Tag: CoronaVirus

Coronavirus: US intelligence debunks theory it was ‘manmade’

The US intelligence community has determined Covid-19 “was not manmade or genetically modified”, though it is still investigating the virus’ origins.

The National Intelligence chief’s office said agencies are looking into whether the outbreak began from animal contact or a laboratory accident.

President Donald Trump later suggested he had seen evidence the virus came out of a Chinese laboratory.

China has rejected the theory and criticised the US response to Covid-19.

What did the intelligence chief say?

The Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees US spy agencies, said on Thursday it concurs with the “wide scientific consensus” regarding Covid-19’s natural origins.

“The [intelligence community] will continue to rigorously examine emerging information and intelligence to determine whether the outbreak began through contact with infected animals or if it was the result of an accident at a laboratory in Wuhan.”

The virus was first detected in Wuhan, China. There are now over 3.2 million cases worldwide and more than 231,000 deaths.

Thursday’s statement is the first clear response from US agencies debunking conspiracy theories – both from the US and China – about the virus as a purported bioweapon.

The idea that the coronavirus could have inadvertently leaked from a laboratory has not yet been disproven.

What did President Trump say?

Taking questions at the White House on Thursday, Mr Trump stoked this theory.

He was asked by a reporter: “Have you seen anything at this point that gives you a high degree of confidence that the Wuhan Institute of Virology was the origin of this virus?”

The president replied: “Yes, I have. Yes, I have. And I think the World Health Organization should be ashamed of themselves because they’re like the public relations agency for China.”

He added: “Whether they [China] made a mistake, or whether it started off as a mistake and then they made another one, or did somebody do something on purpose?

“I don’t understand how traffic, how people weren’t allowed into the rest of China, but they were allowed into the rest of the world. That’s a bad, that’s a hard question for them to answer.”

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The New York Times reported on Thursday that senior White House officials have asked the US intelligence community to investigate whether the virus came from a Wuhan research laboratory.

Intelligence agencies have also been tasked with determining if China and the WHO withheld information about the virus early on, unnamed officials told NBC News on Wednesday.

What’s the background?

Mr Trump has recently been escalating his rhetoric with China over the pandemic after what officials within the US president’s administration had described as a truce with Beijing on the war of words.

Mr Trump has often blamed China at briefings, accusing its officials of covering up the virus early on and saying they could have stopped the disease from spreading.

He has similarly criticised the WHO and withdrew US funding for the global body.

China’s Foreign Ministry, meanwhile, has accused the Trump administration of trying to distract from its own problems tackling the crisis.

A ministry spokesman has also repeatedly promoted the idea – without evidence – that Covid-19 might have originated in the US.

According to the Washington Post, the Trump administration is looking into ways to punish China financially. Discussions reportedly include allowing the US government to sue China for damages or cancelling debt obligations.

The US-China propaganda war

This is the first definitive statement on the matter from US intelligence agencies. It rejects the most extreme of the conspiracy theories about the pandemic’s origins – that the Chinese developed and un-leashed the coronavirus as a bioweapon.

But it doesn’t rule out the possibility that the virus was accidentally leaked from a Wuhan laboratory studying infectious diseases.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo in particular has talked up that scenario, urging China to let outside experts into the facility, and raising questions about lab safety in other parts of the country. The Chinese government says any such allegations are unfounded and fabricated out of nothing.

Claims and counterclaims about the origins of the virus are part of a propaganda war over China’s handling of the coronavirus crisis.

But they also reflect US frustration with the Chinese for not sharing more data about how the pandemic developed.

How Ecommerce Companies Can Continue Engaging New Customers

With most states under some kind of stay-at-home order, many businesses have been forced to close brick-and-mortar locations. Even when stores are staying open, foot traffic is falling as customers stay home and order online in an effort to stop the spread.

The results are significant. Data from Emarsys and GoodData show that for the week ending April 10, ecommerce revenue in the United States is up 42 percent year over year. Many countries have seen even greater growth.

Needless to say, now is the time to optimize your digital storefront or get online if you haven’t yet. Companies that are already set up for ecommerce are naturally in a better position, but every retail brand should look into how it can sell its products and services online and better communicate the option to its customers.

An audit of your ecommerce site is a great starting point. Are your calls-to-action in the right place? Are you focusing and describing the benefits of your product? Does your site take too long to load? Even seemingly minor things can have a big impact. Neil Patel reports that 40 percent of web users abandon a site that takes more than three seconds to load.

Even if your site is already in good shape, it may be helpful to make adjustments that reflect the current circumstance. Keeping customers informed about how the shutdown is affecting your product availability, shipping speed and more will give them greater confidence when they make a purchase.

Adjusting your marketing strategy will also prove beneficial. Doubling down on existing customers that have purchased from you in the past and are familiar with your brand is of paramount importance in uncertain economic conditions.

