covid-19 Archives

U.S. Ramps Up Case Against China on Virus Outbreak, Cover-Up

7May

By Patti MohrNo Comments

Globalization, Disintegration, Organizations, IMF, WTO, G7, UN Security Council, Types of News: Bit

U.S. Ramps Up Case Against China on Virus Outbreak, Cover-Up

May 7, 2020—With the key question unresolved about how the COVID-19 virus emerged in Wuhan, China, diplomatic relations between China and the United States as well as other Western governments have ruptured, perhaps permanently. Funding Pulled The U.S. government stopped funding a line of research funding that fostered collaboration between U.S. scientists and those in Wuhan, China. The National Institutes of Health research project received $3.38 million over six years. It was a small part of its overall budget. (For perspective, in 2019, total NIH awards/grants were $28 billion.) But it was still a lot in terms of funding. The project proposed to understand the risk of bat coronavirus that poses "a significant threat to global health and food security." It came in the wake o...

Amazon.com Executive Quits In Protest of Worker Firings

4May

By Patti MohrNo Comments

Global Economics, Types of News: Brief

Amazon.com Executive Quits In Protest of Worker Firings

May 4, 2020-Despite surging sales, Amazon.com faces a critical time as its workers around the world raise safety concerns and as one of its top executives resigns due to "toxicity running through the company culture." Tim Bray left his position as a vice-president at Amazon Web Services May 1 in protest over the company's treatment of workers who complained about unsafe warehouse conditions amid the COVID-19 pandemic. Bray said that although the decision to leave would cost him over a million dollars "not to mention the best job" he's ever had, he could no longer support power imbalances between workers and executives. In a blog post, Bray said Amazon.com executives fired two high-profile activists who had promoted a petition and organized a video call on behalf of warehouse work...

GUEST POST: The Shattering of Global Oil

28Apr

By Guest WriterNo Comments

Energy Policy, Oil & Gas, Type of News: Guest Post, Types of News: Analysis

GUEST POST: The Shattering of Global Oil

By Peter Zeihan Oil demand is relatively inelastic. That’s a fancy-schmancy economic term that means people and firms’ energy demand doesn’t vary very much from day-to-day or even year-to-year. Driving to work is perhaps the most accessible example. You do it every workday. If you don’t, you don’t work. And so you drive. Your gasoline demand is stable. Inelastic. Doesn’t matter much if gasoline sells for $1 or $4. On the price side, this means the “normal” rules of supply and demand barely apply. Even minor shifts in supply or demand have wildly outsized impacts on price. We’re used to seeing this as a shortage. China booms and oil prices go up. Iran and Iraq go to war and prices go up. Derivatives trading enters the world of oil and prices go up. Geopolitical Shocks to Oil Pr...

COVID-19, From Bats to Humans: Examining the Wuhan Connection

17Apr

By Patti MohrNo Comments

Communism, Dictatorship, Globalization, Disintegration, Organizations, IMF, WTO, G7, UN Security Council, Types of News: Analysis

COVID-19, From Bats to Humans: Examining the Wuhan Connection

April 17, 2020--A great and tragic mystery of 2020 is the origin of the COVID-19 virus that is sweeping the world with sickness and death. Some researchers point to a seafood market in Wuhan. Others say it could have started in a Chinese lab in Wuhan. Most certainly, it came from bats. But how did it jump to humans? From Wuhan to the World To date, the COVID-19 virus that has infected over 2 million people worldwide and killed 149,000 people. Of the first 309 confirmed cases in China, 270 cases were confirmed in Wuhan. Of the first 41 patients hospitalized in Wuhan with the virus, 27 of them, 66 percent, had a connection to a food and wild animal market. Wholesale Food Market As early as December 2019, reports from China pointed to the connection to the Huanan Seafood Wholes...

Eurozone Ministers Agree to €500bn Rescue Package

10Apr

By Patti MohrNo Comments

Domestic Politics: Europe, EU, Eurozone, Global Economics

Eurozone Ministers Agree to €500bn Rescue Package

April 10, 2020--Under increasing strain to hold their political and economic union together, Eurozone finance ministers agreed to a €500 billion economic rescue package for workers, businesses and governments. Eurogroup President Mário Centeno said the plan is meant to ensure Europe grows "together and not apart once the virus is behind us." The latest rescue package to deal with the economic fallout from the COVID-19 crisis comes on top of monetary and fiscal stimulus measures worth trillions of Euros. Previous measures amount to 3 percent of GDP in fiscal measures and 16 percent of GDP in new monetary policies, according to the Eurogroup. Finance ministers from the 19 Eurozone countries agreed to the latest measure after a marathon 14-hour session. "Now we are building Europe...