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https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014257

China launched a new Earth-observation satellite from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China on Thursday.

The satellite, Gaofen-3 03, was launched by a Long March-4C rocket at 7:47 a.m. (Beijing Time) and has entered the planned orbit successfully.

The launch marks the 414th mission for the Long March series carrier rockets.

Published : April 07, 2022

By : Xinhua

#SootinClaimon.Com : ขอบคุณแหล่งข้อมูล : หนังสือพิมพ์ The Nation.

https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014255

The minister explained masks would still be required in certain situations, such as on public transport, in hospitals and in residential care homes.

Spain’s Health Minister Carolina Darias said on Wednesday that she has proposed to the government that face mask legislation for most indoor settings be removed after the Easter holidays.
 

If the government goes ahead with the plan, the new rule is likely to be in force on April 20.

“I have proposed that in the Cabinet meeting (held on April 19) we will pass a decree that will mean masks are no longer obligatory indoors,” Darias said on the ministry’s social media site, adding the change would come into effect the following day.

People wearing face masks are seen in Madrid, Spain, Feb. 1, 2022. (Xinhua/Meng Dingbo)

“Thanks to the high level of immunization in the population, we are in a favorable situation,” she said.

The minister explained masks would still be required in certain situations, such as on public transport, in hospitals and in residential care homes.

Spain ended the obligatory use of face masks outdoors in February.

Spain has recorded a total of 11,578,653 COVID-19 cases and 102,747 deaths since the start of the pandemic, according to official data. 

Hospital and military personnels work at a vaccination point in Seville University in Seville, Spain, on Jan. 7, 2022. (Photo by Gustavo Valiente/Xinhua)

Published : April 07, 2022

By : Xinhua

#SootinClaimon.Com : ขอบคุณแหล่งข้อมูล : หนังสือพิมพ์ The Nation.

https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014254

The leaders reaffirmed their common position to further develop the Russian-Serbian strategic partnership.

Russian President Vladimir Putin and Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic reiterated their readiness to deepen bilateral relations during a phone conversation on Wednesday.
 

Putin congratulated Vucic on his victory in the presidential elections on Sunday and the success of his party in the parliamentary elections, the Kremlin said in a statement.

The leaders reaffirmed their common position to further develop the Russian-Serbian strategic partnership and expand trade and economic ties, including in the energy sector.

They also discussed the situation in Kosovo and the negotiations between the Russian and Ukrainian delegations.

Published : April 07, 2022

By : Xinhua

#SootinClaimon.Com : ขอบคุณแหล่งข้อมูล : หนังสือพิมพ์ The Nation.

https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014253

A new comprehensive Israeli study has found that a fourth COVID-19 vaccine dose triples the protection against severe illness in people aged 60 and over, compared with three-dose protection, the Israeli Health Ministry said Tuesday.

The study, published in the New England Journal of Medicine, was conducted by the ministry, three leading Israeli universities and the Sheba Medical Center, Israel’s largest hospital.
 

Using the ministry database, the researchers extracted data on 1,252,331 persons who were 60 years of age or older and eligible for a fourth dose.

It was conducted during a period in which the Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2 was predominant, between January 10 and March 2 in 2022.

Except for the three-fold lower severe illness rate among the fourth-dose vaccinated, it was found that the protection did not decline throughout the study’s eight-week period.

The rate of verified COVID-19 cases among the fourth-dose vaccinated people was twice as low as the three-dose group, but protection against confirmed infection appeared short-lived, according to the study.

A medical staff member wearing protective gear tends to a patient in the COVID-19 ward at Beilinson Hospital Rabin Medical Center in the central Israeli city of Petah Tikva on Feb. 1, 2022. (Gideon Markowicz/JINI via Xinhua)

Published : April 07, 2022

By : Xinhua

#SootinClaimon.Com : ขอบคุณแหล่งข้อมูล : หนังสือพิมพ์ The Nation.

https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014252

U.S. President Joe Biden will sign an executive order banning new investment in Russia by Americans no matter where they live, a factsheet from the White House said, adding the executive order aims to “ensure the enduring weakening of the Russian Federation’s global competitiveness.”