Paid social and email marketing should take precedence, especially if you need to communicate certain offers that may entice previous customers. Customer-acquisition costs could also rise during this time. A smart strategy to maintain cash flow is to extend previous customers new, exciting offers to help retain them.

Making an appealing pitch 

While many people are cutting back on their spending habits, almost everyone is still buying necessities that keep them happy and healthy while at home. Unsurprisingly, food and other household essentials have seen the greatest online sales growth. In fact, an eMarketer analysis of online grocery sales found a 183 percent increase in March 2020 compared to the year before.
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Certain companies may be facing the kinds of difficult conditions that prevent them from acquiring new customers, brands specializing in meal prep, beverages and other food-delivery essentials could find themselves in the perfect situation to scoop up market share and acquire new customers. Home-improvement brands have also seen major sales increases as people look for activities to stay productive while stuck at home. Video games have been moving in record numbers as well.

When promoting your ecommerce brand, keep customers’s current habits in mind. Whether you’re giving them something productive to do or helping them stay entertained, this focused messaging will help illustrate the essential nature of your products. And try and bypass stay-at-home-specific messaging to avoid inundating customers with fear-fomenting sentiments.

Remain aware of potential challenges

Even the most digitally savvy brands are subject to risk during this time. In an interview with CNBC, analyst Oscar Orozco warned, “Even though consumers are buying more products online, digitally native brands should anticipate hardships in the coming months … Sales will continue to shift from nice-to-have products to must-have products.”

Supply-chain challenges may also pose a threat. Many manufacturers are shifting to making face masks, ventilators and other necessary supplies, which could impact your own production and, thus, your ability to advertise. The increased volume of online orders means shipping delays for many brands.

Keep such risks in mind as you enhance your ecommerce efforts. A proactive approach to such challenges will help you better communicate with your customers and adapt to potentially changing preferences.

Getting through and growing stronger

While this is a period of tremendous challenges for retailers, it is also a clear reflection of just how important ecommerce has become. Brands that truly focus on optimizing their digital experience and reaching customers online will be better able to continue driving revenue. Better yet, they will also be in a stronger position when society eventually gets back to normal. Your efforts to shift strategies and improve your ecommerce options will leave you better prepared for a future in which online sales continue to play a major role.

Russian PM Mishustin tests positive

Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin has gone to hospital after he was diagnosed with coronavirus.

His positive test came on the same day that Russia recorded a record 7,099 cases, taking the total number of infections above 100,000.

Mr Mishustin was given the role of prime minister in January and has been actively involved in Russia’s handling of the epidemic.

Russian TV showed him telling President Vladimir Putin of his diagnosis.

“I have just learned that the test on the coronavirus I took was positive,” the prime minister said during the video call.

Mr Mishustin suggested that First Deputy Prime Minister Andrei Belousov should take his place and Mr Putin agreed. Mr Mishustin will now go into self-isolation.

“What’s happening to you can happen to anyone, and I’ve always been saying this,” Mr Putin told him.

“You are a very active person. I would like to thank you for the work that has been done so far.”

Mikhail Mishustin is the first senior politician here to fall sick with coronavirus.

He looked exhausted as he informed President Putin, via a video call, that he had tested positive and was handing over his responsibilities and heading into self-isolation.

Mr Putin said it only showed how the virus did not discriminate. He told the prime minister to give him a call when he got to hospital.
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Mr Mishustin himself used the chance to urge all Russians to take coronavirus seriously, and to stay at home as an 11-day, extended May holiday begins.

Officials fear warmer weather will send families rushing to the countryside as usual. So Moscow is increasing the number of police patrols in the coming days, to ensure people stick to the strict lockdown.

Despite the sharp rise in cases, the Moscow-based coronavirus headquarters says 1,073 people in Russia have now died of coronavirus, a relatively low number for Russia’s size.

Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov says Russia’s reaction to the pandemic has enabled it to avoid an “Italian scenario”.

But President Putin warned this week that Russia did not have enough protective equipment for health workers and medics have complained in several regions of having insufficient protective suits.

Moscow’s Mayor, Sergei Sobyanin, has meanwhile said he believes many of those living in the Russian capital do not realise how serious the situation is.

He said he had seen more people violating the restrictions, estimating his city was only a quarter of the way through the crisis.

“If we see things are getting better, then of course we will reduce the restrictions. But until that happens, you need to be courageous and patient. It’s very important for you and your health,” he said.

CREDIT: BBC

Tesla posts profit despite hit from coronavirus

Tesla shrugged off coronavirus-related problems and posted a profitable first quarter.

