Cerrejón mineworkers hold firm: show your support

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7 October, 2020Workers at the Cerrejón coal mine in Colombia are five weeks into a bitter strike against the imposition of a brutal new shift system. They need your support.


Members of IndustriALL affiliate Sintracarbón are in the fifth week of a strike at the Cerrejón coal mine in Colombia.
Union president Igor Diaz gives a strike update in a radio interview on Monday

When the Covid-19 restrictions began, collective bargaining negotiations were suspended. When they resumed this summer, Cerrejón unilaterally announced a radical change to the shift system, without consulting the union and in violation of Colombian law. The new shift roster, which workers call the 'death shift', will lead to the loss of 2,500 direct and indirect jobs, and require workers to work an additional 72 days a year for the same wage.

Sintracarbón members voted for strike action to resist this assault on their terms and conditions. The Colombian labour ministry offered facilitation to end the strike, but Cerrejón boycotted the process. The mine is jointly owned by three multinational mining companies, AngloAmerican, BHP and Glencore, who have refused to intervene. IndustriALL has written to the companies more than once to demand they take responsibility for the crisis.

IndustriALL has also written to Cerrejón’s customers - major energy companies in Europe and Turkey, including Vattenfall and Engie – asking them to conduct due diligence over Cerrejón’s violations of workers’ rights. In addition, IndustriALL is contacting institutional investors in the three mining multinationals, including pension funds, to make them aware of the situation.

Sintracarbón workers need your support. 

Please sign the LabourStart petition and tell the company to return to the negotiating table.

http://www.industriall-union.org/cerrejon-mineworkers-hold-firm-show-your-support

Once again, a company has taken advantage of the Covid-19 pandemic to attack workers' rights. This time, it's coal miners in Colombia who have had to go on strike. Workers at the Cerrejón coal mine are in the middle of bitter dispute with three multinational mining companies, Anglo American, BHP and Glencore.   When the pandemic broke out back in February the union, in good faith, withdrew its list of demands and suspended collective bargaining negotiations. When negotiations resumed in July, the company refused to respond to the union proposals, and instead demanded concessions in rights and benefits. Then the company unilaterally announced a radical shift change roster, without consulting the union and in violation of Colombian law. The new shift roster, which workers call the 'death shift' will lead to the loss of 2,500 direct and indirect jobs, will require workers to work an additional 72 days a year for the same wage, will cause turmoil in workers' family lives and will lead to an increase in fatigue and thus an increase in accidents. The company has boycotted the government labour ministry’s facilitation to end the strike, now in its fourth week. The union in Colombia and IndustriALL global union have a launched an online campaign on LabourStart in support of the miners.  Please take a moment to show your support - click here.  And please don't forget our campaign in support of miners in Ukraine, who have taken their fight for justice underground - into the mines.  Learn more and show your support here.

Nitrogen fertilizers are jeopardizing climate goals, new study finds

BY AFS STAFF

OCTOBER 9, 2020

The expanding use of nitrogen fertilizers in agriculture is pushing nitrous oxide emissions to levels that jeopardize climate goals and the objectives of the Paris Agreement, according a new study published in Nature.

Nitrous oxide — a greenhouse gas 300 times more potent than carbon dioxide — remains in the atmosphere longer than a human lifetime. Its use has risen 20 percent from pre-industrial levels and accelerated in recent decades, with alarming implications for climate change, researchers found.

“The dominant driver of the increase in atmospheric nitrous oxide comes from agriculture, and the growing demand for food and feed for animals will further increase global nitrous oxide emissions,” explains study lead author Hanqin Tian, director of the International Center for Climate and Global Change Research at Auburn University in Alabama. “There is a conflict between the way we are feeding people and stabilizing the climate.”

The study, which aimed to produce the most comprehensive assessment to date of all sources and sinks of the potent greenhouse gas, was undertaken by an international consortium of 57 scientists from 14 countries and 48 research institutions, with the International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) in a key role. It was led by Auburn University under the umbrella of the Global Carbon Project and the International Nitrogen Initiative.

The study also determined that the largest contributors to global nitrous oxide emissions come from East Asia, South Asia, Africa and South America. Emissions from synthetic fertilizers dominate releases in China, India and the United States, while emissions from the application of livestock manure as fertilizer dominate releases in Africa and South America, the study found. The highest growth rates in emissions are found in emerging economies, particularly Brazil, China and India, where crop production and livestock numbers have increased.

The most surprising result of the study was the discovery that current trends in nitrous oxide emissions are not compatible with pathways consistent to achieve the climate goals of the Paris Agreement.

“Current emissions are tracking global temperature increases above 3°C — twice the temperature target of the Paris Agreement,” said study co-author Robert Jackson, a Stanford University professor and chair of the Global Carbon Project.

However, opportunities to reduce nitrous oxide emissions do exist, according to study co-author Wilfried Winiwarter, a senior research scholar in IIASA’s Air Quality and Greenhouse Gases program and former director of the International Nitrogen Initiative’s European center.

“Europe is the only region in the world that has successfully reduced nitrous oxide emissions over the past two decades,” Winiwarter says. “Industrial and agricultural policies to reduce greenhouse gases and air pollution and to optimize fertilizer use efficiencies have proven to be effective. Still, further efforts will be required, in Europe as well as globally.”

“This study shows that we now have a comprehensive understanding of the nitrous oxide budget, including climate impacts,” adds study co-lead Rona Thompson, a senior scientist from the Norwegian Institute for Air Research. “We are able to assess and quantify measures to reduce nitrous oxide emissions, and many of these measures will also improve water and air quality, benefiting both human health and ecosystems.”

Study co-leader Josep “Pep” Canadell, chief scientist in the Climate Science Center at the Australia-based Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization and executive director of the Global Carbon Project, agrees that the research is significant and urgent.

“This new analysis calls for a full-scale rethink in the ways we use and abuse nitrogen fertilizers globally and urges us to adopt more sustainable practices in the way we produce food, including the reduction of food waste,” he notes. “These findings underscore the urgency and opportunities to mitigate nitrous oxide emissions worldwide to avoid the worst of climate impacts.”

