The mostly white development sector only funds efforts led by more ‘legitimate’ people. We need support from the diaspora
Being poor, black and from sub-Saharan Africa is the hardest thing you can ever be. But that is what I am.
Before Covid-19 came, extreme poverty had largely become a problem of only one part of the world – sub-Saharan Africa. According to the World Bank in 2018, the region was projected to host more than 90% of the world’s extreme poor by 2030.
Continue reading...Company says adapting recruitment processes for neurodiverse groups disproportionately affected by unemployment has led to increased innovation
Talking to people can be difficult for Rishabh Birla, but his last job demanded he did a lot of it. He has autism and finds making eye contact uncomfortable. For Birla, the rules of conversation are puzzling and he sometimes veers off course, alarming the other person.
A 25-year-old postgraduate, Birla had been working at a cosmetics startup in Thane, not far from Mumbai. “The job involved communicating with different clients to keep track of their orders. It was exhausting to interact with so people every day,” he says.
Continue reading...Those who rose up against dictatorship believe their example will inspire another generation
Ten years ago they were overthrowing Egyptian dictator Hosni Mubarak. Now they are in exile in Britain, under threat of imprisonment by the military regime. For Cairo’s revolutionaries, it has been a long journey of high hopes and broken dreams.
“I was part of a historical moment,” says Sayed, 39. He was working in the Middle East in December 2010 when Mohamed Bouazizi, a street vendor in Tunisia, set himself on fire in a protest against his treatment by local officials. Fuelled by social media coverage, the incident sparked protests around the region, including in Egypt, where crowds flocked to Tahrir Square in Cairo demanding the overthrow of Mubarak.
Continue reading...Teargas and water cannon also deployed on fourth day of protests against last week’s coup
Police in Myanmar have responded with increasing violence to protests against last week’s military coup, using water cannons, rubber bullets and live ammunition in a crackdown that left a woman in a critical condition on Tuesday.
Tens of thousands of people marched in towns and cities across the country in defiance of a ban on gatherings in some areas to voice their opposition to the military takeover of the government.
Continue reading...Health ministry sends team to investigate ‘concerning’ virus cases in Yanomami territory near Venezuelan border
Ten Yanomami children died from Covid-19 in January, fueling fears over the disproportionate impact the coronavirus is having on vulnerable indigenous communities in the Brazilian Amazon.
“It is very concerning that so many kids died in less than one month,” said Júnior Hekurari Yanomami, the head of Condisi-YY, an indigenous health council.
Continue reading...John Magufuli’s cavalier disregard of Covid’s impact in the great lakes region is fuelling conspiracies and endangering lives
What is wrong with President John Magufuli? Many people in and outside Tanzania are asking this question.
Magufuli claimed last year that God had eliminated Covid in the east African country of 60 million people, and has since made dismissing Covid vaccines his central priority – leaving many people asking: why?
Continue reading...Natural disaster compounded by the collapse of a lucrative export during the pandemic has thrust people into poverty
This time last year the west coast of Bangladesh was a thriving place for shrimp farmers. It was a decent enough living and there was a healthy export market.
Majnu Sardar, who lives in Koyra upazila (administrative region) in Khulna district, used to earn enough to feed, clothe and educate his family of six. Now they are living in a small mud hut, with a canopy of leaves as a roof, on the banks of the Kapotaksha River after Cyclone Amphan buried his house and land in May.
Continue reading...Water cannon used on demonstrators in the capital as marches take place in cities and towns across the country
Massive crowds of anti-coup protesters have marched in towns and cities across Myanmar on the third day of street demonstrations against a coup a week ago in which the army detained elected leader Aung San Suu Kyi.
From the Himalayan town of Putao to cities on the shore of the Andaman Sea, demonstrators came out in the biggest numbers so far since the coup.
Continue reading...Pace for vaccinations has slowed as government website to register crashes repeatedly and Covid death toll is third highest
Rodolfo spent hour after aggravating hour trying to register his elderly mother for a Covid-19 vaccination through a Mexican government website, only for the system to crash repeatedly.
“I spent three days fighting with the website,” he said. “My mom would have been unable to do it without me.”
Continue reading...Childbirth rights group supports examination into disproportionate health outcomes
An urgent inquiry to investigate how alleged systemic racism in the NHS manifests itself in maternity care will be launched on Tuesday with support from the UK charity Birthrights.
The inquiry will apply a human- rights lens to examine how claimed racial injustice – from explicit racism to bias – is leading to poorer health outcomes in maternity care for ethnic minority groups.
Continue reading...Analysis: as need outstrips funding, experts are making the case for overhauling ‘old-fashioned’ donor-recipient narratives
This year one in every 33 people across the world will need humanitarian assistance. That is a rise of 40% from last year, according to the UN. More than half of the countries requiring aid to help deal with the coronavirus pandemic are already in protracted crises, coping with conflict or natural disasters.