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The electric car maker earned net income of $16 million, while income excluding special items, such as stock based compensation, came in at $227 million. The company lost money on both those measures in the year-earlier quarters.
Analysts surveyed by Refinitiv had forecast the company would post a narrow loss due to the shutdowns of its factories in California and Shanghai at times during the quarter and a drop in completed vehicle sales compared to the fourth quarter of last year.
Shares of Tesla (TSLA) jumped 9% in after-hours trading on the report. Shares have now more the doubled since the start of the year, even if they have come down from the all-time high reached in mid-February before coronavirus concerns hit the broader market.
Still, the company said it couldn’t promise that its unexpected profit will continue in the face of disruptions caused by the Covid-19 outbreak.
close dialog
“It is difficult to predict how quickly vehicle manufacturing and its global supply chain will return to prior levels,” Tesla said in a statement to investors. “Due to the wide range of potential outcomes, near-term guidance of net income and free cash flow would likely be inaccurate.”
Although it did not offer specific guidance, the company did say, “While near term profit guidance is on hold, we believe we will achieve industry leading operating margins and profitability.” It said it has the capacity to build 500,000 vehicles this year, even with the production interruptions. Tesla said it had been on course to have its best sales quarter in its history before it had to suspend operations in California because of the outbreak.
Tesla’s numbers impressed experts, even if they warned that the company will have a tougher time in the current period.
“The first quarter financial numbers suggest the automaker has turned a corner and is making serious headway on its business model,” said Karl Brauer, executive publisher at Kelley Blue Book. “As brands go, Tesla’s is one of the strongest in the automotive industry. And that kind of brand equity is a company’s best defense during economic turmoil. It’s likely Tesla will prove more resilient than other automakers in terms of 2020 sales. But ‘more resilient’ doesn’t mean immune, and Tesla’s first quarter success story will be difficult to repeat in the coming months.”
The profit marked the first time in the company’s history that it posted positive net income in three consecutive quarters. In fact, through the middle of 2018, the company had only posted two profitable quarters in its entire history.
But this marks the fifth profitable quarter out of the last seven, and it suggests that the upstart electric car maker has turned a corner on its profitability. Last year was the first year it achieved an annual profit when excluding special items. Tesla had said in January, before it was faced with disruptions, that it expected to be profitable on an ongoing basis.
The company was able to avoid the types of growing pains that produced losses in the past. It said the Model Y, its new lower-priced SUV that it expects will become its best-selling vehicle, has already achieved a gross profit margin in the quarter despite only starting production in January. It’s the first time it made a profit on a car in its first quarter on the assembly line.
Tesla said that gross margins on the Model 3 sedans being built in its Shanghai factory, which only opened in late 2019, are already approaching the margins at the California factory.
The company did have one bit of bad news, announcing it is pushing back the planned start of production of a semi-tractor that had been set to begin later this year to 2021. It did not give a reason.
Tesla did not break out the cost of the shutdown of its plants due to coronavirus concerns in its statement to investors. CEO Elon Musk has been critical of many of the steps taken to battle the Covid-19 outbreak. Tuesday night he tweeted “FREE AMERICA NOW.”
During his call with investors Wednesday evening, Musk railed against the government orders shutting down non-essential businesses, particularly in the Bay Area where his Fremont plant is located.
“We are a bit worried about not being able to resume production in the Bay Area, and that should be identified as a serious risk,” he said. He pointed out that Tesla has only two car factories, including the one China, and the one in Fremont makes the overwhelming majority of its cars.
“While Tesla will weather the storm there are many small companies that will not,” Musk said. “Everything people have worked for their whole life is being destroyed in real time. Many suppliers are in super hard times, especially the small ones.”

CREDIT: CNN

The dark side of working from home

Now that many people have been working from home for more than a month, the novelty might be starting to wane. And a dark side of working remote could emerge: loneliness.

Workplace loneliness can be a problem even when everyone is working in an office. But the sudden shift to remote work can increase the risk.

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“If you’ve been working with people for a while and had that connectivity and face-to-face meetings and were used to that work environment, and now suddenly working at a distance with little connectivity, it really creates a huge problem,” said Ben Fanning, author of “The Quit Alternative: The Blueprint for Creating the Job You Love Without Quitting.” “It’s like being on a remote island.”
Even if you are working from home with your spouse and kids running around, you can still feel professionally lonely.
Research shows that workplace loneliness hurts job performance. You can become a less effective worker as co-workers find you less approachable and stop collaborating.
“The lonelier you are, the worse you will perform,” said Sigal Barsade, a professor of management at The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania. “You become less effectively committed to your organization.”