The United States on Wednesday imposed additional sanctions on Russia for its military operation in Ukraine, targeting the country’s major financial institutions and the two daughters of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
 

According to a factsheet from the White House detailing the measures, the United States will impose full blocking sanctions on Russia’s largest financial institution, Sberbank, and the country’s largest private bank, Alfa Bank, freezing any of the two banks’ assets in the U.S. financial system and prohibiting Americans from doing business with them.

U.S. President Joe Biden will sign an executive order banning new investment in Russia by Americans no matter where they live, the factsheet said, adding the executive order aims to “ensure the enduring weakening of the Russian Federation’s global competitiveness.”

Additionally, Americans will no longer be allowed to conduct business transactions with major Russian state-owned enterprises, whose assets subject to U.S. jurisdiction will be frozen. The Department of the Treasury will announce the names of these entities Thursday.

A man walks into a Sberbank office in Moscow, Russia, Feb. 25, 2022. (Xinhua/Evgeny Sinitsyn)

Full blocking sanctions will be imposed on Putin’s two adult daughters, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov’s wife and daughter, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin as well as former Russia President and Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev, who is now deputy chairman of the Security Council of Russia.

As a result, these individuals will be cut off from the U.S. financial system and the Biden administration will freeze the assets they hold in the United States.

Separately, the Treasury Department on Tuesday barred Russia from making debt payments with U.S. dollars from accounts at U.S. financial institutions, making it harder for the Russian government to meet its financial obligations.

The White House said in the factsheet that the United States and its allies will still allow Western companies to operate in Russia in sectors related to basic food provision, medicine and health care as well as telecommunications services, so as to alleviate the sanctions’ negative impact on ordinary Russians.

If necessary, the factsheet added, appropriate exemptions and carveouts will be issued to ensure humanitarian activities are not disrupted. 

Published : April 07, 2022

By : Xinhua

#SootinClaimon.Com : ขอบคุณแหล่งข้อมูล : หนังสือพิมพ์ The Nation.

https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014240

Despite downside risks posed by geopolitical events including the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the U.S. economy entered this period of uncertainty “with considerable momentum in demand and a strong labor market,” U.S. Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard noted.

U.S. Federal Reserve Governor Lael Brainard said Tuesday that it is “of paramount importance” to get inflation down, noting that the central bank is “prepared to take stronger action” if inflation indicators show such action is warranted.

“Currently, inflation is much too high and is subject to upside risks,” Brainard, U.S. President Joe Biden’s nominee to serve as the central bank’s vice chair, said in prepared remarks at a virtual event held by the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis.

“All Americans are confronting higher prices, but the burden is particularly great for households with more limited resources,” Brainard said, noting that lower-income households “disproportionately” feel the burden of high inflation.

Lower-income families expend a greater share of their income on necessities, have smaller financial cushions, and may have less ability to switch to lower-priced alternatives, she said.

U.S. personal consumption expenditures (PCE), the Fed’s preferred inflation measure, surged 6.4 percent in February over the past year, the Commerce Department reported last week. The index is well above the Federal Reserve’s 2 percent target on inflation.

People have meals at a restaurant in New York, the United States, March 7, 2022. (Xinhua/Wang Ying)

The core PCE, which excludes the volatile food and energy prices, was up 5.4 percent in February from the same period last year, marking the biggest jump in nearly four decades.

Despite downside risks posed by geopolitical events including the Russia-Ukraine conflict, the U.S. economy entered this period of uncertainty “with considerable momentum in demand and a strong labor market,” Brainard noted.

