Month: October 2020

Twitter Inc. said Friday that it would remove tweets calling for people to interfere with the U.S. election process or implementation of election results, including through violence, as the company also announced more restrictions to slow the spread of misinformation.Twitter said in a blog post that, from next week, users will get a prompt pointing them to credible information before they can retweet content that has been labeled as misleading.It said it would add more warnings and restrictions on tweets with misleading information labels from U.S. political figures like candidates and campaigns, as well as U.S.-based accounts with more than 100,000 followers or that get “significant engagement.”Twitter, which recently told Reuters it was testing how to make its labeling more obvious and direct, said people will have to tap through warnings to see these tweets. Users can also only “quote tweet” this content; likes, retweets and replies will be turned off.Twitter says it has labeled thousands of misleading posts, though most attention has been on the labels applied to tweets by U.S. President Donald Trump. Twitter also said it would label tweets that falsely claim a win for any candidate.Temporary stepsThe company announced several temporary steps to slow amplification of content. For example, from Oct. 20 to at least the end of the U.S. election week, global users pressing “retweet” will be directed first to the “quote tweet” button to encourage people to add their own commentary.It will also stop surfacing trending topics without added context and will stop people seeing “liked by” recommendations from people they do not know in their timeline.Twitter’s decision to hit the brakes on automated recommendations contrasts with the approach at Facebook Inc., which is amping up promotion of its groups product despite concerns about extremism in those spaces.Social media companies are under pressure to combat election-related misinformation and prepare for the possibility of violence or polling place intimidation around the Nov. 3 vote.Reuters has reported that Republicans are mobilizing thousands of volunteers to watch early voting sites and ballot drop boxes to try to find evidence to back up Trump’s unsubstantiated complaints about widespread voter fraud.On Wednesday, Facebook said it would ban calls for poll watching using “militarized language.”
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Asian kudzu vines smothering the southern United States. Pacific lionfish devouring Caribbean sealife. South American cane toads killing their way across Australia.  
 
As bad as invasive species are today, a study says they will get worse.    
 Researchers predict that non-native—or alien—species introductions will increase globally by around 36 percent during the first half of the 21st century.
 
The researchers call for better monitoring and regulations to contain the spread of alien species.
 The movement of plants and animals around the planet soared over the last century as human trade and travel opened new global pathways.
 
Not all alien species are problematic, but invasive alien species—like kudzu—wreak environmental or economic havoc in their new homes.  
 
“Together with climate change and land use change, invasive alien species are posing one of the greatest threats to biodiversity,” said Hanno Seebens, ecologist at the Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre and lead author on the study.  
 
From devouring crops to clogging water pipes, invasive species cost the United States alone around $120 billion each year. Some species are intentionally introduced to new regions by humans. Others arrive accidentally as stowaways in goods shipped by planes, trucks and ships or as hitchhikers on luggage. 
“A species can only arrive in a new region when you connect different [regions],”  Seebens explained. “When we extended our trade networks, we connected more and more [regions], which allowed more and more species to come.”  
However, the number of possible species could taper off in the future. “We may just run out of species to be transported, because at some point, all species may have been transported already.”
 
To forecast alien species introductions for each continent between 2005 and 2050, the researchers used past records of alien species introductions and estimates of the number of possible species that could be introduced.
 
Alien species introductions will increase on every continent, they predict.FILE – An Asian hornet chases a bee near a beehive in Loue, northwestern France, Sept. 14, 2019.The largest increase is expected in Europe, with a 64 percent rise in alien species introductions totaling more than 2,500 species. In Australia and New Zealand, they predict just a 16 percent increase or about 1,286 new alien species.
 
“We know that a certain proportion of alien species will be problematic, so the more of them that there are, the higher the likelihood that we’ll have problems,” said Cascade Sorte, associate professor of ecology and evolutionary biology at the University of California Irvine, who did not contribute to the research.  
 
“In some ways it’s shocking to think that, with all of the impacts that we’ve already seen [from alien species], there’s even a possibility that things can get worse,” she added.
 
On all continents, the study predicted the greatest increase in introductions for insects and their relatives. One reason is that these tiny animals can easily escape detection and be accidentally transported to new regions.
 
The researchers predict just small increases in alien mammal introductions, ranging from just 0 to 16 percent—or up to 12 species. According to Seebens that is because the number of possible mammal species is limited.
 