What it looks like

Loneliness leads to a downwardspiral,according to Barsade.
“Once you are lonely, you are more socially hyper-vigilant and start to lose your social skills,” she said. “You behave in ways that promote more loneliness.”
You might start to over- or under-disclose personal information. Lonely workers can also become overly cautious about being rejected by their peers, which can make them seem less approachable, said Hakan Ozcelik, professor of management at California State University, Sacramento.
“Lonely people read negative cues more quickly and ignore positive cues,” said Ozcelik. “You have dark lenses through which you are interpreting messages.”
Workers who were already feeling marginalized in the office and might have only been getting an occasional wave in the morning or head nod in the hallway might be more prone to feeling lonely working from home.
“Now they don’t even get that. If people aren’t talking to them separately, the people who are already lonely might become even more so,” said Barsade.

What you can do

Loneliness isn’t a trait, it’s more of a motivational state like hunger, explained Barsade.
“The same way we get hungry and need to eat, we get lonely and need social contact. We don’t want to be lonely.”
Social contact requires an extra layer of planning these days. Be proactive and set up virtual meetings and phone calls with co-workers that can replace those trips for coffee or hallway run-ins.
Don’t rely too much on instant messaging or email. “A phone call is a far better cure to loneliness than email, instant messages and social media,” said Fanning.
And keep in mind: Loneliness can distort your view of your relationships. For instance, you might think someone is purposefully ignoring your email, but really they are just inundated with juggling work and homeschooling their kids.
“Try not to take it personally when you feel like you aren’t getting the kind of attention and connection you normally would,” said Barsade. “They may be dealing with something happening in their environment that is not related to who you are as a person or colleague.”

What managers can do

Managers play an important role in preventing loneliness among their team.
“Managers need to pay attention now more than ever,” said Barsade. That means regular check-ins and making sure everyone is connecting as a team.
Host regular team meetings, but don’t make them all about work. Add some time for socialization. To get the ball rolling, Fanning suggested asking open-ended questions like, “who did something fun this weekend they want to share?”
But there’s a fine line between helping people stay connected and overburdening them with everything else demanding their time.
“Don’t make it a burden that becomes draining and leads to burnout,” warned Barsade.

Trump draws up plan to punish China

The Trump administration is formulating a long-term plan to punish China on multiple fronts for the coronavirus pandemic, injecting a rancorous new element into a critical relationship already on a steep downward slide.

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The effort matches but goes far beyond an election campaign strategy of blaming Beijing to distract from President Donald Trump’s errors in predicting and handling the crisis, which has now killed more than 60,000 Americans.
Multiple sources inside the administration say that there is an appetite to use various tools, including sanctions, canceling US debt obligations and drawing up new trade policies, to make clear to China, and to everyone else, where they feel the responsibility lies.
“We have to get the economy going again, we have to be careful about how we do this,” said one administration official, speaking on condition of anonymity.
“But we will find ways to show the Chinese that their actions are completely reprehensible.”
The intelligence community is meanwhile coming under enormous pressure from the administration, with senior officials pushing to find out whether the virus escaped into the public from a laboratory in Wuhan, China, two sources familiar with the frustrations said.
In an unprecedented move, the intelligence community issued a statement saying it was surging resources on the matter as it would in any crisis.
“The IC will continue to rigorously examine emerging information and intelligence to determine whether the outbreak began through contact with infected animals or if it was the result of an accident at a laboratory in Wuhan,” the statement said.
CNN reported earlier this month that the government was looking into the theory that the virus originated in the lab but hadn’t yet able to corroborate it. Earlier this month Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said the weight of evidence suggests the virus was of natural origin.
The New York Times reported Thursday that officials were pressuring intelligence analysts to find information supporting the idea.
“I think we will figure it out,” an administration official said, when asked if it was possible the origin of the virus would never be established.
The US-China clash is brewing amid growing suspicion inside the administration over China’s rising strategic challenge and fury that the virus destroyed an economy seen as Trump’s passport to a second term.
“I am very confident that the Chinese Communist Party will pay a price for what they did here, certainly from the United States,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said last week.
The building confrontation comes as both sides seek to exploit an already fragmented geopolitical environment already shaken by their rivalry that has been thoroughly fragmented by the pandemic.
In the long term, it threatens to cause uneasy choices for US Asian allies who are also keen not to antagonize the giant in their backyard. And the growing tension could have significant repercussions for the global economy as the US seeks to wean itself off supply chains dominated by China.
There are serious questions to be addressed about China’s transparency in the early days of the outbreak in Wuhan and whether its autocratic system fostered an attempt to cover it up. The United States is not the only nation that wants answers amid a pandemic that has devastated the global economy and cost hundreds of thousands of lives.
In response to building pressure, China has launched a propaganda effort to distract from its own culpability, including blaming US soldiers for importing the pathogen in remarks that infuriated Trump.

