Day: June 18, 2021

The Delta variant of the coronavirus, first detected in India, has been detected in neighboring Sri Lanka.

“It is the worst we could have imaged at such a time,” Dr. Chandima Jeewandara, director of the Allergy, Immunity and Cell Biology Unit at the Sri Jayewardenepura University, told The Hindu newspaper. “We are already dealing with a spike in cases with the Alpha variant. Delta poses a greater risk because our vaccine coverage is low, and among those who are vaccinated a majority have got only one dose.”

According to the Johns Hopkins University Coronavirus Resource Center, Sri Lanka, a nation of about 22 million people, has more than 233,000 COVID cases.

Israel’s new government that was sworn in Sunday said Friday it would transfer up to 1.4 million doses of soon-to-expire Pfizer coronavirus vaccine to the Palestinian authority in exchange for about the same number of doses the authority anticipates getting later this year.

Israel has been criticized for not sharing vaccine with the more than 4 million Palestinians in the occupied West Bank and Gaza Strip.

In South Korea, a delay in the delivery of COVID-19 vaccines has pushed the government to offer its residents mixed doses. People who received the Astra Zeneca vaccine as a first dose will now be offered the Pfizer vaccine for the second.

A panel of health care experts say they believe India will likely experience a third surge of coronavirus cases in October. “It will be more controlled” than previous surges, said Dr. Randeep Guleria, director at All India Institute of Medical Sciences, because some people have been inoculated.

On Friday, India reported more than 62,000 new COVID-19 cases in the previous 24 period. The nation also reported 1,587 COVID-19 deaths, the country’s lowest death toll in 60 days.

In the U.S., Vice President Kamala Harris visited the southeastern city of Atlanta, Georgia Friday to encourage people to get vaccinated for the coronavirus.

About 36% of Georgians have been vaccinated, a rate lower than most U.S. states.

Harris’s visit is part of a White House campaign to get 70% of all U.S. adults at least one dose of a vaccine by Independence Day on July 4.

Johns Hopkins said early Friday it has recorded more than 177 million global COVID-19 cases. The U.S. leads the world in the number of cases with 33.5 million, followed by India with 29.8 million and Brazil with 17.7 million.

Worldwide deaths from the disease have now topped 3.84 million.

Johns Hopkins also said 2.5 billion vaccine doses have been administered.

Source: Voice of America

GENEVA – The U.N. refugee agency, which just released its 2020 Global Trends report, said the number of people forcibly displaced last year by wars, violence, persecution and human rights violations hit a record high of 82.4 million, 4% more than in 2019.

This is the ninth consecutive year that forced displacement figures have continued to rise. Even lockdowns and border closures because of the coronavirus pandemic have not stopped people from fleeing for their lives in the face of war and atrocities.

Of the more than 82 million forcibly displaced, 26.4 million are refugees, who have crossed international borders in search of protection. Most of the rest are people displaced within their own countries because of conflict and violence.

U.N. High Commissioner for Refugees Filippo Grandi said the number of internally displaced people has doubled over the past 10 years.

“We are now in excess of one percent of humanity being forcibly displaced,” Grandi said. “And one of the many figures that to me is quite interesting and striking is that 42% of these people are children.”

The report found that more than two-thirds of all refugees who have fled abroad come from just five countries — Syria, Venezuela, Afghanistan, South Sudan, and Myanmar. For the seventh consecutive year, Turkey has hosted the largest number of refugees, followed by Colombia, Pakistan, Uganda, and Germany.

Grandi said new crises that have caused fresh displacements include northern Mozambique, where violence by armed groups, poverty, climate change and other factors have displaced up to 700,000 people.

He said violence in countries in the Central Sahel, including Burkina Faso, Niger and Mali, has prompted 750,000 people to flee their homes.

“And then, of course, Ethiopia, where the Tigray crisis has provoked up to — and we are not even sure about that — up to 1 million additional internally displaced people in addition to about 50 to 60,000 that have crossed the border into Sudan.”

High Commissioner Grandi said the global trend for displacement crises in 2021 is not looking good. In the first six months of this year, he said, very few refugees have returned home and protracted refugee crises have stagnated.

At the same time, he said, new crises are arising, churning out new refugees and internally displaced people faster than solutions can be found.

Source: Voice of America

) The virtual meeting was chaired by Secretary General of Lao Youth Union Alounxay Sounnalath with Co-chair UNFPA Lao Country Representative Mariam Khan.

Representatives from the government ministries, mass organizations, CSOs, International Organisations and young people participated in the event.

The Lao Youth Union (LYU) and the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) also held discussions on the impacts of COVID19 on adolescents and young people.

Officially endorsed by the Prime Minister in December 2020, Laos’ National Youth and Adolescent Development Strategy will be implemented by concerned ministries and agencies including mass organizations from central to local levels.

It provides strategic directions to relevant ministries to create necessary provisions, allocate budgets and implement programmes and projects for health, education, employment, protection and participation of adolescents and young people. Additional resources will be mobilized and budgets allocated by the government to ministries and public agencies for interventions as needed.

The strategy will also mobilize technical and financial support from international organizations, development partners and the private sector.

