicle use. The party said the state should tax the owners of SUVs to encourage them to buy cars that are smaller and pollute less.

Legault replied that he preferred incentives to punishment, while Charette said Quebec's territory is large and people outside big cities rely on larger vehicles to move around on tough terrain.

Despite it being panned by the opposition, the plan received positive reviews from a group representing business leaders in the province. The Conseil du patronat du Quebec said in a statement the government's plan is "ambitious" and presents "new economic opportunities tied to sustainable development."

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov 16, 2020.

Morgan Lowrie, The Canadian Press

How close are we to a COVID-19 vaccine? 

What results from Moderna, Pfizer mean

  

© Dado Ruvic/Reuters 

Both Moderna and Pfizer have announced that preliminary results from their Phase 3 clinical trials ow tshheir vaccines are more than 90 per cent effective in protecting against the coronavirus infection.

Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech both announced in November that their vaccine candidates against the novel coronavirus have shown promising preliminary results in Phase 3 clinical trials. The two vaccines are among several that have been preordered by the Canadian government. So how close are we to getting the vaccine? What needs to happen first? And what kind of vaccine is this anyway? Here are some answers.

Moderna announced on Nov. 16 that preliminary data from its ongoing Phase 3 clinical trial shows the vaccine is 94.5 per cent effective at preventing COVID-19 caused by the coronavirus.

Similarly, Pfizer had said on Nov. 9 that interim analysis of data from its Phase 3 clinical trial, which is also still ongoing, suggests its vaccine may be 90 per cent effective at preventing COVID-19.

The analyses were both conducted by an independent data monitoring board. Pfizer's looked at 94 infections, and Moderna's looked at 95 infections recorded so far during the trial to see which occurred among those who received the real shot versus those who received a dummy shot or placebo. With both vaccines, each participant gets two injections.

Moderna said of the 95 infections, all but five were in participants who got the placebo. In addition, all 11 severe cases of COVID-19 were among those who had received the placebo. Pfizer did not say how many infections occurred in each group, but a 90 per cent effectiveness would imply that no more than eight of the infections were in the group that received the vaccine, Reuters reported, assuming equal numbers of volunteers in the group that received the vaccine and the group that received the placebo.

The results are preliminary, and the initial protection rate might change by the time the study ends, both companies cautioned.

Moderna's analysis looked for cases starting two weeks after the second dose of the vaccine. The Pfizer analysis so far looked for cases of COVID-19 seven days after the second dose. Pfizer has now said it will also look for cases 14 days after the second dose.

If the shots wear off quickly, the infection rate could go up among those who received them.

Neither company has said how many of the infections so far occurred in older people, who are at highest risk from the disease. (Vaccines are often less effective in older populations, which is why there are higher-dose flu and shingles vaccines for seniors.)

Participants were tested only if they developed symptoms. That means it's possible that some vaccinated participants could still have become asymptomatic carriers and were still able to unknowingly spread the virus.

Many people with COVID-19 have very mild symptoms, and it's not yet clear whether the vaccines prevent severe disease or prevent transmission of the virus from an infected individual to someone who isn't.

The final data has not been analyzed, peer reviewed or published for either study. Moderna and Pfizer say they will submit the data to a scientific peer-review publication once they're complete.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has said a vaccine must be at least 50 per cent effective to be approved, ideally for preventing the disease but possibly for only preventing severe disease.

The World Health Organization recommends that, at minimum, it wants a clear demonstration that the vaccine is effective at least 50 per cent of the time in preventing the disease, preventing severe disease or preventing shedding or transmission. However, it says it prefers vaccines to have at least 70 per cent efficacy across the whole population, with consistent results in the elderly.

WHO also said the vaccine must confer protection for at least six months and ideally at least one year.

This were Phase 3 clinical trials, the final human trial step before regulatory approval. While Phase 1 and Phase 2 studies are focused mainly on safety, dosing and lab indicators of an immune response, Phase 3 trials answer a key question: are those who get the vaccine protected from the disease compared to those who get a placebo? It could also reveal rarer side effects that aren't observed in smaller Phase 1 and 2 trials.

Both trials started on July 27. So far, Pfizer's study has enrolled more than 43,000 people in the United States, Argentina, Brazil, Germany, South Africa and Turkey. Moderna's study has enrolled 30,000 in the U.S. In both studies, each person gets two shots, 28 days apart. Some get the real vaccine candidate, while the others get a placebo.

The Phase 3 trials will end when:
At least half the participants have been tracked for side effects for at least two months.
Pfizer records 164 infections and Moderna records 151. That means Pfizer has 70 left to go, and Moderna has 56.