Administration sizes up options

Officials note that finding ways to punish China will be a sensitive business.
“We’ll get the timing right,” Pompeo said on Wednesday. In the extreme circumstances of the pandemic, China has the capacity to hit back at the United States making it “irresponsible” to drive too hard too early, officials say.
With the US afflicted by shortages of personal protective equipment, medical devices, biologic drugs and Chinese-made pharmaceuticals, it is vulnerable to short-term disruption in established supply chains amid a pandemic that has infected more than a million Americans.
Pompeo appeared to demonstrate this restraint last week when he was asked about new Chinese export controls that have prevented US medical supplies from getting to the US. In private, US officials are irate, but in public Pompeo used delicate language.
“The good news is we have seen China provide those resources. Sometimes they’re from US companies that are there in China, but we’ve had success,” Pompeo said.
“We are counting on China to continue to live up to its contractual obligations and international obligations to provide that assistance to us and to sell us those goods,” Pompeo said.
In the longer term, especially if Trump wins reelection, the US effort will likely treat offshore supply chains as national security priorities rather than as simply economic questions.
“If we fail to do that in the face of this crisis, we will have failed this country and all future generations of Americans. It is that clear,” Trump economic advisor Peter Navarro told CNN.

A tense turn in US-China relations

The toughened posture toward China is consistent with Trump’s rejection of the principles of Sino-US ties that date back to President Richard Nixon’s courting of the then-closed communist state in the early 1970s.
Trump says that the process of ushering Beijing into the world economy in an effort to avoid a clash between the dominant power, the US, and China, the rising one — known as the Thucydides Trap — has been a disaster.
He has argued that Washington has emboldened and enriched a foe with nearly three times its population and that has “raped” US industry in the flight of blue-collar jobs abroad.
It was a message that was electrified Trump supporters in the decaying US rustbelt in 2016 and is one on which he is relying to brand his presumptive Democratic opponent as a China-appeasing tool of the foreign policy elite in November.
“This is the natural way to go. It’s the only way to go. It is pretty much the main campaign theme,” said an official familiar with the campaign’s messaging efforts focused on China.
The administration’s national security strategy — which was laid out in 2017 — also casts China as a competitor and a revisionist power.
But as is often the case, the administration’s hard line is undermined or tempered by the President’s own unorthodox personality and approach to his job.
Trump’s over-personalized approach to world leaders and his fixation with preserving his friendship with Xi is also directly contradicting his political and diplomatic strategy.
“We are not happy with China,” Trump said Tuesday but his statements are undercut by the multiple times he praised Chinese President Xi Jinping for his handling of the pandemic earlier this year, apparently partly motivated by a desire to keep a US-China trade deal, one of the few limited wins of his administration, on track.
One disadvantage of Trump’s insistence on forging friendships with strongman leaders is that it leaves national relationships more susceptible to any fractures in personal ties.
Both Trump and Xi are the most aggressive, nationalistic leaders of their two nations in decades, who are keen to flex personal power in a way that can cause volatile foreign relations.
And the US President is not alone in facing domestic incentives to initiate confrontation. While China’s Communist Party leaders enjoy absolute power, they are susceptible to internal political pressures — especially as they try, like Trump, to deflect from their own virus missteps.
In its own disinformation offensive, Beijing has blamed US troops for bringing the novel coronavirus to China. On Tuesday, Foreign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang accused “American politicians” of telling barefaced lies about the pandemic.
“They have only one objective: to try to shirk responsibility for their own epidemic and prevention and control measures and divert public attention,” Geng said.
The heated rhetoric over the virus threatens to unleash a chain reaction of mistrust and tension that worsens tensions between the US and China exacerbated by Trump’s trade war, territorial flashpoints including in the South China Sea and the global US campaign against the Huawei communications giant.
Former US Secretary of State Madeleine Albright warned on CNN last week that the building heat was dangerous.
“Frankly, it is each side pushing each other’s hyper nationalism buttons and we are getting nowhere,” she said.

The US/China freeze

Relations with China have plummeted in recent years, amid rising tensions over trade, Beijing’s territorial claims in the South China Sea and its rise to challenge the US strategically.
Trump’s decision to freeze funding for the World Health Organization, based on claims it was too solicitous from China, could also further undercut US influence, especially in Asia where the US withdrawal from the the Trans Pacific Partnership was a big win for Beijing.
China does have a record of overplaying its hand and driving regional powers back into the US orbit. The Obama administration exploited such a misstep with its Asia pivot.
Recent failures such as flawed personal protective equipment sent to Europe have tarnished Beijing’s coronavirus diplomacy. Racist treatment of Africans in the southern Chinese city of Guangzhou has had a similar effect. And despite its efforts to change the story, China may never escape the notoriety of being the incubator for the disease and claims its autocratic system was responsible for critical delays in tackling the virus.
So there is fertile ground for the Trump administration to exploit in its effort to punish China. But its own domineering attitude in the Trump years and a poorly managed effort to combat Covid-19 challenge the credibility of its efforts.
“There is really nobody who does not want to see China held to account for the political coverup attempt, which slowed down international awareness and allowed the virus to spread. There is a resentment around the world,” said Danny Russel, an Obama-era State Department official in charge Asia Pacific policy. “But I think you would be hard pressed to find a political leader in Asia or Europe who does not believe this anti-China push by the Trump administration is an entirely a political move. They are trying to deflect blame for the catastrophic incompetence of the administration.”