“Mammals are often very big. And so they are not easily transported to other areas. And the small ones, mice or rats for example, have already been transported all over the world,” said Seebens.
 
“We could, if we chose to as a global society, do something about [alien species],” said Bethany Bradley, professor of spatial ecology and biogeography at the University of Massachusetts, who was not involved in the study. “It requires more inspections; it requires more regulation. It’s definitely costly.”
 
“But on the other side of things,” she added, “there are estimates of hundreds of billions of dollars being spent every year on managing invasive species. I think we have the solutions to the problem that this paper lays out; we just haven’t implemented them.”
 
One reason for fewer alien species introductions in Australasia is the strict border regulations that Australia and New Zealand have in place, says Seebens. The isolation of those countries also means there’s less opportunity for species to cross borders.
 
The study predicts alien species introductions in a “business as usual” future, providing a baseline for comparing different future scenarios. For example, increased trade and transport or accelerated climate change would likely boost alien species introductions. On the other hand, adoption of new regulations could slow introductions.
 
“Our recommendations would be to have stricter regulations and stricter border controls,” said Seebens. People should also be aware of alien plants in their gardens and avoid releasing non-native pets into the environment, he added. 
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Spain’s government declared a state of emergency in Madrid Friday, taking control of efforts to fight the spread of COVID-19 from local authorities after a regional court struck down restrictions as the region faces one of the most significant outbreaks in Europe.
 
Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez’s government took the step at a special cabinet meeting as he imposed his authority on regional officials, who have resisted his calls for restrictions on travel in the region.
 
The move gives Sanchez extraordinary powers to order new constraints on life in the capital, where efforts to control a surge in infections have been complicated by the standoff. The step forced Madrid authorities to restore restrictions they had ignored following the court ruling.
 
At a news conference Friday, Health Minister Salvador Illa said the measures, which prohibit residents from leaving the area, including nine nearby towns, without a valid reason, among other measures, would be effective immediately and remain in place for 15 days.
 
The Madrid region’s 14-day infection rate of more than 560 coronavirus cases per 100,000 residents is more than twice Spain’s national average of 256 and five times the European average rate of 113 for the week ending September 27.
 
The Interior Ministry said an extra 7,000 policemen and security personnel would be deployed for enforcement of the measures “at various exit and access points of the region under state of emergency.”  
 
The partial lockdown comes as the nation begins a three-day holiday weekend, and initial reports from Madrid said cars continued to pour out of the city and its neighboring towns on Friday. 
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Pakistan has blocked online short-video sharing platform TikTok on the grounds of “immoral/indecent” content for viewing in the majority-Muslim nation.The state regulator said Friday that it had repeatedly instructed the platform to tighten its content monitoring to block access to the “unlawful” material.”However, the application failed to fully comply with the instructions, therefore, directions were issued for blocking of TikTok application in the country,” said the Pakistan Telecommunication Authority, PTA.The regulator defended the decision, saying the PTA, in a formal warning, had given “considerable time” to the online platform to respond and comply with the instructions.FILE – A man opens social media app TikTok on his cellphone, in Islamabad, Pakistan, July 21, 2020.”TikTok has been informed that the authority is open for engagement and will review its decision subject to a satisfactory mechanism by TikTok to moderate unlawful content,” according to the PTA.There was no immediate reaction from the popular online platform to the blocking of its service by Pakistani authorities.Amnesty International slammed the ban on TikTok, saying that in the name of a campaign against vulgarity, people are being denied the right to express themselves online.”The #TikTokBan comes against a backdrop where voices are muted on television, columns vanish from newspapers, websites are blocked and television ads banned,” Amnesty said in a statement posted on Twitter.TikTok, owned by China-based ByteDance, is also under pressure globally due to security and privacy concerns.Neighboring India has already blocked access to the social media outlet, along with dozens of other apps developed by Chinese companies, citing cybersecurity concerns.TikTok is also under scrutiny in other countries, including the United States, the biggest market by revenue for the company.Dating apps banLast month, Pakistan blocked access to five dating apps for their delivery of “immoral/indecent content” in violation of the country’s laws.The platforms include Tinder, Grindr, Tagged, Skout and SayHi.The PTA, without elaborating on the sweeping ban, said that all five companies had failed to respond to its directive within the stipulated time, though it did not specify the timeframe.Tinder is globally popular and owned by Match Group.Grindr, which has a large following in the U.S., describes itself as a social network “for gay, bi, trans, and queer people.”Homosexuality and extra-marital relationships are outlawed in Pakistan. 
 