Image: Shutterstock/Singkham

CANADA
NDP Leader Singh calls for Second World War-style excess profits tax to pay for pandemic spending

BILL CURRY
OTTAWA OCTOBER 8, 2020

NDP leader Jagmeet Singh responds to a reporters question during a news conference on Parliament Hill Thursday in Ottawa.
ADRIAN WYLD/THE CANADIAN PRESS

NDP Leader Jagmeet Singh is calling for an excess profits tax to help pay for emergency pandemic spending, drawing inspiration from temporary tax measures imposed by Canada and the U.S. during the First and Second World Wars to address profiteering concerns.

At a news conference on Parliament Hill, Mr. Singh repeated his calls for a wealth tax and tougher enforcement of offshore tax evasion while also adding the new proposal to his party’s wish list of tax measures.

Mr. Singh said that while many businesses are suffering during the pandemic, he pointed to companies such as Amazon.com Inc. and large grocery chains as examples of firms that are enjoying “massive” profits because of shifting consumer trends. He said corporate profits that are above prepandemic averages should be subject to at least double the current corporate tax rate.

“It should not be everyday people that pay the price for the cost of this pandemic or the cost of the recovery," he said. “Those at the very top who have enjoyed massive profits should certainly pay their fair share.”

Mr. Singh later asked Prime Minister Justin Trudeau in Question Period on Thursday whether he would support the idea. Mr. Trudeau did not directly address the question, but said the government has already raised taxes on the top 1 per cent of income earners.


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Katherine Cuplinskas, press secretary to Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland, also did not directly address the NDP proposal, but said in an e-mail that the government pledged in last month’s Throne Speech to “identify additional ways to tax extreme wealth inequality," including by limiting the stock option deduction for wealthy individuals at large, established corporations and "addressing corporate tax avoidance by digital giants.”

The NDP is in a position of influence on Parliament Hill as the only opposition party to vote with the minority Liberal government on a confidence vote this week. The Liberals secured the NDP’s support in exchange for adopting NDP policy proposals in areas such as sick leave and increasing income support benefits. In addition to the new call for a tax on excess profits, Mr. Singh also repeated his party’s earlier requests for a 1-per-cent wealth tax on family wealth over $20-million and increased taxes on “web giants” such as Amazon, Google and Facebook.

Some economists in Canada and the United States have recently called for an excess profit tax to cover the cost of high levels of emergency government spending during the pandemic. Both countries imposed temporary excess profit taxes during the First and Second World Wars.

Allison Christians, the H. Heward Stikeman Chair in Tax Law at Montreal’s McGill University, who has researched excess profit taxes, said such a temporary tax would make “great sense” in the current environment. However, she cautioned that the continuing uncertainty regarding how countries tax multinational corporations complicates the issue. She said such a tax could be more easily applied to Canadian companies.

“It’s not a punishment of their success. Rather, it’s an acknowledgement that the brokenness of the market has created a windfall for them,” she said in an interview. “And if the government takes some of that, especially now to pay for things that we now really are struggling to pay for, for example, health care, then that’s good over all for the economy.”

Prof. Christians said her review of Canada’s excess profit tax during the Second World War left her with the impression that it raised some revenue, but not a lot, and that it didn’t harm the economy.

Scott Hodge, president of the Washington-based nonpartisan Tax Foundation, wrote in July that modern advocates of excess profit taxes tend to have an “idealized” view of how they worked in wartime. He noted that the foundation’s research at the time found that such taxes were difficult to administer “and certainly impacted economic growth.”

The NDP made its call on the same day that the Parliamentary Budget Officer released a report indicating that increased spending on business tax enforcement by the Canada Revenue Agency is generating billions in new tax revenue and a nearly sixfold return.

Thursday’s PBO report examined the effect of $1.9-billion in additional funding that has been provided to the CRA over an eight-year period starting in 2015-16. The government has said the funding is aimed at the underground economy and preventing tax evasion and aggressive tax planning, and that it expects it will generate $13-billion in increased revenue.

The PBO doesn’t confirm that figure, but says it appears the government is generating about $5.70 for every new dollar spent on business tax compliance. It projects that ratio will decline over time, which suggests the government may fall short of the $13-billion target. It also notes that Ottawa will likely only collect about 81 per cent of the identified revenue because of appeals and other challenges in collecting taxes owed.

Mr. Singh said the PBO’s findings support his call for increased tax enforcement as a way of addressing concerns over the federal deficit, which the PBO said last month could reach $328.5-billion this fiscal year.

Dan Kelly, president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, said tax proposals from the NDP need to be taken seriously given the party’s current position of influence in Parliament. He said “excess profits” is hardly a concern for most small businesses this year.

He cautioned though that the government should be careful in imposing any new tax-enforcement measures on businesses during a period in which many are struggling to keep the doors open while managing the new paperwork burden created by various support programs.

“To enable the CRA to go after tax cheats, they have to create a whole bunch of paperwork for thousands who aren’t," he said. “And right now, this would be a real poor use of time for small-business owners to be facing giant audits."

Kyrgyzstan’s President declares state of emergency, orders troops to deploy amid unrest



OLGA DZYUBENKO
BISHKEK
REUTERS
PUBLISHED OCTOBER 9, 2020



People rally to demand the impeachment of Kyrgyz President Sooronbai Jeenbekov, at Bishkek's Ala-Too Square, on Oct. 7, 2020.
VYACHESLAV OSELEDKO/AFP/GETTY IMAGS

Kyrgyz President Sooronbai Jeenbekov declared a state of emergency in the capital Bishkek on Friday and ordered the military to end days of unrest, as supporters of rival political groups fought on the streets.

A Reuters journalist in the capital heard gunshots and saw demonstrators from rival groups throwing rocks and bottles at each other and scuffling. One opposition politician was reported to have been wounded.