What Not to Do When You Reopen Your Business

As states grapple with timelines for reopening their economies, businesses now face the challenge of how and when to bring employees back safely.

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Several factors make this task difficult for business owners to navigate. Safety guidelines may differ from state to state, so companies with multiple locations across the country need to stay up to date on the various guidelines. Making matters even murkier, the federal Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) has not stepped in to issue overarching rules for employers or clarify their responsibilities for keeping employees safe.

This is all to say that if not handled carefully, any post-pandemic reopening plan may quickly become a legal minefield for businesses, says Travis Vance, a Charlotte, North Carolina-based partner and the chair of the Covid-19 task force at the labor and employment law firm Fisher & Phillips. “We’re going to see a lot of claims filed related to coronavirus,” Vance says, and while workers’ compensation may cover you for many of them, negligence claims aren’t covered. That means you need to be ready to show you’ve taken steps to preemptively reduce the risk in your facilities.

Vance offers five tips on what not to do when making your plan.

1. Don’t automatically adopt a company-run temperature-taking operation.

Taking employees’ temperatures sounds like a smart safety measure until you consider the logistical challenges involved. Vance points to three big areas of concern: keeping that biometric data private once you collect it, figuring out how to compensate employees while they wait in line, and keeping the people in that line safe, given the imperative to social distance. To be sure, employers may not have a choice on this matter because some states may issue reopening guidance that advises companies to begin taking their employees’ temperatures. If your business is in one of these states, Vance says some companies are getting creative to avoid the data privacy problem by using instant-read thermometers that they simply show to the employee after they’ve taken their temperature. “Collect as little data as you can,” Vance says.

If you’re able, don’t attempt to train someone on staff to take temperatures, he adds: “Look for ways to contract with [health care professionals] to the temperatures.” They will have the proper equipment and necessary training.

2. Don’t assume social distancing will be easy to enforce.

Similar to taking temperatures, while social distancing seems simple in theory, it’s much more difficult to execute. Even if you can move cubicles so that everyone is six feet apart, you also need to address break rooms and bathrooms. If you can, make communal restrooms into one-person bathrooms. Consider public-facing positions such as receptionists and how you’ll keep them from exposure. And don’t forget hallways. “Make corridors one-way traffic only,” Vance says. “It sounds silly, but you need to think about stopping face-to-face exchanges even in places like hallways.”

3. Don’t assume all of your workers will feel safe enough to come back to work.

Even if you take all necessary safety precautions, it’s highly likely you will have some employees who won’t want to return to work because they feel unsafe.

“OSHA’s threshold for people refusing to work is when someone is facing a high risk of imminent death,” Vance says. “In those cases, the only way to avoid such a hazard is for the person to not work. Most of the time employees can’t refuse to show up for work. So what do you do when they just decide not to show up?”

Start thinking now about how you’ll handle operations if many people still want to work from home and how you’ll treat all employees fairly in this case.

4. Don’t equip your team with masks without a proper procedure in place.

Again, some state orders may require you to supply your team with masks. In many cases, this order won’t come with any additional guidance, so it will be up to your company to figure out a plan for getting a sufficient supply, keeping them clean, and training employees on how to wear them properly. Another question to consider: What’s your response if an employee wants to wear a bandanna instead of a mask?

“Everyone needs to adopt a policy on this; it doesn’t matter if you’re a bank or a food processing plant,” Vance says. “It’s putting every business on equal footing in terms of workplace safety.”

5. Don’t forget to come up with a plan for how to handle visitors to your office.

All of the careful precautions you take to keep your staff safe will be for naught if you don’t also think about how to handle third-party visitors to your office, whether it’s package delivery people or clients. Most businesses Vance advises, from retail to professional services companies, are opting to post signage outside of their buildings advising visitors not to enter if they’ve had Covid-19 symptoms recently or been in contact with someone who has been infected. Usually, they also stipulate calling the receptionist instead of walking right in.

CREDIT: INC!

The world’s biggest car factory just reopened

Volkswagen reopened the world’s biggest car factory at Wolfsburg in Germany on Monday after the coronavirus forced it to shut down for the longest period in its 82-year history.