Pfizer said it will reach its tracking milestone later this month.

© CBC

Infectious disease experts say the results are promising.

"It looks as if both these vaccines are going to work, and very likely both these vaccines are going to be rolling out early 2021," Dr. Christopher Labos, a Montreal-based epidemiologist, told CBC News Network after Moderna's announcement.

Dr. Bruce Aylward, WHO's senior adviser, said following the Pfizer announcement that the vaccine could "fundamentally change the direction of this crisis" by March, when the UN agency hopes to start vaccinating high-risk groups.

Vaccines won't be available immediately for the general public in Canada.

Dr. Caroline Quach, a paediatric infectious disease physician and medical microbiologist at Sainte-Justine Hospital in Montreal, cautioned we're not "out of the woods" yet, and everyone still needs to practise safety measures, such as handwashing, staying home when sick, physical distancing and wearing non-medical masks.

That's because independent experts haven't yet seen the full data to determine if the clinical trial participants who received the vaccine and placebo were similar enough to draw conclusions.

Experts also caution that the roll out of the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccine to the general public will be slow, and logistical hurdles remain, such as the extremely cold temperature requirements for its genetic component. Moderna has said its vaccine is stable at fridge temperatures for a month and regular freezer temperatures are cold enough for long-term storage.

Both Moderna's and Pfizer's candidates are messenger RNA vaccines. Pfizer's is officially called BNT162b2 and Moderna's is known as mRNA-1273.

The vaccines consist of genetic instructions on how to make the modified spike protein from SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. The genes are encoded in mRNA and packaged in lipid nanoparticles. Once the vaccine is injected into the body, human cells use the instructions to make copies of the spike protein for the immune system to learn to recognize.

Pfizer's technology includes Vancouver-based Acuitas Therapeutics's lipid nanoparticles to deliver the mRNA after it's injected into our cells.

Two other mRNA vaccines, are in Phase 2.

Canada also has a homegrown mRNA vaccine candidate that is currently in preclinical evaluation from Toronto-based Providence Therapeutics.© CBC

This type of vaccine does not contain any virus or viral proteins, which means it can't cause a real infection and is considered safer.

It is also relatively quick to manufacture.

Alan Bernstein, a trained virologist and president and CEO of non-profit CIFAR, a Canadian-based global research organization that brings together top researchers to address important questions, called the Pfizer announcement "great results for humanity."

"There's never been a vaccine made from RNA, so this is opening up a whole new world of making vaccines if this result holds up," said Bernstein, who previously led a major HIV vaccine effort.

However, the mRNA vaccine is a novel technology, and no vaccines of this type have been approved for widespread human use.

One disadvantage of mRNA is that it's not very stable. That means it needs to be stored at very cold temperatures. BioNTech's CEO says the vaccine needs to be kept at -70 C for longer-term storage, although the company says it can survive five days in a refrigerator.

That may make it logistically difficult to distribute, especially in less developed countries.

Moderna says its vaccine can survive a month in the fridge and can be stored for months at regular freezer temperatures of -20 C.

WHO recommends that vaccines have a shelf life of at least two weeks in the fridge and at least six to 12 months at temperatures as low as -70 C. However, in the long-term, it says vaccines should be able to be stored at -20 C.

Canada announced on Aug. 5 that it had preordered both the Moderna and the Pfizer/BioNTech vaccines. It later specified that it had reserved 20 million doses of each, with the option to purchase more. In the case of the Moderna vaccine, the agreement specifies that the federal government has the option to purchase another 36 million doses. Because two doses are required, Canada would initially have enough to vaccinate 10 million people with each vaccine if they are approved. Both companies said the vaccines would be delivered in 2021.

Pfizer/BioNTech say they can produce up to 50 million vaccine doses in 2020 and up to 1.3 billion doses in 2021.

Besides Canada, they have already received preorders from other countries.

For the Pfizer vaccine, the U.S. has preordered the first 100 million doses, with option to add another 500 million. Pfizer and BioNTech say they can deliver 50 million of those doses by year end. The United Kingdom has ordered 30 million. The companies also have a proposed agreement with the European Union for 200 million doses.

Moderna expects to have about 20 million doses, earmarked for the U.S. by the end of 2020. The U.S. has ordered a total of 100 million doses, with the option to acquire more. Moderna has also signed deals with Israel and Switzerland.

Both Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech plan to ask the U.S. Food and Drug Administration for emergency use authorization of their vaccines once the trials are complete and the safety data analyzed.