Jeenbekov’s office said in a statement the state of emergency, including a curfew and tight security restrictions, would be in effect from 8 p.m. on Friday until 8 a.m. on Oct. 21.

His order did not say how many troops would be deployed but they were instructed to “take the situation under control” and use military vehicles, set up checkpoints, and prevent armed clashes.

Earlier the president had said he was ready to resign once a new cabinet was appointed.

Kyrgyzstan's President Sooronbai Jeenbekov said on Friday he was ready to resign once a new cabinet was appointed to end the power vacuum in the Central Asian nation gripped by unrest since opposition supporters seized government buildings on Tuesday.REUTERS

The country has seen a power vacuum, with opposition groups quarrelling among themselves since seizing government buildings and forcing the cancellation of results from Sunday’s parliamentary election which they denounced as fraudulent.

Two leading opposition figures reached an agreement to join forces on Friday, and won the backing of Jeenbekov’s predecessor as president, Almazbek Atambayev. But their followers and followers of other groups held rival rallies, which politicians said posed a danger of violence.

Russia has described the situation in Kyrgyzstan, which borders China and hosts a Russian military base, as “a mess and chaos.”

The crisis tests the Kremlin’s power to shape politics in its former Soviet sphere of influence, at a time when fighting has erupted between Armenia and Azerbaijan, and Belarus is also engulfed in protests.

The opposition is divided between 11 parties which represent clan interests in a country that has already seen two presidents toppled by popular revolts since 2005.

Rival candidates for the premiership Omurbek Babanov and Tilek Toktogaziyev joined forces on Friday, with Toktogaziyev agreeing to serve as Babanov’s deputy. They were backed by four parties, local news website 24.kz reported.

They were joined at a rally in Bishkek by the former president Atambayev. A few thousand followers chanted “I am not afraid” and “Kyrgyzstan” to the rhythmic beating of large drums.

Followers of another candidate, Sadyr Zhaparov, also numbering a few thousand, held a demonstration nearby. Some of Zhaparov’s supporters later rushed into the square, leading to scuffles between the rival groups until the Babanov and Toktogaziyev supporters withdrew.

A video posted by several Kyrgyz media showed an apparently unconscious Toktogaziyev being taken away from the square, with people around him screaming he was wounded and taking off his coat to revel a bulletproof vest.

Separately, an aide to Atambayev said a shot had been fired at his car which did not wound anyone.

Jeenbekov’s allies swept Sunday’s parliamentary vote in the official results that have now been discarded. They have kept a low profile as the opposition parties have taken to the streets. Western observers said the election was marred by credible allegations of vote-buying.

So far, veteran officials who supported the revolt have been in control of the security forces. On Friday, self-appointed provisional heads of the interior ministry and the state security service left their respective buildings and handed over the leadership to their deputies. The two state bodies said the move was meant to ensure security forces remained apolitical.

VIDEO https://www.theglobeandmail.com/world/article-kyrgyzstans-president-declares-state-of-emergency-orders-troops-to/

Spain: Portraits of King Felipe VI burned as thousands protest his Barcelona visit

By Euronews with AP • last updated: 09/10/2020 

Activists of Catalonia's pro-independence grassroots group, ANC, burn a portrait of Spain's King Felipe VI during a demonstration in Barcelona on Friday, October 9, 2020. - Copyright Emilio Morenatti/Associated Press

Several thousand Catalan separatists REPUBLICANS protested the visit of Spanish King Felipe VI and Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez to Barcelona amid continued tensions between the restive region and national authorities.

Several thousand Catalan separatists protested the visit of Spanish King Felipe VI and Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez to Barcelona amid continued tensions between the restive region and national authorities.

Crowds gathered as activists of the pro-independence grassroots group Catalan National Assembly (ANC) set fire to a portrait of the Spanish monarch during a demonstration in the centre of the city.

Police set up roadblocks and heavily patrolled the streets around the train station where the king and prime minister attended the Barcelona New Economy Week innovation awards on Friday.

Representatives of the Catalan government and the city's mayor Ada Colau did not attend.

The visit by Spain’s heads of state and government comes less than two weeks after Catalonia’s regional chief, Quim Torra, was removed from office by Spain’s Supreme Court.

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The court ruled him unfit to hold office for having violated election laws when he refused to remove a banner from public buildings supporting imprisoned Catalan separatists during an official election campaign.

As well as a €30,000 fine, the panel of judges on the court upheld a one-and-a-half-year ban on Torra holding public office imposed by a Barcelona court in December 2019.

Some small groups of protesters gathered to burn photos of the king on Thursday night, chanting "Catalonia has no king."

But there were no reported major clashes with police like the ones that occurred when Sánchez held a Cabinet meeting in Barcelona in December 2018.

Effigies of the king were burned in a show of defiance on Catalonia's National Day - known as La Diada - on September 11, just weeks before the Supreme Court's ruling on Torra's case.

Over 50,000 protesters turned out for the annual celebrations which usually attracts large numbers but were muted by the region's response to the coronavirus pandemic.

Catalonia’s separatist movement, which is supported by roughly half the 7.5 million residents in the region, wants to create a republic in the wealthy northeast corner of Spain.

The region's political system is in paralysis in the wake of Torra's ban. Snap elections have been tentatively pencilled in for February 14, 2021, if regional lawmakers can't elect a candidate to replace the ousted president.

The competing pro-independence parties in Catalonia’s ruling coalition are refusing to put forward a joint candidate to replace Torra as a way to protest their leader’s removal, while parties opposing secession lack a majority to elect a successor.

UPDATED

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Berlin police clear anarchist-occupied house Liebig 34

FORMER EAST GERMANY

Police in Berlin met with resistance while trying to clear left-wing activists from an occupied house and cultural center following a court order. People living in the building have called the eviction illegal.



Police have launched an operation to clear the Liebig 34 house in Berlin, which had been occupied by a group of left-wing radicals.