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The world’s largest carmaker has made 100 changes to the way its plants operate as it tries to restart business without risking the health of hundreds of thousands of workers. Its experience underscores the daunting task ahead for manufacturers as they resume work in a world still reeling from the pandemic.
“We have never developed, produced and sold vehicles under these conditions before,” said Bernd Osterloh, the top labor representative at Volkswagen (VLKAF).
The gigantic Wolfsburg plant is located on the banks of an equally impressive feat of human engineering, the 200-mile long Mittelland Canal connecting sea and inland ports in Europe. Originally built in 1938 to house workers for Volkswagen’s factories, Wolfsburg isstill home to the group’s headquarters and has produced more than 45 million cars since 1945.
It’s where the iconic Beetle was produced for more than three decades and where the automaker’s bestselling models, the VW Golf series and the Tiguan, are made today.
The plant shut on March 19 as the novel coronavirus tore through Europe, prompting carmakers to halt production across the continent after borders were closed and national lockdowns imposed. Its reopening is symbolic of wider efforts to kickstart economies in Europe, where some 14 million people work in jobs connected to the automobile sector.
The sprawling factory complex covers 6.5 million square meters (70 million square feet). It churned out about 700,000 cars last year, or roughly 3,500 a day. Some 63,000 people work on the site, about half the residents of the city after which it is named.
Reopening Wolfsburg has been anything but straightforward. The plant depends on a supply chain spanning 71 countries and more than 2,600 companies, all dealing with the fallout of the coronavirus. Volkswagen has put in place 100 different health and safety measures, agreed with its workers,with information displayed on more than 8,000 posters at the plant, and explained in booklets.
“Volkswagen is setting a standard for German industry with this agreement,” said Osterloh.

What’s changing at Wolfsburg

The company plans to ramp up production slowly, in line with the availability of parts, government requirements and the demand for cars, which collapsed as the coronavirus spread. It expects to build 1,400 cars at Wolfsburg this week, risingto 6,000 next week, or about 40% of outputprior to the pandemic.
“At Volkswagen, health takes precedence over speed,” Thomas Ulbrich, head of e-mobility for the Volkswagen brand, said in a statementlast week when the company reopened its electric vehicle plant in Zwickau, Germany.
Wolfsburg will restart with one shift of 8,000 production line workersinstead of the usual 20,000. Hours will initially be reduced for some employees, with shift changes arranged so that workers arriving don’t meet those that are leaving. Workers will be expected to check their own temperature and change into their uniforms at home each morning, rather than on site. They will be asked to use elbows to open doors and walk in single file once inside, following markers on the floor to keep space between people.
Social distancing will be enforced during team meetings and over lunch breaks, with reduced seating in common areas and conference rooms converted into office spaces. Canteens will remain closed and workers asked to bring their own lunch. Water dispensers have been temporarily removed to reduce the likelihood of infection and air conditioners set to circulate as much fresh air as possible.
Tools will be disinfected after every shift and workers will no longer pass them to one another by hand, instead setting materials down in containers so that others can pick them up at a safe distance. Several hundred additional hand washing facilities are being installed throughout the plant.
Vehicles will be spaced further apart on the factory floor and workers will complete tasks on the same car separately where possible. Masks will be worn where it is not possible to keep 1.5 meters (5 feet) apart.
Another huge challenge for Volkswagen and other manufacturers will be ensuring that the armies of suppliers entering their factories do not increase the risk of infection. Volkswagen, which also owns the Audi, Porsche and Seat brands, said it has shared its 100-point safety plan with more than 40,000 suppliers and logistics partners throughout the world.
CREDIT: CNN

The next pandemic could be a war

Not against a country or regime, but a virus — an enemy invader that is as alien to most people as it is invisible, and completely unaffected by humanity’s borders, politics or morality.