Trump bureaucrat blocking Biden transition team is job hunting
Dave Goldiner 

Time to make sure your Linkedin profile is up to date, Emily!

The obscure political appointee of President Trump who is blocking President-elect Joe Biden from launching his transition is reportedly looking for a new job once the new president takes office.

Emily Murphy, the General Services Administrator, apparently sees the writing on the wall, despite her head-in-the-sand effort to curry favor with Trump by denying the reality of Biden’s win.

ABC News reported Monday that Murphy has privately sent messages to acquaintances enquiring about job opportunities in 2021.

© Susan Walsh 

General Services Administration Administrator Emily Murphy

Needless to say, the little-known bureaucrat will only need a new gig because Biden is going to be taking over the White House in January, the same reality that she is actively seeking to deny at the same time.

Murphy has the formal power to decide — or “ascertain” in bureaucratic language — that the election is done and dusted.

That announcement effectively allows the winning candidate’s team to start talks with career staff at federal agencies and to gain access to internal government information including national security matters and plans to fight the coronavirus.

All of that is on hold because Murphy claims the results are still unclear, a falsehood promoted by Trump and his followers.

A GSA spokesperson denied that Murphy was looking for a job, but acknowledged that officials often consider future opportunities at the end of any presidential term.

Biden won states worth 306 electoral votes to unseat Trump. The Democratic President-elect leads Trump by about 5.6 million votes overall.

Save capitalism, tax boomers, new report suggests SAYS TRUMP'S BANK

National Post Staff 
  

© Provided by National Post

COVID-19 could be the catalyst that forces embittered millennials to overthrow the capitalist order — but policymakers could intervene before that happens, a new report by Deutsche Bank proposes .

Out of the pandemic emerged younger workers who were disproportionately affected by the economic crash because they are more likely to be employed in industries such as retail or hospitality, where working from home was not a possibility. As well, job prospects have dwindled for the newer graduates and they have little in savings.

The authors of the report, strategists Jim Reid and Luke Templeman, predict “sudden and seismic shifts in the established capitalist order” if young workers continue to experience economic inequality.

“In fact, if we do not act now, there is a serious risk that over the coming decade, when the younger generation of voters begins to outnumber the older generation, a populist politician could corral the anger of the young,” the report reads.

In order to address this, Reid and Templeman suggest that rather than taxing all baby boomers, policymakers should look at where baby boomers made their wealth and tax them accordingly.

“We should avoid a simple age-related tax. A blunt instrument makes no sense.”

Baby boomers have been able to grow their wealth with ultra-low interest rates; urbanization that’s inflated property prices; investing in companies that exploit the environment; access to cheaper education decades ago; and their mere population size outpacing younger generations, which allows them to win democratic elections.

To help close the wealth divide, the report suggests several tax policies:

• The first would be a tax on primary residence. It could be done through a capital gains tax, which could be focused on houses exceeding a certain value, to acknowledge the leverage boomers were able to take advantage of decades ago.

• Another area policymakers could focus on is additional taxes on financial assets such as stocks and bonds. This could be key because baby boomers are benefitting from low interest rates as they begin to sell the assets heading into retirement

Remote workers should be taxed for privilege of working at home, says Deutsche

• Reid and Templeman also recommend a “super tax” on stocks to make up for gains that companies made by exploiting the environment. Governments could then in turn reinvest the funds in stemming climate change.

The suggested taxes on capital gains is to avoid higher taxing on income, the two write, as it’s an “invasion on hard work” and there is a risk that work would be disincentivized.

The report also urges policymakers to address disparities in landownership and education.

Cities have to instigate a mass shakeup of existing rules that leave a low supply of homes for a growing population. When it comes to education, higher costs for higher education are outpacing graduate salaries.

If policymakers choose to avoid the wealth gap between baby boomers and the younger generations, it could spell disaster, the report says.

“If we do not enact substantial change now, then a generation of young people will soon take power,” Reid and Templeman write. “When they do, all indications are that they will enact policies that not only forcibly redistribute in blunt ways, but also upend the very foundations of capitalism.”

Terry Glavin: Bob Rae spoke the truth on Myanmar's genocide. Will it be ignored?

We need to acknowledge the world’s surrender in the face of war crimes, and all those 'never-again' promises we don’t even pretend to keep anymore

Author of the article: Terry Glavin Publishing date: Apr 04, 2018 •

Rohingya Muslims gather behind a barbed wire fence in Maungdaw district, Rakhine State, on Myanmar's border with Bangladesh on March 18, 2018. 