Hundreds of protesters gathered early Friday morning in the Friedrichshain neighborhood as police began enforcing the eviction order. Fights broke out between black-clad demonstrators and the police in front of the building, as recorded and tweeted by a reporter from the daily Die Welt.

Police drove a van up to the building's entrance and several officers tried to break through the barricaded door.

Around 1,500 officers from eight different German states took part in the evictions, including specialist units. The police were acting on behalf of a court order to return the property to its owners.

Read more: Extinction Rebellion blocks German parliament

'A long history' of clashes between police, activists

DW reporter Emmanuelle Chaze was on the scene as protesters and police gathered outside the building. She tweeted a video showing the hundreds of people who had come to "defend a building occupied by anarcho-queer-feminists that police has planned to evacuate this morning," adding that "antifas & police have a long history of stand offs in this Berlin suburb."

The mostly young people defending the occupied corner house shouted slogans in support of the occupants and against the police — "houses for those who live in them," "all of Berlin hates the police."

Read more: Climate activists occupy coal mine, power plants

According to police accounts, glass projectiles and fireworks were thrown at officers within the closed-off zone. Throughout the night protesters allegedly burned tires, garbage dumpsters and set fire to the Tiergarten metro station building.

The occupants of Liebig34 claimed that their lawyer was prohibited by police from entering the house or talking with the bailiff, as such the "eviction is still illegal."
Feminist refuge, symbol of resistance

Liebig 34 describes itself as an "anarcha-queer-feminist" housing project and one of the last remaining symbols of the leftist scene in the German capital. The leftist bar Syndikat was cleared in August despite large protests in the city.

Police were on hand early ahead of the scheduled eviction

The Liebig 34 building, which is covered in flags and leftist graffiti, has offered a place of refuge for women, trans and intersex people since 1999. An autonomously run bar and cultural center allowed the occupants to raise funds to cover rent.

Read more: Berlin gentrification debate flares over Norwegian billionaire's investment

The owner of the property, Gijora Padovicz, refused to renew the group's 10-year rental contract in 2018 and began a court process to evict the inhabitants. Padovicz owns several hundred homes in Berlin and has been accused of allowing his properties to deteriorate in order to renovate them and increase rents, according to the Agence France-Presse news agency.

William Noah Glucroft, a DW reporter, tweeted pictures showing how East Berlin has changed over the past few years. He said that gentrification is "(partly) what Liebig34 is about."

ab/sms (AFP, dpa)
Date 09.10.2020
Permalink https://p.dw.com/p/3jf3W



Police clear out famous Berlin squat Liebig 34

By Euronews with AP, AFP • last updated: 09/10/2020 - 

During the eviction, police officers use a turntable ladder to enter through a window of "Liebig 34". - Copyright Christophe Gateau/dpa via AP


Police in riot gear have cleared out the notorious Liebig 34 squat in Berlin.

They entered the building after residents refused to open the door for a court employee to deliver their eviction notice.

Inhabitants say they have grown angry with soaring rents in the German capital.

Police spokesman Thilo Cablitz said 1,500 officers were called to assist in the eviction. Authorities said they only encountered passive resistance from residents as they carried people individually down a firetruck ladder.

"They are becoming homeless," Moritz Heusinger, the lawyer for the Liebig34 collective, told AFP news agency.

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"It goes against human rights to throw people out onto the street in the middle of a pandemic when they cannot pay their rent."


Some of the tenants pumped their fists in the air as they were led out from an upper level by police, while others forced police to carry them out.

An armoured car was also stationed in front of the graffiti-covered building, as police kept onlookers at a wide distance.

The so-called "Liebig 34" squat is located in Berlin's Friedrichshain neighbourhood.Paul Zinken/dpa via AP

A number of supporters of the residents threw firecrackers and bottles at the police, but Cablitz reported that other protests had been peaceful.

The famous squat is named after its address, Liebigstrasse 34, in Berlin's eastern Friedrichshain neighbourhood, and was a symbol for the left-wing scene, housing around forty women, trans and intersex people since 1999.

The building has been partially occupied for 30 years and has been subject to numerous court battles before the residents were finally ordered out of the apartments.

German police had prepared themselves for clashes, which broke out during stormy eviction attempts in the 1990s.

After the fall of the Berlin Wall, blocks of abandoned houses in the east of the capital were taken over by students, artists, and activists, with occupations later legalised.

Face masks far more protective against COVID-19 than face shields, CDC experts

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By Sally Robertson, B.Sc. Oct 8 2020

Researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) have conducted a study showing that face masks and neck gaiters appear to be much more effective than face shields at reducing the expulsion of respiratory aerosols that could potentially transmit severe acute respiratory syndrome 2 (SARS-CoV-2).

Study: Efficacy of face masks, neck gaiters and face shields for reducing the expulsion of simulated cough-generated aerosols. Image Credit: DimaBerlin / Shutterstock

SARS-CoV-2 is the agent responsible for the current coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic that continues to pose an ongoing threat to global public health and the economy.

Using a cough aerosol simulator to expel small aerosol particles into different face coverings, the team found that the N95 respirator, procedure mask, cloth mask, and neck gaiters effectively reduced the emission of the aerosols, while the face shield was not.


“Our results suggest that face masks and neck gaiters are preferable to face shields as source control devices for cough aerosols,” writes William Lindsley and colleagues.

A pre-print version of the paper is available in the server medRxiv*, while the article undergoes peer review.

Cough aerosol simulator system for source control measurements. The system consists of an aerosol generation system, a bellows and linear motor to produce the simulated cough, a pliable skin head form on which the face mask, neck gaiter or face shield is placed, a 105 liter collection chamber into which the aerosol is coughed, and an Andersen impactor to separate the aerosol particles by size and collect them.
Community transmission can occur through infected aerosol droplets

SARS-CoV-2 can be transmitted from person to person via large respiratory aerosols (diameter greater than around 10µm) that are produced when an infected person coughs, sneezes, breathes, talks, or sings.

