Pandemic reversing improvements in wealth inequality, World Bank says

Temporary reprieve from surge in inequality erased by Covid-19 policies

Governments’ responses to Covid-19 are reversing gains made in combating global inequality, according to a World Bank report. It found the virus was disproportionately affecting the poor and warned the fallout would worsen.

World Bank President David Malpass explained that the situation arose from a confluence of negative factors, leading to a perfect storm of economic depression. “The world economy is simultaneously facing Covid-19, inflation, and policy uncertainty, with government spending and monetary policies in uncharted territory,” he said.

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Government-mandated shutdowns were the primary reason for a spike in poverty rates that has affected populations around the world, the report stated. Government spending, deficits, and debt have soared to “record highs” compared to GDP, and countries are reluctant to raise interest rates lest their populations prove to be unable to withstand the economic shock.

Noting that “booming asset prices” are bolstering the bank accounts of the rich even as job losses and massive inflation have torpedoed any growth within the poorest population groups, the Bank warned that such an “increasing divergence of fortunes” was “especially troubling given the possibility of social discontent in developing countries.” Spikes in some commodity prices – such as the fuel hike in Kazakhstan – can trigger popular outrage on such a level that it threatens governments’ control.

Worse, the effects of the Covid-19 shutdowns are likely to echo through multiple generations, as children’s educational development has suffered due to school closures – especially those in low-income families who particularly struggled to access remote learning, the Bank’s report warns.

Malpass insisted that mass vaccination and “concerted international action and a comprehensive set of national policy responses” were the only ways for his institution to correct the problems it helped cause. Chief among his recommendations was a call for accelerated debt relief efforts, and while he stressed the importance of carbon taxes and other climate-change policies, he acknowledged that now was perhaps not the time to raise fuel prices.

Both the Bank and the International Monetary Fund were strong proponents of lockdowns. Echoing a similar offer from the IMF, the World Bank reportedly told Belarus in early 2020 that it could receive a significant amount of relief funding in exchange for modeling its Covid-19 control measures on those of Italy, which at the time was under a strict lockdown. When President Alexander Lukashenko declined to lock down his country, the bank warned Minsk’s economy would “face a severe shock” that year – a carrot/stick approach often seen in that institution’s dealings.

Ransomware attack cripples jail

The Metropolitan Detention Center in Albuquerque went into lockdown after the attack disrupted vital systems

A suspected ransomware attack in New Mexico has disrupted services across an entire county, including a local jail in Albuquerque that went into lockdown after losing access to camera feeds, databases, and automatic doors.

The incident, which occurred on January 5 in Bernalillo County, has resulted in inmates at the Metropolitan Detention Center (MDC) in the state’s largest city being confined to their cells. Phone and internet services at the jail were also affected, leaving staff unable to check prisoner records.

The cyber attack also took down – and possibly corrupted – vital jail databases, including its incident-tracking database, which records all reports of violence at the facility such as fighting, use of force, and allegations of sexual assault.

In an emergency court notice, county lawyers noted that the “unusable” automated door system had meant “staff had to use keys to manually open facility doors.” Attorney Taylor Rahn revealed that there had been “no access to cameras within the facility” since the evening of the attack.

Visitor access to the detention center was also suspended as the jail went into lockdown, according to an Albuquerque Journal newspaper report about the wider service disruptions at government buildings across New Mexico’s most populous county that left many offices closed.

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In a statement on Monday, the county notified the public that services were still “limited,” requesting people to “understand the gravity of this ransomware issue.” Among the systems affected were those at the Probate Court, which was “unable to docket new cases” while “operational intake and release” of inmates continued at the MDC.

The lockdown also apparently sparked a legal wrinkle since the county risked potentially violating a 1995 lawsuit settlement about confinement conditions at its jails, according to The Verge. Under the terms of that deal, inmates are given privileges, including time out of cells and regular access to phones and other devices.