PHOTO BY JOE FREEMAN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

It is sober reading, as you might imagine. Released Tuesday under the title “Tell them we’re human: What Canada and the world can do about the Rohingya crisis,” the 12,963-word final report by former Ontario premier and former federal Liberal interim leader Bob Rae, appointed special envoy to Myanmar last October, is a study in surrender.

This is not to say Rae’s assessment of the agonies endured by Myanmar’s brutally persecuted Rohingya Muslim minority is the work of a coward, or an exercise in appeasement, or a capitulation in the face of ongoing atrocities that “bear the hallmarks of genocide,” according to another report, this one tabled only three weeks ago by the United Nations’ own Special Rapporteur on human rights in Myanmar.

Rae is as solid as it gets (I should probably get this out of the way right here: he and I are both senior fellows with the Raoul Wallenberg Centre for Human Rights), and he did not shirk his onerous duty. He travelled throughout the region. He met with survivors and community leaders and humanitarian workers. Rae traversed the convulsing human landscape on Myanmar-Bangladesh borderlands by helicopter. He was permitted to venture, although under guard, deep into Rakhine State, the military terror zone from which more than 670,000 Rohingya Muslims have been ethnically cleansed, by fire, mass rape, terror and murder, since last August.

Bob Rae, Canada’s Special Envoy to Myanmar, releases a report about the humanitarian and security crisis there at a press conference in Ottawa on April 3, 2018. 

PHOTO BY SEAN KILPATRICK/CP

Rae’s report is of the quality, detail and sophistication you would expect from at least a year’s worth of effort by a team of investigators. And yet still, if mostly between the lines, what emerges from his report is the cold and merciless reality of what has transpired in Myanmar over the past few months. It is a reconstruction of the civilized world’s abject surrender in the face of war crimes, crimes against humanity and all the rest of those “never again” promises we don’t even pretend that we mean to keep anymore.

It’s just the way the world is. So we have to make do with the primitive tools that we’ve got, and we can only do so much. “I think we’re living in a world without adult supervision at the moment,” Rae said during an appearance on the CBC’s Power and Politics on Tuesday. “We got into the habit after 1945 of looking to the Americans for leadership, or others, for a long time the British, and so on. Those days are gone … it’s a different world.”

It is in the pitiful context of that different world, then, the miserable, brutish, grasping world of China’s Xi Jinping, and Russia’s Vladimir Putin, and America’s Donald Trump, that Rae crafted a series of innovative, improvised, make-do recommendations. “Our first obligation is to protect lives,” he writes. And we might even be able to save a few. That’s what it’s come to.

Our first obligation is to protect lives

It might be all we can do, and to that end, Rae proposes that Canada should hike its paltry $46-million relief commitment in the region to a mostly humanitarian $150 million a year over the next four years. That outlay should also include the “necessary work on accountability and the gathering of evidence” for possible prosecution of the Myanmar officials culpable for the bloody pogroms and complicit in the brutal expulsion of the Rohingyas from their homelands.

“This evidence has to be collected, and we need to find a way to move forward to bring those responsible for these crimes to justice,” Rae writes, suggesting that the targeting of more individuals for sanctions under the Justice for Victims of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act would be one way to go. Two months ago, following the lead of the U.S. State Department, Canada listed Myanmar’s Major-General Maung Maung Soe under the Act. Which means Soe can’t visit Canada and any assets he might have in Canada are to be frozen.

Another route Rae suggested was a collaborative effort with like-minded countries to encourage the International Criminal Court to consider an investigation. That seems unlikely, though. Myanmar never signed the Rome Statute establishing the court. Then there’s the option of Canada leading an effort to set up a Myanmar version of the International Impartial and Independent mechanism (IIIM) looking into war crimes in Syria. But that’s maybe not the best model.

The smouldering debris of burned houses is seen in the abandoned Muslim village of Warpait, in Rakhine State, in a photo taken on Oct. 14, 2016.

 PHOTO BY YE AUNG THU/AFP/GETTY IMAGES

The UN General Assembly established the Syrian IIIM in December 2016. Mass murders proceed apace. Headed up by former French jurist Catherine Marchi-Uhel, the Syrian IIIM issued a report last Thursday pointing out that it still doesn’t have regular budget funding, Syrian dictator Bashar Assad won’t allow investigators into the country and IIIM researchers can’t keep track of all the war crimes being committed anyway.