However, smaller aerosols are also emitted during these activities, suggesting that short-range airborne virus transmission might also be possible.

To protect against this potential route of community transmission, various public health bodies, including the CDC and the World Health Organization (WHO) have recommended that the general public wear face masks or other face coverings as source control devices.


“Source control devices are intended to protect other people from infectious aerosols emitted by the wearer, as compared with personal protective equipment such as N95 respirators which are primarily intended to protect the wearer,” explains the team.

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However, people often dislike wearing face masks, and compliance levels can be low and inconsistent, say the researchers.

People may repeatedly remove and replace the mask and keep adjusting it, which can contaminate the hands. This potentially leads to the transmission of the virus, particularly in cases where the masks are re-used.
Face shields were proposed as an alternative

In an opinion article in the Journal of the American Medical Association, researchers suggested that face shields may be more effective at reducing community transmission because they are more comfortable and, therefore, more likely to be widely adopted by the public.

However, few studies have examined face shields as source control devices, and quantitative data on efficacy is lacking.
What did the current study involve?

Now, Lindsley and colleagues have used a cough aerosol simulator to eject a cloud that simulates small respiratory aerosols (0 to 7µm in diameter) into different types of face coverings and assessed the quantity of particles that were able to travel through and around each device.

The researchers tested the collection efficiencies (the fraction of the aerosols blocked by the device) of an N95 respirator, a medical procedure mask, a commercial 3-ply cloth face mask, a polyester neck gaiter, and a commercial disposable face shield.

Neck gaiters are worn either as a single layer of fabric or as a folded, two-layer fabric. For the experiments carried out in this study, the researchers tested both configurations.
Face masks and gaiters were much more effective than the face shield

On average, the N95 respirator stopped 99% of the total cough aerosol being expelled into the environment, while the procedure mask blocked 59%, and the cloth face mask blocked 51%.

The neck gaiter blocked 47% of the cough aerosol when it was worn as a single layer and 60% when it was worn as a double layer.

The face shield, on the other hand, only stopped 2% of the cough aerosol being expelled into the atmosphere.

There were no significant differences in the collection efficiencies of the procedure mask, cloth mask, and neck gaiter, but all of these devices were significantly more effective than the face shield.


“Our results suggest that face coverings are more effective than face shields as source control devices to reduce the expulsion of respiratory aerosols into the environment as a public health measure to reduce the community transmission of SARS-CoV-2,” concludes the team.

*Important Notice

medRxiv publishes preliminary scientific reports that are not peer-reviewed and, therefore, should not be regarded as conclusive, guide clinical practice/health-related behavior, or treated as established information.
Journal reference:

Lindsley W, et al. Efficacy of face masks, neck gaiters and face shields for reducing the expulsion of simulated cough-generated aerosols. medRxiv, 2020. doi: https://doi.org/10.1101/2020.10.05.20207241

Health inequities can be measured in children as young as 5 years old, shows study

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Reviewed by Emily Henderson, B.Sc.Oct 9 2020

In a nationwide study, UCLA researchers have found that health inequities can be measured in children as young as 5 years old. The research, published in Health Affairs, contributes to a growing body of literature finding that children of color who are also poor face greater health inequities than their white counterparts.

Researchers trained kindergarten teachers in 98 school districts across the United States to administer the Early Development Instrument (EDI), a measure of children's physical, social, emotional and language development.

The assessment was administered to more than 185,000 kindergarteners from 2010 to 2017. After analyzing and correlating the results according to where the children lived, the investigators found that 30 percent of children in the lowest-income neighborhoods were vulnerable in one or more domains of health development, compared to 17 percent of children in higher-income settings.

The researchers also found that income-related differences in developmental vulnerability varied substantially among children from different ethnic and racial groups. Black children, for example, were at highest risk, followed by Latina/o children. Asian children were at lowest risk.

The differences in developmental vulnerability between Black children and white children were most pronounced at the higher socioeconomic levels and tended to narrow for Black and white children from lower-income neighborhoods.

Such early disparities can have a profound influence on children's long-term development, leading to higher rates of chronic conditions such as diabetes, heart disease, drug use, mental health disorders and dementia as adults.


Our findings underscore the pronounced racialized disparities for young children. Many other studies have highlighted patterns of income and racial inequality in health and educational outcomes. What this study shows is that these patterns of inequality are clearly evident and measurable before kids start school."

Neal Halfon, MD, Study Lead Author and Director of the Center for Healthier Children, Families and Communities, UCLA

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Halfon also is a professor of pediatrics, public health and public policy in the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, the Fielding School of Public Health and the Luskin School of Public Affairs.

The report also underscores the value of understanding child-developmental inequities at the most micro levels.

"Because the EDI is reported at and linked to Census-tract-level indices of neighborhood risk, this measurement tool helps cities and local grassroots efforts develop targeted supports and services to address racialized disparities," adds co-author Lisa Stanley, project director for Transforming Early Childhood Community Systems at the UCLA Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities.

The EDI tool was developed by Dr. Dan Offord and Dr. Magdalena Janus at the Offord Centre for Child Studies at McMaster University in Ontario, Canada, and has been internationally validated, and used widely in Canada, Australia and other nations.

The EDI was first piloted in 2009 by UCLA in Santa Ana, in partnership with First Five Orange County. Over the past 10 years, UCLA had enabled city and school district leaders in over 85 communities, spanning 18 states, to assess the health, development and well-being of more than 350,000 kindergartners across the U.S.

UCLA researchers make this data accessible to local communities to help them develop their own initiatives to address the root causes of inequalities.

"These findings not only highlight the equity challenges we face but also reveal the truly inequitable design of all the systems responsible for ensuring that children thrive," says co-author Efren Aguilar, geographic information systems lead at the Center for Healthier Children, Families, and Communities at UCLA.