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China said Friday it is joining a World Health Organization international initiative to distribute COVID-19 vaccines to the developing world.  China, Russia and the U.S. had said they were not joining the alliance to help two-thirds of world’s population receive the vaccines by 2022.China’s reversal makes it the largest country to participate in what is known as the COVAX deal.  “We are taking this concrete step to ensure equitable distribution of vaccines, especially to developing countries, and hope more capable countries will also join and support Covax,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Hua Chunying said in a statement. Over 36 million infections
More than 36.5 million people have been infected with the coronavirus as it snakes it way around the world, according to statistics from the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center. 
 
The U.S., India and Brazil lead in the number of cases and deaths from COVID-19 — the disease caused by the virus. India’s health ministry reported more than 70,000 new cases in the past 24-hour period.  
 
The U.S. has more than 7.6 million infections and upwards of 212,000 deaths. India has nearly 7 million COVID cases, with more than 106,000 deaths, while Brazil has over 5 million cases and a death tally close to 149,000.
Russia reported a new record for coronavirus cases Monday – 12,126, bringing its total of confirmed cases to 1,272,238.  The previous daily high was in May.  Some officials there say new restrictions may have to be imposed. Ukraine reported a record 5,804 new cases Friday.  Authorities are expected to extend the Eastern European country’s lockdown until the end of October. Australia said Friday it has experienced two straight days without any COVID-19 deaths, the longest amount of time it has not had any COVID deaths in three months. White House Director of Strategic Communications Alyssa Farah puts on her mask after speaking to reporters about U.S. President Donald Trump’s coronavirus disease (COVID-19), outside the White House in Washington, Oct. 8, 2020.White House outbreak
Various health departments in the U.S. capital, Washington, and the states of Maryland and Virginia sent letters Thursday to individuals who worked at the White House in the past two weeks or attended an event Sept. 26 in the Rose Garden for Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett, urging them “to contact their local health department for further guidance/questions regarding their potential need to quarantine.”   
 
The White House seemingly has become the source for several COVID-19 cases, including the infection of U.S. President Donald Trump, several lawmakers and the president of Notre Dame University.  
 
