Day: February 25, 2021

ByteDance has agreed to a $92 million class-action settlement over data privacy claims from some U.S. TikTok users, according to documents filed Thursday in U.S. District Court in Illinois. ByteDance, the Chinese company that owns the short video app that has more than 100 million U.S. users, agreed to the settlement after more than a year of litigation. “While we disagree with the assertions, rather than go through lengthy litigation, we’d like to focus our efforts on building a safe and joyful experience for the TikTok community,” TikTok said Thursday. The settlement still requires court approval. FILE – A man opens social media app TikTok on his cellphone, in Islamabad, Pakistan, July 21, 2020.The lawsuits claimed the TikTok app “infiltrates its users’ devices and extracts a broad array of private data including biometric data and content that defendants use to track and profile TikTok users for the purpose of, among other things, ad targeting and profit.” The settlement was reached after “an expert-led inside look at TikTok’s source code” and extensive mediation efforts, according to the motion seeking approval of the settlement. Separately, in Washington the Federal Trade Commission and U.S. Justice Department are looking into allegations that TikTok failed to live up to a 2019 agreement aimed at protecting children’s privacy. 
 
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U.S. President Joe Biden hosted an event at the White House Thursday honoring the 50 millionth coronavirus vaccination administered in the country.Four people — an elementary school counselor, a grocery store employee and two firefighter EMTs — were vaccinated against the virus at the White House Thursday afternoon to commemorate the milestone..@POTUS watching vaccination to commemorate 50 million #COVID19 shots under his watch. pic.twitter.com/CizKLRlXYv— Patsy Widakuswara (@pwidakuswara) February 25, 2021 “Fifty-million shots in just 37 days since I’ve become president,” Biden told reporters at the event, noting that despite extreme weather conditions, the United States is on track to surpass his promise to vaccinate 100 million people in his first 100 days in office.Almost half of Americans over the age of 65 have received at least one of two shots of the vaccine, according to the White House.50 million shots in the past 37 days — no other country has done it.There are about 55m Americans who are over 65:– Six weeks ago, only 8% had gotten a shot– Today, almost 50% have gotten at least one shotLong way to go, but what a change these past weeks!— Ronald Klain (@WHCOS) February 25, 2021But U.S. officials have warned that there is still a long road ahead. Biden urged Americans to continue wearing masks and said Thursday he cannot provide a date for when things will return to “normal.”The president’s chief medical adviser, Dr. Anthony Fauci, who heads the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, also cautioned, “We are still at an unacceptably high baseline level,” preventing the resumption of normal society.Earlier this week, the United States confirmed that half a million people had died of COVID-19 — the highest death rate from the virus in the world. In 2020, the virus shaved a full year off the average life expectancy in the United States, the biggest decline since World War II, according to a new report from the National Center for Health Statistics.
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The COVAX facility for coronavirus vaccines will soon get access to 170 million doses of AstraZeneca’s vaccine, according to the U.N. Children’s Fund.  
 
The COVAX Facility aims to ensure at least 2 billion vaccine doses are available to 85 of the world’s poorest countries.  UNICEF said Thursday that deliveries of the vaccine will begin in the first quarter of 2021.   
 
Two other vaccine makers, Pfizer and the Serum Institute of India, are also providing their vaccines to COVAX for distribution.
 
In other COVID-19 news, a new study finds the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is as effective in real-world use as it was during its late-stage clinical trials.  
 
In a large-scale study of 1.2 million people, researchers at Israel’s Clalit Research Institute found the two-dose vaccine reduced symptomatic cases of COVID-19 by 94% across all age groups and reduced severe illnesses by 92%. Researchers also found that a single shot of the vaccine was 57% effective after just two weeks.  
 
The peer-reviewed study, published Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine, is the first analysis of a national COVID-19 vaccination strategy.    
 