"Only by addressing the historical exploitation and exclusion of marginalized communities, can we begin to repair the pains and exploitative practices of the past and redesign our community systems so that all children thrive."
Source:

University of California - Los Angeles Health Sciences
Journal reference:

Halfon, N., et al. (2020) Measuring Equity From The Start: Disparities In The Health Development Of US Kindergartners. Health Affairs. doi.org/10.1377/hlthaff.2020.00920.

More evidence Pangolin not intermediary in transmission of SARS-CoV-2 to humans

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By Susha Cheriyedath, M.Sc.Oct 4 2020

Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the causative agent for the current coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic that has affected more than 35 million people and caused more than 1 million global deaths to date. The unprecedented repercussions of the pandemic have forced scientists to study the virus and its mechanism of infection closely in order to find a way to contain the spread of this virus through vaccination or treat affected people with effective therapeutic strategies that will help bring down the death rate.

Many of these efforts are focused on identifying the intermediate animal that is potentially involved in the transmission of the SARS-CoV-2 virus to humans. Several works found evidence for pangolin being the intermediary between the virus and humans based on the presence of virus related to SARS-CoV-2 in Malayan pangolins, ACE2 receptor polymorphism, and the similarities in sequence between the receptor-binding domain (RBD) of pangolin and human Sarbecoviruses.

However, some studies later reported that the binding affinity of the pangolin ACE2 receptor for the RBD of the virus is low. In a recent paper published in the journal Infection, Genetics and Evolution, researchers from the University of Barcelona, Spain; Xiamen University, China; and IHU-Méditerranée Infection and CNRS, France, provided more evidence to prove why pangolin cannot be the intermediate animal in SARS-CoV-2 transmission to humans.

Study: COVID-19: Time to exonerate the pangolin from the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 to humans. Image Credit: Vickey Chauhan

The team proposed a different model named the ‘circulation model’ to illustrate how SARS-CoV-2-related coronaviruses could have circulated in different species, including humans, before COVID-19 emerged.

While many previous studies indicated that bats and pangolins were the culprits in COVID-19 transmission to humans, none of the studies clarified the actual role of these animals in the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic. The SARS-CoV-2 virus is suspected of having emerged from bats and was said to be closely related to the Sarbecoviruses MN996532_raTG13 and RmYN02 from the Chinese horseshoe bats Rhinolophus affinis and Rhinolophus malayanus, respectively.

Intermediate Horseshoe Bat (Rhinolophus affinis). Image Credit: Binturong-tonoscarpe / Shutterstock
Genomic analysis shows SARS-CoV-2 has been circulating in bats for many decades

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The findings of this study did not agree with the currently proposed spillover model for zoonotic emergence. Also, the in-depth genomic analysis failed to support recombination in SARS-CoV-2 and showed that it has been circulating in bats for several decades now. Moreover, the drawback of metagenomic analyses that some previous studies performed is that there is not enough evidence to show that different parts come from the same virus and the recombinants came from artifactual assembly mosaics.

The SARS-CoV-2 spike protein S1 binds to the human ACE2 molecules on the cell surface. The analysis of ACE2 3D structures indicated that the amino acids found in the 30–41, 82–93, and 353–358 regions play a key role in interactions with the viral S1 spike protein. This set off a series of in silico analyses of ACE2 polymorphism that aimed at predicting which putative intermediate host animal might bind best to the ACE2 receptor so as to capture a SARS-CoV-2-like virus that is transmissible to humans.

Other than pangolin, the virus was shown to bind to the ACE2 receptor from a host of animals, including Chinese horseshoe bats, cats, civets, turtles, monkeys, ferrets, dogs, Chinese hamsters, cows, buffaloes, sheep, swine, and pigeons. According to the researchers, the virus does not preadapt to the host; instead, there is a host-driven selection of viruses post-exposure that can evade immune surveillance. The virus is already present in humans or animal species close to humans. A random event like a mutation suddenly makes it pathogenic or more invasive.

“According to the circulation model, what really prepares the ground for the epidemic is simply an accidental event, i.e., a mutation, recombination or reassortment in the virus genome.”

Circulation model puts focus back on human activities

The authors feel that the actual triggers for epidemics and pandemics lie in the organization of the society and human/animal contacts, and amplification loops offered by the human society, such as land conversion, contacts, markets, mobility, and international trade.

According to the researchers, a significant positive aspect of the circulation model is that the focus of the model is on human activities and not wildlife, and if we want to prevent future pandemics like these, we must reconsider the manner in which we interact with nature. They concluded that bats, pangolins, and other animals are not responsible for the epidemics or pandemics humans are facing right now. Blaming such infectious diseases on zoonotic emergence caused by wildlife may only result in unnecessary culling and mass slaughter leading to loss of biodiversity.
Journal reference:

Roger Frutos, Jordi Serra-Cobo, Tianmu Chen, Christian A. Devaux, COVID-19: Time to exonerate the pangolin from the transmission of SARS-CoV-2 to humans, Infection, Genetics and Evolution, Volume 84, 2020, 104493, ISSN 1567-1348, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.meegid.2020.104493, http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1567134820303245




Written by Susha Cheriyedath has a Bachelor of Science (B.Sc.) degree in Chemistry and Master of Science (M.Sc) degree in Biochemistry from the University of Calicut, India. She always had a keen interest in medical and health science. As part of her masters degree, she specialized in Biochemistry, with an emphasis on Microbiology, Physiology, Biotechnology, and Nutrition. In her spare time, she loves to cook up a storm in the kitchen with her super-messy baking experiments.

86 percent of the UK's COVID-19 patients have no symptoms

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By Angela Betsaida B. Laguipo, BSN Oct 9 2020

Many people who contract the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the virus that causes the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), develop only mild and moderate symptoms. A small fraction of those infected develop severe symptoms, which usually occur in people who are at higher risk due to comorbidities.

Study: Three Quarters of People with SARS-CoV-2 Infection are Asymptomatic: Analysis of English Household Survey Data. Image Credit: Noiel / Shutterstock

Now, a new study by researchers at the University College London revealed that 86 percent of people who tested positive for COVID-19 did not have virus symptoms, such as cough, fever, and loss of taste or smell. The study findings, collected by the Office for National Statistics, the U.K. statistics body, highlight the role of asymptomatic patients in the spread of the virus.