Photos of the Barrett event showed the mostly maskless crowd not observing social distancing protocols, including sitting shoulder-to-shoulder in chairs placed on the lawn.  The Expanding Number of COVID-19 Cases Linked to the White HouseAn increasing number of people with connections to the White House – including the President and First Lady – contracted COVID-19 recently        
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Young people have suffered less under the COVID-19 virus than older people medically, but experts say the gap has narrowed, and so-called superspreading among the young is a factor.“The FILE – A general view of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) headquarters in Atlanta, Georgia, Sept. 30, 2014.A woman wearing face mask walks on a street in Hong Kong, Feb. 18, 2020. COVID-19 viral illness has sickened millions of people in China since December.In December 2019, as COVID-19 was emerging in China, colleges and universities worldwide released hundreds of thousands of students home for winter break. Many of the more than 360,000 Chinese students who study in the U.S. returned to China for the holiday.A month later, they and other international students returned to their campuses in the U.S. and around the world as COVID-19 was gaining speed.In March, U.S. colleges and universities began their spring breaks, times when students traditionally head to warm beach destinations, such as in Florida, Texas and Mexico, to blow off steam after studying for midterms.Dr. Sean O’Leary, associate professor of pediatrics-infectious diseases at the University of Colorado Anschutz Medical Campus, told VOA that in response to the wave of COVID-19 cases in the U.S., many universities shut down their campuses, sent students home or asked them to return from spring break to clean out their rooms, and then put them on airplanes for points around the country.“From the perspective of the U.S. as a country, was that the best choice?” O’Leary asked. Campuses were “one place where we knew there was widespread transmission.”Lauterbach said the disease is insidious in younger people because they typically show only mild or no symptoms, and scientists now believe that 80% of COVID-19 transmission occurs among those who don’t seem ill.Kids ride their bikes at Las Heras park after lockdown measures to fight the COVID-19 novel coronavirus pandemic were relaxed, in Buenos Aires, on July 21, 2020.A study by the American Academy of Pediatrics  looked at more than 2,000 youths ages 18 and younger in China.Doctors from Shanghai Children’s Medical Center and Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine wrote that where the virus first emerged, in Hubei province, 13% of confirmed cases had asymptomatic infection, a rate that “almost certainly understates the true rate of asymptomatic infection, since many asymptomatic children are unlikely to be tested.”Research published Aug. 6 by JAMA Internal Medicinefound that many COVID-19 patients remained asymptomatic for a prolonged period, and the viral load was similar to that of symptomatic patients. Older children have also been shown to transmit the coronavirus as much as adults, according to a large study from South Korea. The study, which analyzed nearly 65,000 people in South Korea, found that children younger than 10 were around half as likely to spread the virus as adults. However, young people ages 10 to 19 years old are more likely than other age groups to disperse COVID-19 into households.Of 10,592 household contacts, 11.8% had COVID-19, with 18.6% being index patients ages 10 to 19. It was 1.9% for the 48,481 non-household contacts.“We should make it clear to younger people that if they behave in a careless fashion, that they are not only putting themselves, their peers, older people and peers [with underlying conditions] at risk,” Lauterbach said, “but they put themselves at risk and their best friends. So, we need to convey a message that this is a serious disease for all age groups.”“It is quite clear that not many young people die from the disease,” Lauterbach said.“But it is astonishing that we see very, let’s say, remarkable numbers of younger people in the ICU and also often on ventilator support,” he said.“Currently, we do not know whether they will fully recover their lung function or not. We definitely do not know that for certain. So, we have to take this way more seriously than we did in the past.” Kathleen Struck contributed to this report.
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The National Football League reported Thursday yet another Tennessee Titans football player has tested positive for COVID-19, raising questions about their game scheduled for Sunday in Nashville.The latest positive test brings the total to 23 positive COVID-19 tests among players and staff for the Tennessee franchise, and 21 of those positive cases have come since Sept. 29, two days after the Titans game with the Minnesota Vikings in Minneapolis. The team facility has been closed since that time.The team had gone two consecutive days without a positive test before two more tests came back positive Wednesday. A third day would have allowed them to return to their team facility in Nashville, under league rules.The outbreak has already led to the postponement of the Titans’ scheduled game last week against the Pittsburgh Steelers to the seventh week of the season. NFL sources say their game Sunday with the Buffalo Bills in Nashville is currently is being evaluated.Some current and former players took to social media Thursday calling for the Titans to be forced to forfeit a game as punishment for their “irresponsible” behavior in allowing the virus to spread.On Wednesday, the New England Patriots had to cancel practice at the team’s headquarters in Foxborough, Massachusetts, after defensive player Stephen Gilmore became the third player on that team to test positive for COVID-19.Quarterback Cam Newton tested positive Saturday and is on the reserve/COVID-19 list, and the Patriots placed a defensive tackle from the practice squad on that list Tuesday. The NFL says the Patriots have reported no new cases as of Thursday.Gilmore, last year’s NFL defensive player of the year, participated in a game Monday between the Patriots and the Kansas City Chiefs in Kansas City. The Chiefs reported no positive cases since that game and have been allowed to practice.Under NFL protocols, players are required to wear protective equipment, including the mandatory use of masks and other gear during practice. 