Late-stage clinical trials of the Pfizer-BioNTech showed the vaccine was 95% effective in combating the novel coronavirus.  South Africa variantMeanwhile, Moderna says it has developed a new version of its two-dose vaccine targeted to combat the COVID-19 variant first identified in South Africa. The U.S.-based pharmaceutical company has sent a small amount of the new version to the U.S. National Institutes of Health for additional study.   FILE – Tiffany Husak, left, a nursing student at the Community College of Allegheny County, receives her first dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, during a vaccination clinic in Pittsburgh, Jan. 28, 2021.Moderna is also testing whether to add a third booster shot to its current two-dose regimen to determine whether it can create the immunity needed to fight the South African variant.   Both Pfizer and Moderna say they plan to increase their output of the vaccine within the next few months, with Pfizer doubling its output to 13 million doses per week by mid-March, with Moderna hoping to deliver 40 million doses per month by April.  European Union leaders will meet Thursday via videoconference to discuss ways to improve the slow pace of the production and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.  Concerns are growing among the 27-member regional bloc that the fast-spreading variants recently detected in Britain and South Africa will be resistant to the new vaccines.   Tokyo Olympic Games
In Japan, organizers for the postponed Tokyo Summer Olympic Games are placing a number of coronavirus-related restrictions on spectators coming out to witness the traditional relay of the Olympic torch.    The relay will begin March 25 in the northwestern prefecture of Fukushima, the site of the March 2011 nuclear disaster triggered by an earthquake and subsequent tsunami.    President of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics Organizing Committee Seiko Hashimoto (R) speaks with Tokyo 2020 Vice Director-General Yukihiko Nunomura (L) before the press briefing on operation and media coverage of Olympic Torch Relay in Tokyo, Feb. 25, 2021.Yukihiko Nunomura, the vice director-general of the Tokyo 2020 organizing committee, announced Thursday that spectators will be required to wear masks, and will not be allowed to eat or drink except for water to avoid heatstroke.  Cheering and shouting is also banned, but spectators can clap as the torch relay passes by.    Organizers say spectators will be required to preregister for a spot at each relay point to witness the torch’s arrival, but Nunomura said the relay could be stopped if too many spectators gather along the route.    The 2020 Tokyo Olympics were postponed for a year as the novel coronavirus outbreak evolved into a global pandemic.  However, recent public opinion polls indicate an overwhelming majority of Japanese believe the games should be postponed again or canceled, with Tokyo and other areas under a state of emergency to quell a surge of new infections.   The opening ceremony for the postponed Games will be held on July 23.   
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As Syria approaches the 10-year mark in its civil war next month, the United Nations says the nation’s youngest generation is suffering most, as millions of children suffer malnourishment, stunted growth, and a lack of schooling.“More than half a million children under 5 in Syria suffer from stunting as a result of chronic malnutrition, according to our latest assessments,” U.N. Humanitarian Chief Mark Lowcock said Thursday in his monthly briefing to the Security Council on the situation.“We fear this number will increase,” he said.FILE – In this Tuesday, March 10, 2020 file photo, migrants wait in line for a distribution of blankets close to the Turkish-Greek border near Pazarkule, Edirne region, Turkey.Lowcock said stunting is especially bad in the northwest and the northeast of the country, where data show that in some areas, up to one in three children suffers from impaired growth and development due to poor nutrition and recurrent illnesses. The effects of stunting are irreversible.Last week, Lowcock spoke with a group of Syrian doctors. At one pediatric hospital, the physicians said malnourished children occupy half of the facility’s 80 beds. In the past two months, five children have died from malnutrition.“Another pediatrician told me that she diagnoses malnutrition in up to 20 children a day,” Lowcock said. “But parents are bringing their children to her for completely different reasons, unaware that they are suffering from malnutrition. Malnutrition, she said, has become so normal that parents cannot spot the signs in their own children.”Neglect Drives Child Labor in SyriaMillions of displaced Syrian children work difficult, dangerous jobs just to surviveRobbed of childhoodsIn a decade of war, Syria’s youngest citizens have known nothing but conflict and suffering. They are among the millions of internally displaced and refugees; young girls have been married off in their teens, and boys have been recruited to fight. Children have been physically and psychologically wounded from the violence of war — both perpetrated on them and in front of them. Thousands have been killed.“Around half of Syria’s children are now growing up having known nothing but conflict, which has permeated all aspects of their lives and robbed them of their childhoods,” Sonia Khush, Syria response director for Save the Children, told council members.She said there is an “unprecedented education crisis” affecting millions of Syrian children that will hurt the country’s future.