Canada should work with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees to process the displaced Rohingyas for resettlement, and Canada should open its arms to Rohingya refugees, Rae proposes. For now, at least, repatriating any Rohingyas from Bangladesh back to Myanmar is out of the question, he concluded. Only three weeks ago, the UN’s assistant secretary-general for human rights, Andrew Gilmour, reported that by resort to a “campaign of terror and starvation,” Myanmar is continuing its ethnic cleansing of the remaining Rohingyas in Rakhine. “The government of Myanmar is busy telling the world that it is ready to receive Rohingya returnees, while at the same time its forces are continuing to drive them into Bangladesh.”

Canada should take the lead in establishing an International Working Group on the Rohingya crisis, Rae urges. Canada could push the Rohingya issue higher on the agenda of the Commonwealth Heads of Government meeting set for April 18 in London. We could also use the opportunity of the G7 presidency, which Canada holds for 2018. There is also the upcoming gathering of the Organization of Islamic Cooperation Council of Foreign Ministers in Dhaka, Bangladesh, next month.

Canada should lead, Rae said. After all, nobody else is.

After Rae turned in his report on Tuesday, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau thanked him warmly. “This report brings much-needed awareness to the grave humanitarian crisis and gross violations of human rights faced by hundreds of thousands of people including Rohingya communities, other religious and ethnic minorities, and women and girls.”

It will be a while before we know how much of Rae’s insights and proposals will get picked up. “Canada is determined to help respond to this crisis,” Trudeau said. “In the coming weeks, we will assess the recommendations in this report and outline further measures we intend to take

COLD WAR 2.0
Am I right?’ Canadians — not Uighurs — a persecuted people, China corrects UN envoy Bob Rae

China was responding to Canada's UN ambassador asking its human rights council to investigate the treatment of the Muslim minority

The Canadian Press
Lee Berthiaume Publishing date: Nov 16, 2020 •  

Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian says Canada better fits the description of a nation perpetrating a genocide. PHOTO BY KYODO NEWS

CHINA'S PIERRE POILIEVRE

 Pierre Poilievre Is One Of The Most Polarizing Figures In Federal Politics

OTTAWA — The Chinese government is firing back at Canada’s ambassador to the United Nations for calling on the UN to investigate whether China’s persecution of ethnic Muslim Uighurs in its Xinjiang province is a genocide.

During a news conference in Beijing Monday, Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian described Bob Rae’s comments as “ridiculous,” adding that Canada itself better fits the description of having perpetrated a genocide.

Rae told the CBC on Sunday that he has asked the UN Human Rights Council to investigate China’s treatment of the country’s Uighurs in Xinjiang.

Last month a Canadian parliamentary subcommittee concluded in a report that China’s treatment of the Uighurs is a genocide. China rejected that report as baseless.

China has been accused of using forced birth control to limit Uighur births, and detention camps to indoctrinate the mostly-Muslim minority into mainstream Chinese society. Beijing has denied any wrongdoing, saying it is running a voluntary employment and language-training program.

Zhao on Monday used a number of select statistics that suggest China’s Uighur population is growing at a faster rate than Canada’s population to mock Rae’s suggestions that the Uighurs are being persecuted.

Bob Rae attends a press conference regarding his appointment as the next ambassador to the United Nations, on Parliament Hill in Ottawa on July 6. 

PHOTO BY SEAN KILPATRICK/THE CANADIAN PRESS

“I would like to ask this ambassador, if his logic is plausible in finding out who best fits the label of genocide, it seems that it is not the Uighurs who are persecuted, but rather the people of Canada, am I right?” Zhao said.

However, Zhao’s statistics appear to have been incomplete or inaccurate and did not address a report by The Associated Press in June that birthrates have been dramatically cut in Uighur-dominated areas of Xinjiang.

Rae told the CBC on Sunday that “there’s no question that there’s aspects of what the Chinese are doing that fits into the definition of genocide in the genocide convention.”

Yet even as he levelled the allegation, he said an investigation needs to be conducted to gather the required evidence.

In response, Zhao questioned how Rae “reached his conclusion without any evidence?”

Relations between Canada and China are at an all-time low not only because of Beijing’s treatment of its Uighurs, but also due to its continued detention of two Canadian citizens in retaliation for the arrest of Huawei executive Meng Wanzhou.

 WHICH WAS AT THE DIRECTION OF THE USA BASED ON ITS ILLEGAL SANCTIONS ON IRAN WHICH THEY CLAIM HUAWEI VIOLATED

Canada has also joined Western allies in condemning Beijing’s recent actions in Hong Kong, where the Communist regime has been accused of violating international agreements by cracking down on democracy in the former British colony.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 16, 2020.