Day: October 22, 2021

UNICEF Lao PDR today handed over IT equipment and personal protective equipment – PPE – to the Ministry of Information, Culture and Tourism (MICT) to further strengthen UNICEF’s cooperation with the Government of Lao PDR in promoting the rights and wellbeing of children and women in the country, as well as to support those in quarantine centres during the COVID-19 pandemic.

The equipment provided consist of two sets of teleconferences for MICT and the Lao National Radio (LNR) and one photocopy machine and one laptop to the Mass Media Department of MICT. The Vientiane Times newspaper also received an iMax PC and two photo cameras.

The PPE supplies consist of 1,000 boxes of face masks, 100 gallons of hand sanitizer gel, 500 pocket bottles of hand sanitizer gel, 200 alcohol pocket bottles, 30 units of infrared thermometers and 15 units Non-contact digital infrared.

While the IT equipment provided will contribute towards supporting the implementation of COVID-19 risk communication and community engagement (RCCE) activities, including communication on vaccines roll out, at subnational levels, the PPE on the other hand will be distributed to critical MICT and media staff as well as children and women in the quarantine centres.

“To effectively control the spread of COVID-19 and limit its impact on the lives of children and women, providing information is key and we must continue raising awareness about COVID-19 prevention and control measures as well as hygiene practices.

“UNICEF is strongly committed to supporting the Government of the Lao PDR in effectively handling the COVID-19 response. We have previously supported the Government supplies and it is our hope that the new IT equipment and PPE will further contribute towards strengthening UNICEF and MICT’s cooperation to ensure the safety of children and women during the pandemic,” stated UNICEF Representative of UNICEF Lao PDR Pia Rebello Britto.

In addition to the aforementioned equipment, UNICEF will also provide MICT and Lao national radio with Zoom licenses to enable them to use the cloud-based video conferencing service to host large-sized online meetings as a means of addressing the social distancing difficulties associated with organizing large-scale in-person meetings.

Source: Lao News Agency

The Ministry of Industry and Commerce issued on Oct 19 an order to cancel the issuance of import licenses for tractors and walking tractors in an effort to cut production costs and promote commercial production in agricultural industry.

The No. 2982 Order states that a technical permission must be sought from the Department of Transport of the Ministry of Public Works and Transport before tractors can be imported, and they must be imported through international border crossings only.

Meanwhile, walking tractors can be imported through local, traditional and international border crossings without seeking technical licenses from the Department of Transport.

The importation of all types of tractors can be made on the condition that one farming family imports one tractor and they must seek documents from their respective village authorities proving that the tractor is needed for agricultural purposes.

Farmers’ groups, or cooperatives wishing to import any kinds of tractors must obtain documents from the agriculture and forestry office of the district or city in which they are located and the documents must state the purpose of the import and the quantity of the tractors with respect to the actual size of farmland.

Source: Lao News Agency

On Oct 20, the Ethnic Affairs Committee of the National Assembly’s 9th legislature held its plenary meeting under the presidency of the Chairman of the Committee Khamchan Sotapaseuth in the presence of Vice President of the National Assembly in charge of ethnic affairs Souvone Leuangbounmy.

The meeting also saw the presence of President of the Social and Cultural Committee of the National Assembly Thongbay Sayasane, and representatives of relevant sectors.

Delivering a report at the meeting, Vice President of the Ethnicity Affairs Committee Thasakaphone Chanthamath said that the Ethnicity Affairs Committee attached importance to the ideological work of civil servants using various means and the gasping of key documents of the National Assembly and the provincial people’s council.

She noted that over the past one year, the Ethnic Affairs Committee in cooperation with relevant authorites has met eligible voters and disseminate to them the results of the inaugural meetings of the sixth legislature of the National Assembly and the 2nd legislature of the provincial people’s council.

Along with the monitoring of the implementation of the constitution, laws, sub-law instruments, the socio-economic development plan of the government, the committee has attached importance to the preservation of traditional customs of ethnic minorities and the solving of social ills.

Source: Lao News Agency

The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Thursday recommended booster shots for millions who received the Moderna or Johnson & Johnson coronavirus vaccines, and said the booster does not necessarily have to match the original shot.

Rochelle Walensky, the head of the government agency, OK’d the recommendations by an advisory panel Thursday, putting the CDC on the same page as the Food and Drug Administration.

The booster shot for Pfizer vaccine was approved in September.

The CDC committee has recommended that people age 18 and older and who were vaccinated two months or more ago with the single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine are eligible for a booster shot.

Those 65 or older inoculated with two-dose Pfizer or Moderna vaccines are recommended for a booster six months or more after the second dose.

The CDC also recommended a booster for those 18 or older in long-term care facilities, have pre-existing medical conditions, as well as those who live or work in high-risk settings.

The United States on Thursday marked the successful distribution of 200 million COVID-19 vaccines to more than 100 countries, a move the White House said fulfills President Joe Biden’s promise to become “the world’s arsenal of vaccines.”

“Today, Americans have 200 million reasons to be proud,” read a statement from U.S. Agency for International Development Administrator Samantha Power.

“USAID is honored to be at the forefront of this global vaccination effort unprecedented in scale, speed, and complexity, to counter the worst pandemic in modern history,” Power said.

Those donations have come rapid-fire, in a matter of months, with large tranches going out recently to lower-income nations. Last week, the White House announced it was donating 17 million doses of the one-shot Johnson & Johnson vaccine to the African Union, bringing the total donation to the 55-state body to 50 million doses.

However, an analysis by the People’s Vaccine Alliance, a coalition of nongovernmental organizations, including Oxfam and Amnesty International, shows that of the 1.8 billion doses pledged by the world’s richest nations, 261 million, or 14%, have arrived in low-income nations. The report also says that out of 994 million doses promised by vaccine developers AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson, Moderna and Pfizer/BioNTech to COVAX, only 120 million, or 12%, have been delivered.

The shortage has resulted in only 1.3% of people living in the world’s poorest nations being fully vaccinated against the disease caused by the coronavirus.

Meanwhile, researchers around the world are keeping a close eye on a mutation of the highly contagious delta variant of the coronavirus.

The AY.4.2 subvariant, which has been dubbed “delta plus,” has already been detected in Britain, Russia and the United States, but scientists have not determined if it poses a significant risk of being more contagious than the original version, which triggered a wave of new infections and deaths around the world during this year’s third quarter, or whether it is more resistant to vaccines.

The AY.4.2 variant has not been categorized as either a “variant of interest” or “variant of concern” by the World Health Organization.

In Britain, Prime Minister Boris Johnson is resisting calls by some public health officials to implement new COVID-19 restrictions, despite a surge of new infections hitting the nation.

The Health Ministry reported 52,000 new infections on Thursday, with a daily average the past week of more than 44,000 — a 16% increase from the previous week.

The World Health Organization reported this week that Britain has among the highest number of daily new infections in Europe, the only part of the world that saw an increase in new cases last week.

Source: Voice of America