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The European Union on Thursday concluded a deal with an American drugmaker to supply up to 400 million doses of its potential COVID-19 vaccine, bringing its total vaccine supply to 1.1 billion doses for the bloc’s 450 million people.To secure the vaccines, the EU made an undisclosed down payment to Johnson & Johnson, which confirmed the deal in a statement in which it reiterated plans to allocate up to 500 million additional doses to poorer countries. EU states plan to pay for those but the price and liability conditions remained confidential.This is the third COVID-19 purchasing deal the EU has closed as the world races to find and secure shots against the disease. The first two were with AstraZeneca and Sanofi.The announcement came in light of a fresh spike across Europe forcing countries to reintroduce previously relaxed COVID-19 restrictions, including the shutdown of bars, restaurants and gyms.The J&J deal follows supply contracts for 400 million doses of the potential vaccine being developed by AstraZeneca and for 300 million doses of the shot being tested by a partnership between Sanofi and GlaxoSmithKline.The commission plans to ramp up its vaccine collection as it continues to pursue deals with manufacturers like Moderna , CureVac and a partnership between Pfizer and BioNTech. If confirmed, the EU’s total vaccine supply will be nearly 2 billion doses.A senior EU source told Reuters news agency last month that the EU is in talks with Novavax for a seventh vaccine. If it strikes seven deals, the EU would be ahead of Britain and the United States, which each have concluded six supply contracts so far.The J&J vaccine, which is being developed by its subsidiary, Janssen, is based on vector technology, the same used by AstraZeneca. Sanofi’s is a protein-based jab. 
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Germany’s health officials said Thursday new COVID-19 cases are spreading at the fastest rate since April.Health Minister Jens Spahn joined Robert Kock Institute for Disease Control President Lothar Wieler at a news conference in Berlin, where they said the number of new cases of the coronavirus has been rising steadily in Germany since early September. Wieler told reporters, “In the last few days between 1,000 and today even more than 4,000 cases have been reported to the Robert Koch Institute every day.”Weiler said the first seven days of October had seen about twice as many cases as the same period in September.  He said the current weekly nationwide average rate of COVID-19 incidence is 20.2 cases per 100,000 inhabitants; at the beginning of June it was three.German Health Minister Jens Spahn, right, and the president of the Germany’s Robert Koch Institute (RKI), Lothar Wieler, left, address the media about the current developments of the new coronavirus outbreak in Berlin, Germany, Oct. 8, 2020.Wieler said the incidence of infection is increasing in almost all regions of Germany, and that worried him greatly. He said he was unsure of how it will develop in the coming weeks, and that it is possible Germany could see 10,000 cases a day and the virus could spread uncontrollably.The outlook is particularly alarming for a country considered to have had one of the most effective responses to the pandemic in Europe, if not the world. Spahn said Germany has coped with the crisis well, so far, with the health system able to handle the patient load and a generally high level of acceptance among citizens of COVID-19 restrictions.The health minister said a big part of the problem now is young people, who are getting the virus at a higher rate than earlier in the year.  He said youth want to party and travel because they believe they are invulnerable. “They are not. A corona infection is and remains a serious illness,” he said.But Spahn said the virus is not out of control now, and if the nation pulls together and follows guidelines, it can rein it in again. “If 80 million people take part, the chances of the virus drop dramatically. This pandemic is also a character test, a test of character for us as a society,” he said. 
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The world now has more than 36 million cases of the coronavirus.    According to figures compiled by Johns Hopkins University’s coronavirus tracking program, 36,166,574 people across the globe have been diagnosed with COVID-19, including more than 1 million deaths.  The United States leads in both categories with 7.5 million cases and nearly 212,000 deaths. India is a close second in the total number of cases with 6.8 million, while Brazil topped the 5 million mark Wednesday.  Brazil is second in the total number of deaths with more than 148,000, with India third with over 105,000. Memorandum from White House physician Sean Conley to White House press secretary McEnany with information about President Trump receiving a dose of Regeneron’s polyclonal antibody cocktail on Oct. 2 2020.Regeneron
U.S.-based biotechnology firm Regeneron says it has applied to the Food and Drug Administration for emergency approval of the experimental coronavirus antibody therapy that was given to President Donald Trump after he was hospitalized last week with COVID-19.  The company says the therapy is a combination of two antibodies that are believed to boost a person’s immunity to the virus. Although the therapy is still in large-scale clinical trials, it has been available for so-called “compassionate use,” which the FDA must approve on an individual basis.  Regeneron says there currently are enough doses for about 50,000 patients, but expects to have doses available for 300,000 patients “within the next few months,” which will be free to all Americans.  EU vaccine deal
Meanwhile, the European Commission announced Wednesday it has reached a deal with U.S.-based pharmaceutical giant Gilead to buy additional doses of the COVID-19 antiviral drug Remdesivir to treat about 3,400 patients. The drug, which has been approved by the World Health Organization to treat severely or critically ill coronavirus patients, has also been given to President Donald Trump after his treatment.Olivier Veran, France’s health minister, will announce a new set of restrictions Thursday to deal with the country’s surge of new COVID-19 cases. The Reuters news agency is reporting the government will put the cities of Lyon and Lille on maximum COVID-19 alert. Paris and Marseille were put on maximum alert earlier this week, resulting in the closure of bars in the French capital for two weeks.   France reported upwards of 7,500 new coronavirus patients in hospital care Wednesday, out of a record-high 18,746 daily new infections. 
 