As of the March labor report, payroll employment has increased at a pace of 600,000 jobs per month over the past six months, and the unemployment rate has fallen by a percentage point, she noted. Latest data from the Labor Department showed that the unemployment rate in March dropped by 0.2 percentage point to 3.6 percent, just slightly above the pre-pandemic level of 3.5 percent.

Noting that the recovery in labor force participation was “lagging far behind” until recently, the Fed official said the pandemic constraints on labor supply are diminishing for the prime-age workforce. The labor force participation rate was at 62.4 percent in March, still one percentage point below the pre-pandemic level of 63.4 percent.

“An increase in labor supply associated with diminishing pandemic constraints combined with a moderation in demand associated with tightening financial conditions, slowing foreign growth, and a large decrease in fiscal support could be expected to reduce (labor market) imbalances later in the year,” Brainard said.

The Federal Open Market Committee, the Fed’s policy-making body, will continue tightening monetary policy methodically through a series of interest rate increases and by starting to reduce the balance sheet at a rapid pace as soon as its May meeting, Brainard said.

Given that the recovery has been considerably stronger and faster than in the previous cycle, Brainard said she expected the balance sheet to shrink considerably more rapidly than in the previous recovery.

At its March policy meeting, the Fed raised its benchmark interest rate by a quarter percentage point to a range of 0.25 percent to 0.5 percent from near zero, marking its first rate hike since 2018 and a major step in exiting from the ultra-loose monetary policy enacted at the start of the pandemic.

Several Fed officials, including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell, have recently signaled their willingness to support a 0.5-percentage point rate hike at the central bank’s May policy meeting, instead of a traditional quarter-point increase. 

Published : April 06, 2022

By : Xinhua

#SootinClaimon.Com : ขอบคุณแหล่งข้อมูล : หนังสือพิมพ์ The Nation.

https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014239

As Russia produces goods that are also produced in large quantities in Canada (crude oil, natural gas, grains, lumber, metals, fertilizer, etc.), export values could be indirectly affected by higher demand and substantial price increases, given the consequences of the conflict on the future supply of these goods, Statistics Canada explained.

The various trade sanctions against Russia indirectly drove up Canadian export values with higher demand and substantial price increases, Statistics Canada said Tuesday, publishing trade data in February with crude oil contributing the most to the export growth.

According to Statistics Canada data, total trade (exports plus imports) with Russia was 2.8 billion Canadian dollars (2.2 billion U.S. dollars) in 2021, representing 0.2 percent of Canadian trade activity. As a result, the direct impact of the various trade sanctions imposed by a number of countries against Russia is minimal for Canadian merchandise trade values.

As Russia produces goods that are also produced in large quantities in Canada (crude oil, natural gas, grains, lumber, metals, fertilizer, etc.), export values could be indirectly affected by higher demand and substantial price increases, given the consequences of the conflict on the future supply of these goods, Statistics Canada explained.

In February, total exports increased 2.8 percent to a record 58.7 billion Canadian dollars (47 billion U.S. dollars). Exports of energy products rose 7.8 percent to a record 15.4 billion Canadian dollars (12.3 billion U.S. dollars), accounting for 26.2 percent of total exports, an increase of more than 6 percentage points from the share of 19.7 percent observed in February 2021.

Export values of crude oil jumped by 9.9 percent, contributing the most to the growth, largely due to higher prices. The volume of crude oil exports increased 3.9 percent in February, following a decrease of 6.5 percent in January.

Statistics Canada said the imbalance between supply and demand that has persisted for several months, in addition to the uncertainty surrounding the future supply of crude oil due to rising tensions between Russia and Ukraine in late February, is among the causes of the increase in crude oil prices.

Published : April 06, 2022

By : Xinhua

#SootinClaimon.Com : ขอบคุณแหล่งข้อมูล : หนังสือพิมพ์ The Nation.

https://www.nationthailand.com/international/40014237

“A future in which we are to respond to the next Disease X with new vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics in just 100 days is possible – but it will take vision, political will, and commensurate financial investments from governments around the world,” said Richard Hatchett, CEO of CEPI.