The data collecting body gathered information about coronavirus testing from thousands of British households during the pandemic—the asked households whether they developed symptoms or not.


“To reduce transmission of SARS-CoV-2, it is important to identify those who are infectious. However, little is known about what proportion of infectious people are asymptomatic and potential “silent” transmitters. We evaluated the value of COVID-19 symptoms as a marker for SARS-CoV-2 infection from a representative English survey,” the authors wrote in the paper.

COVID-19 symptoms among infected people

The study, published in the journal Clinical Epidemiology, utilized data from the Coronavirus Infection Survey, an extensive population-based survey looking at the link between coronavirus symptoms and test results.

Over 36,000 people living in Northern Ireland, England, and Wales were included in the study, who were tested from April to June. Of the total participants, 0.32 percent of 115 people had a positive test result. From there, the team focused on these individuals to determine specific symptoms.

Of the 115 people who tested positive with SARS-CoV-2, 16 or 13.9 percent reported symptoms, while 99 people or 86.1 percent of the patients, did not report any specific symptoms on the day of the test.

Further, 27 or 23.5 percent were symptomatic, and 88 or 76.5 percent did not manifest symptoms on the day of the test.

“COVID-19 symptoms are poor markers of SARS-CoV-2. Thus, 76.5% of this random sample, which tested positive reported no symptoms, and 86.1% reported none of those specific to COVID-19. A more widespread testing program is necessary to capture “silent” transmission and potentially prevent and reduce future outbreaks,” the team concluded in the study.

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The researchers believe that the study findings may provide critical information for ongoing and future testing programs.

“The fact that so many people who tested positive were asymptomatic on the day of a positive test result calls for a change to future testing strategies. More widespread testing will help to capture “silent” transmission and potentially prevent future outbreaks,” Professor Irene Petersen from UCL Epidemiology & Health Care, said.

“Future testing programs should involve frequent testing of a wider group of individuals, not just symptomatic cases, especially in high-risk settings or places where many people work or live close together such as meat factories or university halls. In the case of university halls, it may be particularly relevant to test all students before they go home for Christmas,” the added.

He also explained that pooled testing could impose a widespread testing strategy, where multiple tests can be grouped into one analysis. This way, they could save time and money rather than doing individual tests.
COVID-19 situation

The United Kingdom reports a second wave of the coronavirus outbreak in the country, which topped more than 564,000 cases and at last 42,000 deaths. Health minister Matt Hancock warned that the U.K. is reporting skyrocketing cases. On Oct. 8, more than 17,540 new daily COVID-19 cases were recorded, which is up by more than 3,000 from the previous day.

Also, 77 people had died after testing positive for COVID-19 within 28 days. The number of patients hospitalized due to the infection increased to a whopping 3,044 from 2,944 the previous day.

Globally, the number of cases has surpassed 36.44 million and the death toll has now reached over 1 million.
Sources:

University College London. (2020). https://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/2020/oct/symptoms-covid-19-are-poor-marker-infection

COVID-19 Dashboard by the Center for Systems Science and Engineering (CSSE) at Johns Hopkins University (JHU) - https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6

Journal reference:

Peterson, I., and Phillips, A. (2020). Three-Quarters of People with SARS-CoV-2 Infection are Asymptomatic: Analysis of English Household Survey Data. Clinical Epidemiology. https://www.dovepress.com/three-quarters-of-people-with-sars-cov-2-infection-are-asymptomatic-an-peer-reviewed-article-CLEP

Written by
Angela Betsaida B. Laguipo is a nurse by profession and a writer by heart. She graduated with honors (Cum Laude) for her Bachelor of Nursing degree at the University of Baguio, Philippines. She is currently completing her Master's Degree where she specialized in Maternal and Child Nursing and worked as a clinical instructor and educator in the School of Nursing at the University of Baguio.

JP Morgan makes $30-billion commitment to fight racial inequality

JPMorgan, the largest U.S. bank by assets, earned $36.4 billion in profit last year.

BY IRINA SLAV · OCTOBER 8, 2020

JP Morgan has committed $30 billion to tackle racial inequality through loans, investments, and direct funding.

CNN’s Jazmin Goodwin reported:

JPMorgan Chase (JPM) is committing $30 billion over the next five years to promote racial equality.

“Systemic racism is a tragic part of America’s history,” said JPMorgan Chase Chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon in a news release. “We can do more and do better to break down systems that have propagated racism and widespread economic inequality, especially for Black and Latinx people. It’s long past time that society addresses racial inequities in a more tangible, meaningful way.”

Imani Moise from Reuters wrote:

The initiative seeks to provide $8 billion in new mortgages for Black and Latino borrowers, $14 billion in loans for affording housing projects, $2 billion in small business loans, and $2 billion in philanthropy.

In comparison, Bank of America Corp and Citigroup Inc have made similar pledges totaling about $1 billion each.

JPMorgan, the largest U.S. bank by assets, earned $36.4 billion in profit last year.

Bloomberg’s Michelle F Davis noted:

The changes are the culmination of months of discussions about how to address racial inequity sparked by this summer’s nationwide protests in the U.S. after the police killing of George Floyd. JPMorgan and other big U.S. banks have been pressured to help remedy race-based economic gaps the industry helped create. Firms including Goldman Sachs Group Inc. and Wells Fargo & Co. have promised to improve diversity among their own ranks.

The Americans who most need a stimulus

One group of Americans needs a fresh stimulus package more than any other: The 2.4 million Americans — and rising — who have been unemployed for more than six months.

Felix Salmon, Courtenay Brown, Dion Rabouin

Data: Bureau of Labor Statistics; Chart: Axios Visuals


One group of Americans needs a fresh stimulus package more than any other: The 2.4 million Americans — and rising — who have been unemployed for more than six months.