“The combination of conflict, displacement, poverty, and now COVID-19, has created the conditions in which millions of children are missing out on an education,” said Khush.She said schools should be safe places where children can flourish, but in Syria, many schools are attacked, used by armed groups and are littered with unexploded devices.Syria has been in steep economic decline, with its currency — the Syrian pound — plummeting in value since 2019 as inflation soars. Khush said that has led many children to leave school to work and help support their families. They are at risk of never returning to the classroom.IS Winning Battle in Syria’s Displaced-Persons Camps Officials warn US-backed forces are struggling to contain persistent threat from terror group, its criminal affiliates, who may be outgunned but aren’t outnumbered Cross border aid fight brewingIn northwest Syria, which is outside government control, critical humanitarian assistance is brought in entirely through a single cross-border checkpoint from Turkey. The U.N.’s Lowcock said those supplies help 2.4 million people monthly.“Without the cross-border operation, doctors in northwest Syria, like some of those I spoke to, would not be able to provide those children the care that they need to survive,” he said. “They would not have the resources and supplies to carry on within quite a short period of time, they said. The situation would go from terrible to catastrophic.”In the past 13 months, the United Nations has lost three of the four border crossings it used to bring humanitarian assistance into Syria from neighboring countries. Due to objections and obstruction from Russia and China on behalf of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government at the Security Council, authorizations for those crossings were not renewed.Damascus prefers all aid to originate internally, but such cross-line deliveries have been insufficient and open the door to regime interference on where the aid goes.The only remaining crossing point, Bab al-Hawa, is up for renewal in July. But it appears Russia has not changed its stance and may seek to block authorization with its veto.“There is no doubt that keeping the cross-border mechanism will also mean keeping supporting terrorists, who are living on what they have extorted and also on how they are controlling smuggling,” Russian Ambassador Vassily Nebenzia told the council.“If we all had to make a decision on the extension of the cross-border mechanism tomorrow, I fear that we would not have any convincing grounds to do so,” he added.The U.N. said conditions in the northwest are worse now than when the council took up the issue last July.“A failure to extend the authorization in the future would trigger suffering and loss of life potentially on a very large scale,” Lowcock said.
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A new study finds the new Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 vaccine is as effective in real-world use as it was during its late-stage clinical trials. In a large-scale study of 1.2 million people, researchers at Israel’s Clalit Research Institute found the two-dose vaccine reduced symptomatic cases of COVID-19 by 94% across all age groups, and reduced severe illnesses by 92%.  Researchers also found that a single shot of the vaccine was 57% effective after just two weeks.FILE – People queue to receive a vaccine against COVID-19 at a makeshift vaccination site in Petah Tikva, Israel, Jan. 28, 2021.The peer-reviewed study, published Wednesday in The New England Journal of Medicine, is the first analysis of a national COVID-19 vaccination strategy.   Late-stage clinical trials of the Pfizer-BioNTech showed the vaccine was 95% effective in combating the novel coronavirus.   South Africa variantMeanwhile, Moderna says it has developed a new version of its two-dose vaccine targeted to combat the COVID-19 variant first identified in South Africa. The U.S.-based pharmaceutical company has sent a small amount of the new version to the U.S. National Institutes of Health for additional study.   FILE – Tiffany Husak, left, a nursing student at the Community College of Allegheny County, receives her first dose of the Moderna COVID-19 vaccine, during a vaccination clinic in Pittsburgh, Jan. 28, 2021.Moderna is also testing whether to add a third booster shot to its current two-dose regimen to determine whether it can create the immunity needed to fight the South African variant.   Both Pfizer and Moderna say they plan to increase their output of the vaccine within the next few months, with Pfizer doubling its output to 13 million doses per week by mid-March, with Moderna hoping to deliver 40 million doses per month by April.  European Union leaders will meet Thursday via videoconference to discuss ways to improve the slow pace of the production and distribution of COVID-19 vaccines.  Concerns are growing among the 27-member regional bloc that the fast-spreading variants recently detected in Britain and South Africa will be resistant to the new vaccines.   Tokyo Olympic Games
In Japan, organizers for the postponed Tokyo Summer Olympic Games are placing a number of coronavirus-related restrictions on spectators coming out to witness the traditional relay of the Olympic torch.    The relay will begin March 25 in the northwestern prefecture of Fukushima, the site of the March 2011 nuclear disaster triggered by an earthquake and subsequent tsunami.    President of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics Organizing Committee Seiko Hashimoto (R) speaks with Tokyo 2020 Vice Director-General Yukihiko Nunomura (L) before the press briefing on operation and media coverage of Olympic Torch Relay in Tokyo, Feb. 25, 2021.Yukihiko Nunomura, the vice director-general of the Tokyo 2020 organizing committee, announced Thursday that spectators will be required to wear masks, and will not be allowed to eat or drink except for water to avoid heatstroke.  Cheering and shouting is also banned, but spectators can clap as the torch relay passes by.    Organizers say spectators will be required to preregister for a spot at each relay point to witness the torch’s arrival, but Nunomura said the relay could be stopped if too many spectators gather along the route.    The 2020 Tokyo Olympics were postponed for a year as the novel coronavirus outbreak evolved into a global pandemic.  However, recent public opinion polls indicate an overwhelming majority of Japanese believe the games should be postponed again or canceled, with Tokyo and other areas under a state of emergency to quell a surge of new infections.   The opening ceremony for the postponed Games will be held on July 23.   
