Patrick Gaspard discusses his Haitian dissident parents, meeting Mandela and protecting democracy
Barack Obama could be forgiven for considering himself a big shot. But Patrick Gaspard used to keep his ego in check.
“You’re of course an extraordinary historic figure but I’m sorry, this doesn’t compare,” Gaspard would joke, “meeting Nelson Mandela will always be the top of Mount Kilimanjaro for me.”
Continue reading...Desmond Tutu, the cleric and social activist who was a giant of the struggle against apartheid in South Africa, has died aged 90
More reaction to Tutu’s death from South African president, Cyril Ramaphosa, and the archbishop of Cape Town, Thabo Makgoba:
Ramaphosa said:
The passing of Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Tutu is another chapter of bereavement in our nation*s farewell to a generation of outstanding South Africans who have bequeathed us a liberated South Africa.
Desmond Tutu was a patriot without equal; a leader of principle and pragmatism who gave meaning to the biblical insight that faith without works is dead.
Desmond Tutu’s legacy is moral strength, moral courage and clarity. He felt with the people. In public and alone, he cried because he felt people’s pain. And he laughed * no, not just laughed, he cackled with delight when he shared their joy.
The loss of Archbishop Emeritus Desmond Mpilo Tutu is immeasurable. He was larger than life, and for so many in South Africa and around the world his life has been a blessing. His contributions to struggles against injustice, locally and globally, are matched only by the depth of his thinking about the making of liberatory futures for human societies. He was an extraordinary human being. A thinker. A leader. A shepherd. Our thoughts are with his family and friends at this most difficult time.
“The Arch meant everything to me,” said foundation chief executive Sello Hatang. “I first met him during the work of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, and was privileged to work with him on a number of projects over the years. He was a friend to Madiba and to the Foundation.”
Continue reading...The Nobel laureate, often described as the moral conscience of his nation, died on Boxing Day in Cape Town
Desmond Tutu, the cleric and social activist who was a giant of the struggle against apartheid in South Africa, has died aged 90.
Tutu, described by foreign observers and his countrymen as the moral conscience of his nation, died in Cape Town on Boxing Day.
Continue reading...Scientists warn, however, that lower severity of cases is not fully understood and may not occur elsewhere
South Africa has reported data on Covid cases driven by the Omicron variant that appears to give added impetus to claims the country is experiencing a lower severity of disease.
“In South Africa, this is the epidemiology: Omicron is behaving in a way that is less severe,” said Prof Cheryl Cohen of the country’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD), one of the authors of the study.
Continue reading...Lazare Eloundou Assomo wants to address imbalance that benefits rich nations and protect sites threatened by climate crisis and war
It covers 9 million sq miles (24m sq km) from the Atlantic to the Indian Ocean and from the Sahara in the north to Cape Point in the south. And in between lie some of the world’s most ancient cultural sites and precious natural wonders.
However, despite its vast size, sub-Saharan Africa has never been proportionately represented on Unesco’s world heritage list, its 98 sites dwarfed by Europe, North America and Asia.
Continue reading...Research in South Africa raises hopes that similar responses may be present with other vaccines
South African researchers examining how the body’s immune system responds to the Omicron variant have identified that T-cells in people who have had the Pfizer vaccine continue to be robust in potentially protecting against severe illness despite Omicron’s ability to evade other defences.
The research raises hopes that similar responses may be present with other vaccines and within unvaccinated individuals who have been infected with coronavirus.
Continue reading...Carcasses found in four provinces, including one pregnant female, with nine arrests made
Poachers have killed 24 rhinos in South Africa during the first two weeks of December after a lull in killings during the Covid pandemic.
On Tuesday, the South African environment ministry said carcasses had been discovered in four provinces across the country since the beginning of the month, with seven rhinos found dead in Kruger national park, six in KwaZulu-Natal and seven in Mpumalanga. Four, including a pregnant female, were shot dead by poachers at a game reserve in the Western Cape last week while a fifth is being treated for gunshot wounds.
Continue reading...British tourists banned from entering France from Saturday; border controls in Portugal extended beyond 9 January to limit Omicron spread
New Zealand has detected its first case of the Omicron Covid-19 variant in a Christchurch managed isolation facility.
On Thursday afternoon, the director general of health Dr Ashley Bloomfield said:
This is a person who is in managed isolation in Christchurch. The person arrived in New Zealand on a flight from Germany via Dubai that landed in Auckland...the people on that flight were transferred to Christchurch on a chartered domestic flight trip with all our usual protocols.
We fully expected we will find a case of Omicron and in fact, we are treating every border related case as if it were Omicron until proven otherwise. We have good protocols in place that are designed to stop the virus getting across the border.”
Continue reading...First confirmed Omicron case in mainland China is detected in Tianjin; Norway to act amid record high infections and hospitalisations
South Africa has reported an additional 37,875 new coronavirus cases, which includes 19,840 retrospective cases and 18,035 new cases, according to the National Institute for Communicable Diseases (NICD).
In the past 24 hours a total of 18,035 positive Covid-19 cases and 21 Covid-related deaths were reported.
I’m worried that PNG is the next place where a new variant emerges.”
Continue reading...An army of riders ferry food around the South African city, their lives and travails largely unseen by the people they serve. Photojournalist James Oatway has spent several months documenting their challenges
It’s a Friday night in Johannesburg. Lockdown has just been eased as Covid infection rates have plateaued. The restive city is slowly springing back to life, with cars once again careering along the city’s recently empty arterial roads.