Why it matters: While the economic recession looks like it ended in April, rising long-term unemployment acts as a drag on the broader economy. Without new stimulus, the number of jobless could end up being almost as bad as the Great Recession of 2008-9.
"The longer people are unemployed, the more they run down assets and savings and that starts to really impact consumption and their ability to spend," Gabriel Chodorow-Reich, a Harvard economics professor, tells Axios.

The backstory:

 In April, for the first time since 2001, fewer than 1 million people were unemployed for more than six months.

That same month, the surge of coronavirus-related layoffs peaked. Today almost 1.5 million of those laid-off workers are still unemployed, and the ranks of the long-term jobless are rising at a rate not seen since the financial crisis.

The biggest job losses have been in leisure and hospitality, where the workforce is 3.8 million people smaller than it was in February. The food services industry is down 2.3 million jobs.

What they're saying: Harvard projections show long-term unemployment peaking in early 2021. Depending on the speed of the recovery, it's likely to reach 3.9 million people at best — and 5.1 million in a worst-case scenario.

Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s, sees a peak of 5 million long-term unemployed as a baseline scenario, cautioning that with stimulus talks having broken down, the number could be more than double that “if we botch it.”

"If we provide stimulus, provide checks, provide unemployment insurance — all these things will support the economy and help businesses get back on their feet and help people get back to work. By not doing it, we're basically committing ourselves to a slower recovery, or even a backslide potentially."— Eliza Forsythe, economics professor at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

In normal times, the longer you're out of work, the more difficult it becomes to find a job. Employers don't like to hire people with large gaps on their résumé, or whose skills might be outdated or rusty.

Those rules don't necessarily apply in a pandemic. "Scarring effects on the labor force have also been less severe than feared," wrote Goldman Sachs economist David Mericle in a research note this week.

"Unemployment has fallen sharply, and most of the remaining job losers are either still on temporary layoff or are in industries that should largely recover with a vaccine. In addition, labor demand has rebounded much more quickly than last cycle, reducing the risk of widespread long-term unemployment."

The other side: There are 4.8 million Americans who are weeks away from being considered long-term unemployed, and more than 1 million have filed initial jobless claims (including the Pandemic Unemployment Assistance program) every week for the past six months.
So, "where long-term unemployment peaks depends on the virus and depends on policy," Zandi says.

Where it stands: The stock market, near record highs, is running on Fed liquidity and looking past the pandemic to an economy that has fully recovered and has put the coronavirus squarely in the rear-view mirror. But that means 2022 at the earliest.

The bottom line: We're only at the end of the beginning of the pandemic. Right now it's mostly too early to tell which jobs are simply going into hibernation for the duration of the crisis, and which ones are gone forever.

Fearing Biden tax hikes, wealthy Americans rush to change estate plans




(Reuters) - Wealthy Americans are scrambling to change their estate plans before year-end, worried that Democrat Joe Biden will win the U.S. presidential election and raise taxes, say financial advisers to the moneyed set.

U.S. Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden waves as he arrives to speak at a carpenters union in Phoenix, Arizona, U.S., October 8, 2020. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque

The biggest concern is that the White House and Congress could get swept up in a “Blue Wave” of Democratic wins that give Biden the power to propose and pass a sweeping set of tax reforms.

Wealthy people are especially nervous that an exemption allowing individuals to leave up to $11.58 million to heirs, free of estate or gift taxes, could be cut before it expires in 2025.

Democrats want to raise estate taxes to the “historical norm,” according to the party’s platform. That could mean slashing the exemption to $5.49 million, the figure in place before Republican President Donald Trump signed a sweeping tax bill that included benefits for corporations and wealthy Americans in 2017, advisers said.

It is unclear how the election will go or what, if any, tax reform will pass. But as Biden has climbed in the polls, rich people are rushing to set up trusts and revise existing ones before year-end to avoid 2021 tax consequences, advisers said.

“The $11.58 million question is, ‘What is going to happen to the gift and estate tax exclusion?’” said Toni Ann Kruse, a New York estates lawyer who counsels ultra-high net worth people. “We don’t know who will win the election or control the House or Senate - and all of those factors will play into what could happen.”

Biden would also “return the estate tax to 2009 levels” to fund paid family and medical leave, according to his website.

His plan also includes raising taxes on long-term capital gains, which is the profit earned by selling assets whose values have appreciated. Taxpayers with income above $1 million would pay a 39.6% income tax on the profit, instead of the current tiered approach that maxes out at 20% for individuals with $441,450 or more income.

In a statement, Biden campaign spokesman Andrew Bates reiterated the candidate’s intent to change tax law in ways that benefit less affluent people.

“Joe Biden is running to rebuild the backbone of this nation - the American middle class - by ensuring that our economy rewards work and not just wealth,” he said.

The uptick in requests for estate changes intensified in June when Biden pulled ahead of Trump in polling, advisers said. Several firms said they have been overwhelmed by requests since then, and expect business to pick up more toward the end of the year.

Tax-related workflow is triple the norm at Miller Samuel Inc, a New York-based real estate appraisal firm, said Chief Executive Jonathan Miller.

“We are flooded with requests for gift and estate tax appraisals right now,” he said.

New York estate and tax planning lawyer Philip Michaels has added around 15 high net worth clients during the last several months who are revising estate plans.

Rockefeller Capital Management, a family office in New York, is holding virtual events for customers while working with legal and tax advisers to sort through nuances of possible legislation, said Joe Roberts, Senior Wealth Strategist.

Clients are worried about a “quick turn and drastic departure” from the status quo, Roberts said.

At the same time, some customers are worried about making decisions too early. That is because trusts created to use lifetime exemptions are not easily unwound.

“It’s a lot of money to give away,” Indianapolis estate planning lawyer John Olivieri said of some of his clients. “People are struggling with, ‘Do I really want to give this away?’”

Reporting by Suzanne Barlyn; Additional reporting by Trevor Hunnicutt; Editing by Lauren Tara LaCapra and Nick Zieminski