In its emergency filing, the county noted that “limited out of cell time may have an impact on inmates’ ability to access telephones and tablets” and warned that the MDC “may be unable to gather data” required by the settlement “depending on the length of the impact of the attack.”

Researchers warn of possible superbug onslaught

The spread of the gene could pave the way for new and devastating superbug infections

The World Health Organization calls antibiotic-resistant bacteria “one of the top 10 global public health threats facing humanity.” Now, US researchers have found a gene that could potentially signal a superbug onslaught.

Researchers from the University of Georgia’s Center for Food Safety (CFS) collected sewage water from an urban area in the state to test for the presence of the MCR-9 gene in naturally occurring bacteria. When present in bacteria, this gene signals that the bacteria is resistant to colistin, one of the world’s most important antibiotics.

Colistin is considered a “last-resort antibiotic,” the researchers explained in a report to the Journal of Global Antimicrobial Resistance last month. Because it is used to treat infections other antibiotics cannot, there is potentially no medicine that can be used once a microbe acquires resistance to it.

The treatment of livestock with colistin is banned in the US, although the medicine is commonly used on animals in countries with less stringent regulations, like India and China. The researchers’ discovery indicates that whether by food imports or global travel, colistin-resistant bacteria has managed to become established in the US.

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The Georgia researchers found MCR-9 in Morganella morganii, a bacterium that can cause infection in humans, albeit rarely. However, the gene transmits in plasmids, or strands of DNA found inside cells that can replicate on their own, independent of the cell. Plasmids can transmit to other forms of bacteria, meaning that microbes like E. coli and Salmonella that commonly affect humans can easily acquire the MCR-9 gene and become resistant to antibiotics.

Lead researcher Issmat Kassem told the University of Georgia’s news site on Tuesday that the fact that MCR-9 was found in an often-overlooked bacterium in a region where colistin is not used is cause for alarm, and proof that the gene has spread in the US without scientists noticing. 

“If we don’t tackle it right now, we are jeopardizing human and animal medicine as we know it and that can have huge repercussions on health and the economy,” Kassem said. “It’s a dangerous problem that requires attention from multiple sectors for us to be able to tackle it properly.”

The World Health Organization classifies antimicrobial and antibiotic resistance as one of its top 10 global health threats. While the organization has called on drugmakers to develop new and “urgently needed” antibacterial medicines, it cautioned that “if people do not change the way antibiotics are used now, these new antibiotics will suffer the same fate as the current ones and become ineffective.”

Hundreds of thousands left without electricity amid record-breaking heatwave

The power grid failed, leaving at least 700,000 people without energy

A record-breaking heatwave has hit Argentina, with temperatures soaring to 45C (113F) in some parts of the country. An associated spike in energy demand has caused grid failures, leading to power cuts.

At least 700,000 people were left without power in Buenos Aires on Wednesday, as residents of the Argentine capital endured sweltering temperatures amid a historic heatwave. 

Electricity firms blamed the outage on a huge spike in demand for energy, which in turn caused technical failures and power cuts. The outage came as the temperature rose above 41C in the capital.

The 41.1C recorded on Tuesday at 4.05pm local time is the second-highest reading in the capital since 1906, according to city authorities. Temperatures are forecast to remain high on Thursday and Friday before finally abating on Sunday. 


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“We have to be very careful these days,” said Buenos Aires city mayor Horacio Rodriguez Larreta, as local leaders warned people to stay out of the sun and remain hydrated. 

“This is a heat wave of extraordinary characteristics, with extreme temperature values that will even be analyzed after its completion, and it may generate some historical records for Argentina temperatures and persistence of heat,” meteorologist Lucas Berengua told Reuters.

The heatwave, which has seen the country’s highest temperatures since 1957, has been driven by the Pacific Ocean’s La Nina weather pattern.

Argentina is currently the hottest place in the world, with daily highs exceeding those in Australia.A lack of rainfall has also seen water levels in the Parana River drop to an almost 80-year low.