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Australia has become the world’s first nation to make digital companies such as Facebook and Google pay domestic news outlets for their content.Parliament approved the law Thursday that would allow a government arbitrator to decide the price a digital company should pay news outlets if the two sides fail to reach an agreement.The final legislation includes a set of amendments as part of an agreement reached Tuesday between the Australian government and Facebook. The amendments include a two-month mediation period that would give social media giants and news publishers extra time to broker agreements before they are forced to abide by the government’s provisions.The agreements ended a stalemate that prompted Facebook to block all Australian news content last week, preventing them from being viewed or shared. The websites of several public agencies and emergency services were also blocked on Facebook, including pages that include up-to-date information on COVID-19 outbreaks, brushfires and other natural disasters.
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Residents at an assisted living facility in the US are getting a taste of life before the coronavirus pandemic. Thanks to a “hug tent,” residents can – while wearing plastic sleeves – embrace and hold hands with their families. More from VOA’s Mariama Diallo.
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The COVID-19 vaccine rollout to date has been far from equitable. The vast majority of doses have gone to high-income countries, but a World Health Organization program aiming to change that delivered its first shots Wednesday, in Ghana. VOA’s Steve Baragona has more.
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At a dog training center in Myakka City, Florida, Heather Junqueira, founder of BioScent, brings a four-year-old beagle, Noel, into a room with stainless-steel canisters, several containing samples of COVID-19.   Noel springs into action as she tries to find the ones with a smell that she knows will earn her praise and dog treats. It only takes Noel only a few seconds to figure out which ones contain gauze pads wiped with sweat or surgical masks worn by people infected with COVID.  Heather Junqueira, founder of BioScent in Myakka City, Florida, gives a reward treat to Noel, a beagle, after she successfully detects a sample of COVID-19 in a canister. (Courtesy of BioScent)BioScent, which trains medical detection dogs, was focusing on research with canines sniffing out certain cancers. But Junqueira switched gears last April after the coronavirus pandemic hit. “I realized the importance of this research,” she told VOA, “and how we might save a lot of lives.” Junqueira discovered it is easier for her dogs to detect COVID-19 than cancer.  “The virus must have a much stronger odor, which is really the body’s response to the virus,” she said, which humans cannot smell.  Dogs have up to 300 million scent receptors as compared to about 6 million in humans. Hounds, including beagles like Noel, have famously sensitive snouts. The results of her study have been “incredibly successful,” Junqueira said, with the dogs recognizing the COVID samples about 95 percent of the time.  This is in line with the high success rates of other studies worldwide that have been released so far, explained Tommy Dickey, professor emeritus at the University of California, Santa Barbara. He collaborated with Junquiera on an article that focused on using medical scent dogs to detect COVID-19 that was published in the Journal of the American Osteopathic Association in February.   Dickey pointed out “the most striking result is that studies have already demonstrated that dogs can identify people who are COVID-19 positive.” And “they can do it non-intrusively, more rapidly and with comparable or possibly better accuracy than our conventional detection tests,” he added.The National Veterinary School of Alfort in France is among the global institutions doing research on dogs’ ability to detect COVID-19. (Courtesy of veterinary professor Dominique Grandjean)For example, experiments by French and Lebanese researchers concluded that dogs could determine COVID on human sweat samples with high accuracy. And the same was true in Colombia, where trained scent dogs could detect the virus from respiratory secretions. Most of the research dogs are doing a better job than the COVID rapid test by “hitting above 90 percent right now,” Junquiera said.  And that is true at some airports, where the dogs are being used in pilot projects to detect COVID.  At the Dubai airport in the United Arab Emirates, a police dog trained to detect COVID-19 smells a sweat sample from a passenger to determine if the virus is on it. (Courtesy of Emirates News Agency)In the United Arab Emirates, the Dubai airport is using specially trained police dogs to sniff COVID. A sweat sample is taken from arriving passengers, which is placed in a metal funnel for the dog to smell. If the virus is detected, then the passengers must take a nasal test.   In a pilot program at Sweden’s Helsinki airport, trained dogs could determine if arriving passengers were infected with COVID-19. The volunteer passengers wiped their skin with a cloth for the dogs to smell. (Courtesy photo)At an airport in Helsinki, Norway, some arriving passengers volunteered to wipe their skin with cloth that was placed in a canister for the canines to smell. The dogs indicated the test was positive by yelping, pawing or lying down.  Aside from airports, collaborators Dickey and Janquiera said COVID scent-trained dogs could be useful in places like train stations, schools and hospitals, as well as at large public gatherings, including concerts and sporting events. Janquiera said she has already been approached by a sports team and casino in Florida about the possibility of utilizing her dogs in the future.   
 
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