 
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An Iranian dissident has contracted the coronavirus at a prison in northern Iran, according to a knowledgeable source, highlighting what U.S. and U.N. officials say is a worsening pandemic threat facing Iran’s prisoners of conscience.In a message sent Tuesday to VOA Persian, an Iran-based source close to the family of dissident Farhad Meysami said Meysami tested positive for the virus at Rajaei Shahr prison in the city of Karaj and was transferred that morning from his ward to a so-called prison “safe room” for isolation. The source had no further details on the conditions of Meysami’s detention.The 50-year-old medical doctor and women’s rights activist has been imprisoned by Iran since his July 31, 2018, arrest. Security agents detained him at his Tehran home where they found him in possession of pins with the slogan “I am against compulsory hijab.”Meysami had been peacefully supporting a 2018 campaign by Iranian women who removed their hijabs in public to protest Islamist regulations requiring the headscarves. He was sentenced in January 2019 to five years in prison on charges of “spreading propaganda against the system” and “gathering and colluding to commit crimes against national security,”  a sentence that was upheld on appeal in August that year.Authorities initially incarcerated Meysami at Tehran’s Evin prison before moving him to Rajaei Shahr last November.A former Iranian political prisoner first reported Meysami’s coronavirus infection in a series of Monday tweets.#فرهادمیثمی در زندان رجائی‌شهر به کرونا مبتلا شده است؛امروز از زندان تماس گرفت و گفت که جواب تستش مثبت شده، اینکه در هفته گذشته احساس بی‌اشتهائی داشته ولی الان حالش خوب است.گفتم این خبر را توئیت بکنم، مخالفتی نکرد.گفتم آیا لازم است بگویم حالِ فعلی‌تان خوب است؟گفت: بله!۱/ pic.twitter.com/grFUJwI8Vv— Zia Nabavi (@ZiaNabavi1) October 5, 2020Zia Nabavi, who is based in Iran, tweeted that Meysami informed him of the diagnosis in a phone call from prison that day. Nabavi said Meysami reported feeling fine after being unwell last week.#فرهادمیثمی که دیروز تست کرونایش مثبت شده بود، صبح امروز به بند امن زندان رجائی شهر منتقل شد.بند امن سلولی انفرادی است بدون امکانات بند عمومی و فاقد هر گونه امکانات درمانی.چند روز پیش #فرهادفهندژ زندانی بهائی و هم اتاق دکتر میثمی هم بعد از ابتلا به کرونا این بند منتقل شده بود pic.twitter.com/84DpO792eu— Zia Nabavi (@ZiaNabavi1) October 6, 2020The former political prisoner followed up with a Tuesday tweet in which he also said Meysami had been transferred to a prison safe room that morning. Nabavi described the safe room as an individual cell without medical and other facilities available to inmates in the public wards.Meysami’s lawyer Mohammad Moghimi also tweeted about his client’s coronavirus diagnosis on Monday.موکلم دکتر فرهاد میثمی به کرونا مبتلاء شده و باید از مرخصی درمانی بهره‌مند شود. بارها گفته‌ام، دوباره تاکید می‌کنم؛ زندانیان سیاسی باید بدون قید و شرط آزاد شوند و سلامتی زندانیان عادی نیز باید تضمین شود یا آنان نیز بصورت موقت یا مشروط آزاد شوند.#فرهادمیثمی#زندانی_سیاسی#کروناpic.twitter.com/6ljKYTbGqR— Mohammad Moghimi (@Moghimi_Lawyer) October 5, 2020“My client should be on medical leave,” Moghimi wrote. “I emphasize again: political prisoners must be released unconditionally, and the health of ordinary prisoners must be guaranteed. Otherwise, they must be released temporarily or conditionally.”Meysami’s infection got a mention in Iranian state media as well. Ensaf News published a Monday report quoting a friend of the dissident, medical book publisher Farhad Teimourzadeh, as saying he heard about the diagnosis from the dissident’s mother, Sedigheh Pishnamaz.The health risks facing prisoners of conscience in Iran have prompted international concern as the Islamist-ruled nation struggles to contain the worst coronavirus outbreak in the Middle East.The U.S. is concerned by the worsening COVID-19 situation in Iran and we reiterate our offer of assistance first made in February. We join @UNHumanRights’ call for Iranian authorities to release all political prisoners from their overcrowded and unsanitary prisons immediately.— Morgan Ortagus (@statedeptspox) October 6, 2020In a Tuesday tweet, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Morgan Ortagus called for Iranian authorities “to release all political prisoners from their overcrowded and unsanitary prisons immediately.”U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Michelle Bachelet also issued a statement Tuesday saying poor conditions inside Iranian prisons have “led to the spread of the virus among detainees, reportedly resulting in a number of deaths.”“I call for [Iran’s] unconditional release of human rights defenders, lawyers, political prisoners, peaceful protesters and all other individuals deprived of their liberty for expressing their views or otherwise exercising their rights,” Bachelet said. “It is particularly important to rectify such injustices at a time when COVID-19 is coursing through Iran’s prisons.” This article originated in VOA’s Persian Service. Lipin reported from Washington and Yazdiha from Istanbul. Click here for the original Persian version of the story.