“This strategy will help the country in improving its human capital that will contribute in achieving the objectives of 9th National Socio-economic Development Plan and Sustainable Development Goals with the vision of leaving no one behind,” said Mr. Alounxay Sounnalath.

The discussions at the launch highlighted the COVID-19 impacts on adolescent and young people in various areas including, education, reproductive and sexual health, mental health and psychosocial issues as well as socio-economic impacts. The COVID-19 impact assessment, showed secondary school dropout and unintended pregnancy are projected to increase due to disruptions in schooling and in access to sexual and reproductive health and family planning services. The assessment also indicates young people whose education and work are interrupted are almost twice as likely to have anxiety and depression. Adolescent girls and young women are at increased risk of gender-based violence and harmful practices such as child marriage.

To address these issues, it is recommended to invest more on youth-focused COVID-19 response taking into account the needs of adolescent and young people including adolescents with disability to ensure inclusiveness.

Data collection particularly disaggregated data is needed to inform planning, as well as engaging adolescents and young people as agents of change participating in the discussion and decision making that impacts their lives. Valuable suggestions were made by the Vice Minister of Home Affairs and from members of the National Assembly.

UNFPA Lao Country Representative Mariam A. Khan congratulated LYU for the development of the strategy. She said “The pandemic calls for immediate and mid to long term strategic responses for addressing the impact of COVID19 on adolescents and young people.”

She further emphasized that, “over half of the population in Laos is below 24 years of age, which provides a window of opportunity for realising a demographic dividend.” “However, the demographic dividend can only be realised if the youth are educated, empowered and have access to employment and economic opportunities,” she added.

UNFPA Laos works closely with LYU to empower adolescents and young people through youth-focused interventions including advocacy, data collection, establishment of counselling and Mental Health Psycho social hotlines, provision of essential service package, comprehensive sexuality education online learning and the Noi Yakhoo mobile Apps, campaigns and risk communication to raise awareness and engage youth to fight against COVID19.

Engaging with youth as partners is a core strategy of UNFPA work and the strategy was developed through an extensive consultative process under the leadership of LYU. A series of consultations with adolescents and young people, concerned line ministries and other stakeholders were organized at all levels. Implementation of the strategy will continue to be inclusive of all concerned stakeholders.

Source: Lao News Agency

The National Taskforce Committee for Covid-19 Prevention and Control has placed the number of daily infections of Covid-19 for Friday at 13 with seven local transmissions in Vientiane and six imported cases (returning workers from Thailand) in Champassak and Savannakhet provinces.

The cumulative number of Covid-19 cases in the Lao PDR has reached 2,047 including 1,931 recoveries, 113 active cases and three deaths. Seven patients of Covid-19 were discharged from hospital today.

Frontline workers including medical workers, elderly people (aged 60 and older) and those with underlying medical conditions are highly recommended to receive Covid-19 vaccines.

“Right now, many people are eager to get Covid-19 vaccine. After visiting vaccination service centres, we have found that most centres can maintain orderliness. However some centres are packed with a lot of people and hence unable to observe social distancing and this poses high risks of spreading the virus to people who are waiting for vaccination. Therefore, village and relevant authorities are advised to have proper measures in place by arranging people in a line with social distancing observed and let us know the number they can handle a day. It is necessary to separate those who are going to receive second doses from the elderly and those waiting for first doses,” said Director of Department of Communicable Disease Control, Ministry of Health Rattanaxay Phetsouvanh.

Source: Lao News Agency

The Laos-Japan online seminar on Humanitarian Assistance and Disaster Relief (HA/DR) was held at ICTC on Jun 18 with participation of defence officials and experts from both countries.

The seminar was organized as a part of capacity building and cooperation projects initiated by Lao and Japanese defence ministries in 2018.

The seminar aimed at sharing lessons and experiences of disaster responses by the Japan Ground Self-Defence Force (JSDF) and the Lao People’s Army (LPA), as well as presenting the achievements of the HA/DR training conducted by LPA last year.

The participants also had a lively discussion on prevention measures to manage risks of COVID-19 infection during HA/DR operations at the area affected by natural disasters.

After a series of devastating flood disasters left serious damages across the Lao PDR in the past several years, LPA’s role and capacity in emergency response to natural disasters has much increased its importance.

The lessons learned from this seminar are expected to be translated into improved HA/DR operations and up-to-date emergency management plan, and transferred to LPA practitioners on the ground.

In the closing remarks, representatives from both sides praised the successful and fruitful results delivered by the seminar.

They also extended sincere appreciation to all the experts and authorities involved. Furthermore, both sides expressed hope for further enhancing defence cooperation between the two countries through bilateral and multilateral frameworks, including ‘Vientiane Vision 2.0’ agreed by ASEAN and Japanese Defence Ministers in 2019.

Source: Lao News Agency

) A virtual meeting between the Lao Minister of National Defense Gen Chansamone Chanyalath and his counterpart from the Republic of Korea Suh Wook was held on Jun 16.

The ministers reviewed the cooperation between the two countries over the past years noting that the relations between their defense ministries have enjoyed a constant growth, especially with respect to lesson exchanges, training on disaster rescue and military medicine, and their decision to establish a joint defense attaché offices and cooperation under the ASEAN-Plus Defense Ministers’ Meeting framework.

Source: Lao News Agency