The International Monetary Fund (IMF) and three other global organizations on Tuesday urged the allocation of 15 billion U.S. dollars in grants this year to fight pandemics and strengthen health systems both domestically and overseas.

The IMF, in partnership with the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), the Global Fund, and Wellcome Trust, published “A Global Strategy to Manage the Long-term Risks of COVID-19” working paper, which calls for a more “comprehensive” and “integrated” pandemic response from the international community.

“It is now evident that COVID-19 will be with us for the long term, and there are very different scenarios for how it could evolve, from a mild endemic scenario to a dangerous variant scenario,” the working paper noted.

“This realization calls for a new strategy that manages both the uncertainty and the long-term risks of COVID-19,” it continued.

A medical staff member adjusts a sign in the wind at a fast COVID-19 test screening tent in Paris, France, April 1, 2022. (Xinhua/Gao Jing)

“Overall, health security is economic security,” said IMF’s First Deputy Managing Director Gita Gopinath, who previously served as the Fund’s chief economist. “The international community should recognize that its pandemic financing addresses a systemic risk to the global economy.”

Gopinath noted that the IMF’s January World Economic Outlook Update estimated the cumulative losses from the pandemic to reach 13.8 trillion dollars from 2020 to 2024. “The cost of inaction – for all of us – is very high. We need to act – now,” she said.

Echoing her remarks, Jeremy Farrar, director of Wellcome Trust and a renowned medical researcher, said “now is not the time to ease up,” noting that the virus’ next move is “anything but certain” and the risk of new variants remains high.

“We need to set our sights on developing next generation vaccines that can block transmission and won’t require endless boosters, strengthening genomic surveillance globally so we can identify and track new variants and improving global access to vaccines, treatments and tests,” Farrar said. “Leaving any countries unprotected puts us all at risk.”

The newly released working paper laid out four policy implications: achieve equitable access beyond vaccines to encompass a comprehensive toolkit; monitor the evolving virus and dynamically upgrade the toolkit; transition from the acute response to a sustainable strategy toward COVID-19, balanced and integrated with other health and social priorities; adopt a unified risk-mitigation approach to future infectious disease threats beyond COVID-19.

Accordingly, the international community should allocate additional funding to fight pandemics and strengthen health systems both domestically and overseas, the paper argued. This will require about 15 billion dollars in grants this year and 10 billion dollars annually after that.

“This price tag is substantial, but failure to invest now – and build on the gains made in the response to COVID-19 – will result in human and economic costs that will reverberate for generations,” said Richard Hatchett, CEO of CEPI.

“A future in which we are to respond to the next Disease X with new vaccines, therapeutics, and diagnostics in just 100 days is possible – but it will take vision, political will, and commensurate financial investments from governments around the world,” Hatchett said.

Peter Sands, executive director of Global Fund, believed that the next phase of the fight against COVID-19 will be different. “We are in for a long fight against a virus that continues to evolve. So we must shift to a more sustainable response that recognizes the linkages between responding to COVID-19, tackling the earlier pandemics of HIV, TB (Tuberculosis) and malaria, and preparing for future pandemic threats,” he said.

The working paper also showed that one of the dangerous legacies of the COVID-19 pandemic, exacerbated by the consequences of Russia-Ukraine war, is weakened capacity in developing countries to invest in their people (including in health) combined with lower appetite for grant support for development as countries prioritize their economies.

“This means the fundamental problem of weak health systems in developing countries and under-investment in global health threats will remain – unless securing resilience is recognized as a common goal and its financing is taken up as a global priority,” according to the paper. 

A boy wearing a face mask poses for photos with a COVID-19 vaccination “passport” after being vaccinated outside a vaccination site in Toronto, Canada, on Dec. 12, 2021. (Photo by Zou Zheng/Xinhua)

Published : April 06, 2022

By : Xinhua