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Zimbabwe, like other African countries, is trying a phased re-opening of schools after closing in March due to COVID-19.But many teachers like 33-year-old Munyaradzi Masiyiwa are refusing to return to class, pointing to low pay and unsafe conditions.Masiyiwa said he makes more money selling brooms than teaching at Cranborne Boys Government High School in Harare.Sorry, but your browser cannot support embedded video of this type, you can
Paul Mavima, Zimbabwe public service minister  (Harare, October 6, 2020) says teacher salaries, about $100 a month, including a $75 “COVID-19 allowance” is all it can afford at the moment. (Columbus Mavhunga/ VOA)Public Service Minister Paul Mavima said teacher salaries, about $100 a month, including a $75 “COVID-19 allowance” is all the government can afford.”It is in this context that we are saying to civil servants please be realistic, exercise moderation in the manner in which you demand salary increases, we don’t want salary increases that will upset the stability that we have so far realized and further torpedo the economic recovery that we have started to see,” Mavima said.Without teachers in class, Zimbabwe’s school children are the ones left paying the price.Filda Rusheje, a parent of student, in Harare (October 7, 2020) wishes if the government can negotiate with the teachers on strike so that children can learn ahead of examinations. (Columbus Mavhunga/VOA)At Glen View High School, students said they only discuss lessons among themselves. Filda Rusheje is one of their parents. She is worried the children won’t learn enough to pass their exams.“The situation at schools is a tough one,” Rusheje said. “They are going to school but they are not learning. My daughter said they are just discussions among learners. They are not even sure if it’s making sense because teachers are not coming. I just wish if the government can negotiate with the teachers so that our children can learn. I want them to look after us in future.”Zimbabwe’s government has threatened to replace defiant teachers like Masiyiwa if they don’t soon return to the classrooms. 
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Wisconsin health officials opened a field hospital Wednesday at the state fairgrounds near Milwaukee to cater to the swelling number of COVID-19 cases threatening to overwhelm hospitals.The 530-bed field clinic was built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in April at the request of Wisconsin Gov. Tony Evers’ administration. Local leaders had warned about the possibility of area hospitals being overwhelmed, but hospitalizations didn’t reach the point where the hospital was needed, until now.Only 16% of the state’s 11,452 hospital beds were available as of Tuesday afternoon, according to the state’s Department of Health Services. The number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients reached 853, its highest during the pandemic according to the COVID Tracking Project, with 216 in intensive care.”This alternative care facility will take some of the pressure off our  health care facilities while expanding the continuum of care for folks who have COVID-19,” said Evers.The spike in cases has largely been blamed on the reopening of colleges and K-12 schools as well as people’s refusal to wear masks and practice social distancing. Wisconsin ranked third nationwide this week in daily new cases per capita, making it the hot spot for coronavirus infections.Over 31,000 coronavirus patients are hospitalized nationwide according to the COVID Tracking Project.The hospital, which is designed to provide low-level care, will accept only patients who have already been hospitalized elsewhere for at least 24 to 48 hours, according to the Wisconsin Department of Administration. Patients who qualify will be transported to the facility by ambulance. The facility will not accept walk-ins.It will be staffed mainly by volunteers, state workers, and National Guard members.Several other states moved to set up field hospitals in the early stages of the pandemic — at great expense — only to find that they got little to no use and many were shut down.
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