Even before Covid-19 threw decades of progress on extreme poverty, healthcare and education into reverse, aid budgets were heading in the wrong direction. In 2020, the UN had just 48% of its $38.5bn (£28bn) in funding appeals met, compared with 63% of $29bn sought in 2019.
Continue reading...Staying home means starvation for many Zimbabweans, and those forced to work face police raids and dwindling custom
Pammula Chiunya, 68, is sitting under an open-sided shed outside a makeshift beer hall in Hopley settlement, six miles (10km) west of Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare. She is not happy.
Chiunya serves roasted chicken heads in a twist of old newspaper to a visibly drunk man, then settles to wait for someone else to emerge from the shebeen, which is crammed with animated revellers dancing to loud music. Customers are elusive, even with her prices: four heads for a dollar.
Continue reading...Indonesian men, women and children are risking their health wearing metallic paint to earn money as the economic impact of coronavirus worsens
It was 8pm on one of the busiest intersections in western Jakarta. Three men in metallic paint from head to toe stood on the footpath. Each was holding a silver can.
Alfan, 25, was one. When the light turned red, he walked in silence, barefoot, and stood in front of the stopped traffic. He bowed deeply for a few seconds and then struck a pose like a statue: standing straight, he raised his right hand to his temple and gave a salute in silence for about a minute without blinking.
Continue reading...Campaigners call for vaccines to be prioritised to frontline health workers and people at highest risk
Communities across Africa are reeling as a second wave of Covid infections recedes, leaving thousands dead amid fears of further surges before mass vaccination campaigns can begin to make a difference.
Few countries in Africa will start immunising even frontline health workers until much later this year, prompting accusations that large orders by wealthy nations are costing the lives of medical staff in poorer parts of the world.
Continue reading...Oxford University project reveals devastating impact on prospects for world’s poorest students, especially girls
In the coffee-farming communities of the Peruvian Amazon, the classroom is a route out of poverty. Gabriela was studying civil engineering in a city an hour and a half from home when the Covid-19 pandemic struck.
The 18-year-old, who is one of thousands of young people tracked since 2002 as part of the Young Lives project led by the University of Oxford, has been forced to postpone her education, in a country where 16% of 19-year-olds have dropped out of education because of the crisis.
Continue reading...Whole communities supported by overseas work are at risk of extreme poverty after the pandemic forced thousands home
When the pandemic forced Firoza Begum back to Bangladesh after six months trapped in her employer’s house without pay, her husband was so angry she had returned empty-handed that he would not let her move back in to the family home.
All her savings after 14 years working in the Middle East had been spent escaping her abusive employer.
Continue reading... Instagram and WhatsApp – owned by Facebook and used to organise protests – also restricted as UN secretary general condemns coup
Myanmar’s army has ordered internet service providers to block access to Facebook as it attempts to stamp out signs of dissent, days after it ousted the democratically elected government of Aung San Suu Kyi.
Facebook, one of the most popular means of communication in Myanmar, has been used to coordinate a civil disobedience campaign that saw health workers at dozens of hospitals walk out of their jobs on Wednesday to protest against the army’s actions. It has also been used to share plans for evening protests, where residents have taken to their balconies to bang pots and pans, a symbolic act to drive away evil.
Continue reading...Country has already set up direct deals but is entitled to receive jabs from programme for poorer countries
Canada is set to receive a significant haul of vaccines over the next months through a platform designed to maximise supply to poor countries, according to a new forecast, despite reserving the most doses-per-person in the world through direct deals with pharmaceutical companies.
Chile and New Zealand, which have also made controversial side deals to secure their own vaccine supplies, will also receive above-average numbers of doses, according to the interim allocation schedule released by Covax on Wednesday.
Continue reading...A tumbledown camp is home to many former Farc rebels four years after peace accords while hundreds more have been killed
Daniela Márquez, 30, bears the scars of Colombia’s long civil war on her body. Until three years ago, she was a medic with what was then South America’s most powerful guerrilla army: the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (Farc).
Five years ago, while her commanders were suing for peace, an airstrike killed seven of her comrades and hurled pieces of shrapnel into her arms, legs and back.
Continue reading...Ousted Myanmar leader facing prison as civil disobedience campaign against military coup grows
Myanmar police have charged ousted leader Aung San Suu Kyi with possession of illegally imported walkie-talkies, which could result in a two-year prison sentence, as a civil disobedience campaign grew against the military’s coup.
A document from a police station in the capital, Naypyitaw, said military officers who searched Aung San Suu Kyi’s residence had found handheld radios that were imported illegally and used without permission by her bodyguards. The charges, confirmed by members of her party, appear to carry a maximum prison sentence of two years.
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