At the scene of a crash, the blue and red lights of emergency vehicles bathe the street in an eerie glow. Two motorbike food couriers have been knocked down by a car. The driver tried to flee but was apprehended by another motorist. One of the bikes has been flattened. Next to it lies a black canvas carrier bag bearing the Uber Eats logo.
A Congolese driver was seriously injured in a crash in Sandton. Footage showed a car going through a red light and hitting the rider. The vehicle did not stop and the driver has never been apprehended.
Continue reading...Analysis: experts say weakened immune systems may give rise to new Covid variants – so HIV prevention could be key to stopping coronavirus
Where did Omicron come from? By all accounts it is a weird variant. Though highly mutated, it descended not from one of the other variants of concern, such as Alpha, Beta or Delta, but from coronavirus that was circulating maybe 18 months ago. So where has it been all this time? And why is it only wreaking havoc now?
Researchers are exploring a number of hunches. One is that Omicron arose in a remote region of southern Africa but failed to spread until now. Another is that it evolved in infected animals, such as rats, and then crossed back into humans. But a third explanation is gaining ground as more data come to light, that Omicron arose in a person with a weakened immune system: someone having cancer treatment perhaps, an organ transplant patient or someone with uncontrolled HIV.
Continue reading...Concerns over equipment shortages, bottlenecks and hesitancy on continent with 7.5% vaccine coverage
With 1bn doses of Covid vaccines expected to arrive in Africa in the coming months, concern has shifted to a global shortage of equipment required to deliver them, such as syringes, as well as insufficient planning in some countries that could create bottlenecks in the rollout.
After a troubled start to vaccination programmes on the continent, health officials are examining ways to encourage take-up as some countries have had to throw away doses.
Continue reading...Private healthcare provider says symptoms in country’s fourth wave are far milder than in previous waves
Covid cases in South Africa have surged by 255% in the past seven days but there is mounting anecdotal evidence that infections with the Omicron variant are provoking milder symptoms than in previous waves.
According to a South African private healthcare provider, the recent rise in infections – which includes the Omicron and Delta variants – has been accompanied by a much smaller increase in admissions to intensive care beds, echoing an earlier report from the country’s National Institute for Communicable Disease (NICD).
Continue reading...The race is on to understand the new variant identified by scientists in South Africa and Botswana, dubbed Omicron (the next Greek letter was “nu”, but this could have been mistaken for “new”). Fears include greater spread, worse disease or reduced effectiveness of treatments and vaccines.
Increased transmission can arise from two factors. First, there is an intrinsic advantage, with a heightened “basic reproduction number” R0; in a susceptible population, that is the average number of people each case infects, although after 20 months of pandemic this has become a notional concept. It was around 3 for the original wild-type virus, compared to around 6 for Delta and possibly rather more for Omicron.
Continue reading...Scientists are racing to establish the variant’s transmissibility, effect on immune system and chance of hospitalisation or death
Three major issues will determine the magnitude of the impact of the new Omicron variant of the Covid virus will have on the nation and the rest of the planet. What is the transmissibility of this new Covid variant? How good is it at evading the antibodies and T-cells that make up a person’s immune defences? What are the chances it will trigger severe illness that could lead to the hospitalisation, and possibly death, of an infected person.
Scientists are struggling to find definitive answers to these critically important questions, although evidence already suggests Omicron has the potential to cause serious disruption. “The situation is very finely tuned and could go in many different directions,” says Prof Rowland Kao of Edinburgh University.
Continue reading...Officials say variant’s R number is believed to be above 6, though most cases are mild and no deaths reported
The pace of Covid infections in the South African province of Gauteng is outstripping anything seen in previous waves, and officials say Omicron is now the dominant variant.
Angelique Coetzee, the chair of the South African Medical Association, said Omicron’s R number, measuring its ability to spread, was believed to be above 6. The R number for Delta, the dominant variant globally, is estimated to be above 5.
Continue reading...More than 100 cases of new variant have now been found in England; Strict social distancing will be required in Ireland’s bars and restaurants with mandatory table service and a maximum of six people per table
California is reporting its second confirmed case of the Omicron variant in as many days.
The Los Angeles County public health department says a full vaccinated county resident is self-isolating after apparently contracting the infection during a trip to South Africa last month.
Continue reading...Judgment rules company can blast sound waves in search for oil along South Africa’s eastern coastline
Royal Dutch Shell will move ahead with seismic tests to explore for oil in vital whale breeding grounds along South Africa’s eastern coastline after a court dismissed an 11th-hour legal challenge by environmental groups.
The judgment, by a South African high court, allows Shell to begin firing within days extremely loud sound waves through the relatively untouched marine environment of the Wild Coast, which is home to whales, dolphins and seals.
Continue reading...Analysis: UK’s early vaccine deployment and use of different vaccines from South Africa mean it’s too soon to say
Omicron is causing consternation around the world, with the variant found to be behind an exponential rise in Covid cases in South Africa. Yet with just 42 cases confirmed in the UK so far, and most European countries seeing numbers in the double rather than triple figures, could this be a tentative sign the variant may fail to take hold outside southern Africa? The bottom line is, it is too soon to say.
One issue is that there are important differences that make it difficult to compare the situations in South Africa and beyond.
Continue reading...Scientists warn of higher rate of repeat infections but say vaccines appear to protect against serious illness
The Omicron variant of Covid-19 appears to be reinfecting people at three times the rate of previous strains, experts in South Africa have said, as public health officials and scientists from around the world closely monitor developments in the country where it was first identified.
As the EU’s public health agency warned that Omicron could cause more than half of all new Covid infections in Europe within the next few months, evidence was emerging, however, that vaccines still appear to offer protection against serious illness.
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