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After dangerously slow starts first in China, Europe and the United States, the world is now mobilizing to face the Covid-19 pandemic in an all-hands-on-deck moment. This counterattack is already showing preliminary results, but much of our effort will be for naught if we fully demobilize once this battle is won.
There’s a reason why militaries don’t demobilize after each war. To face ongoing threats, our militaries maintain ongoing capabilities. Even though we’ve faced terrible pandemics before, we’re now suffering unnecessarily because we’ve not applied their lessons to our ongoing war with deadly pathogens.
If any military had failed as spectacularly as the world’s governments have in preparing for and preventing this crisis, their leaders would have been summarily fired. The commanders who replaced them would then be judged by their ability to do everything possible to prevent the next crisis.
As the levers of state power and public health around the world now shift into gear, we can expect better results over the coming months, potentially including ongoing development of one or more Covid-19 vaccines and therapeutic strategies for critical care
But even once we have a vaccine, we can’t allow a full demobilization because as bad as this virus is, future pandemics could be even worse.
The novel coronavirus hits the rare sweet spot for infectious diseases. It causes illness but many people have mild symptoms or are asymptomatic, facilitating spread. It wasn’t so deadly that it immobilized its new hosts immediately or, as would be the case with Ebola, provoked an immediate quarantine of affected areas. It succeeded in part because the true threat wasn’t immediately recognized.
he world of biology is dynamic by definition, so there has always been the chance that deadly viruses like this would jump from animals to humans. It’s always been a question of when, not if. Through our destruction of national habitats, population growth, international travel, industrial scale animal husbandry and other actions, however, our species has massively exacerbated this threat.
But naturally occurring viruses might pale in comparison to the viruses that could potentially be created by the powerful new tools of synthetic biology — agents precision-engineered to cause harm.
A recent piece in the journal Nature Medicine assessing the likely origins of the novel coronavirus concluded that, whatever the origins of the outbreak itself, SARS-CoV-2 is most likely naturally occurring because of the relatively inefficient way it hijacks human cells. In other words, if a malicious genetic engineer was intentionally manipulating a virus to be deadly and contagious, they could potentially do a much better job.
In 2017, University of Alberta in Canada synthesized an extinct horsepox virus, a cousin of smallpox, for around $100,000.
This science has advanced so rapidly and the cost has come down so precipitously that the same feat could today be achieved for just a few thousand dollars. Unlike nuclear weapons, the development of which need the type of massive infrastructure usually reserved for nation states, developing a synthetic pathogen is now within the capacity of many groups or even individuals distributed across the globe. The next pandemic may not be an accident of nature.
But if we think about our struggle against any and all infectious agents as a battlefield, which we should, then we should learn from our most effective militaries about how best to prepare for what may be heading our way.

Here’s the plan:

1. Maintain essential capabilities: The soldiers in our fight against deadly pathogens are our public health officials, doctors, government planners and data modelers. To build the standing capabilities we’ll need for this fight, we must invest the necessary time and money to prepare for rare but inevitable events. With disease outbreaks, you pay a bit now for readiness or you pay a lot later for response, only with more human suffering added to the price tag. Once we have these personnel in place, we must plan and train like our lives depend on it. They do.
2. Develop global and local surveillance networks: Militaries invest massive resources in monitoring their enemy’s every action through satellite networks, spies and data analytics. To be ready for the next pandemic, we must develop new sensor systems that can identify new infectious agents in real time and use advanced data analytics to identify worrisome patterns of diseases well before a major outbreak emerges.
3. Build and maintain a network of alliances: Few militaries can succeed alone, and no country can protect itself from a deadly pathogen on its own. Pandemic preparedness must become a core and ongoing component of international cooperation. The World Health Organization can play the central role in this process, but only if it has the resources, staff and mandate to succeed. We must make that happen.
4. Build emergency response capacity: Militaries have expeditionary forces to take the battle to the enemy wherever a threat originates. We need the same capabilities for pandemics. The moment a tripwire is triggered indicating a potential pathogenic outbreak, trained emergency response teams, both national and international, must be ready to mobilize and equipped with tools and authority to respond.
5. Forward-deployed personnel and weaponry: Transporting personnel and equipment to faraway locations is expensive and slow, which is why leading militaries deploy people and equipment near the theaters where they will most likely be needed. The organization of the US Strategic National Stockpile may need a review to put more medical equipment closer to the front lines in major urban centers. In recent years, the US government pulled back some of the personnel on the ground in foreign countries working in disease prevention. As we are now seeing, if we don’t fight the skirmish of a pathogenic agent at its source, we can end up fighting a major war everywhere else.
6. Invest in the defensive weapons of the future: Militaries are always building the next generation of weapons and working to counter the enemy’s latest innovations. We now need to step up our efforts to create vaccine platforms that can rapidly counter novel threats as well as universal vaccines designed to target entire classes of viruses. Here, the growing power of synthetic biology to quickly design, build and deploy countermeasures in near-real time can be a powerful force for good.
There is little doubt that we were not ready for the terrible and largely preventable crisis we now face. Our poorly planned, underresourced and haphazard global response has led to over 200,000 deaths, massively disrupted our lives and caused trillions of dollars in economic fallout.
Shame on us if we are caught unprepared the next time.

US Vice President Break Rule, tours clinic without mask

When Vice President Mike Pence walked into the Mayo Clinic on Tuesday, he wasn’t wearing a face mask.

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Everyone else in the building was, according to reporters who were traveling with him. After all, it has been the policy at the renowned Rochester, Minnesota, facility since April 13. They even say they’ll provide one.
Pence was told of the new rules before he visited, the clinic said on Twitter, a post that was subsequently deleted.
“Mayo Clinic had informed @VP of the masking policy prior to his arrival today,” they had written.
But as he visited a blood and plasma donation center inside the building, Pence was bare-faced.
Others in the room — including Dr. Stephen Hahn, the Food and Drug Administration head — wore coverings.
The Mayo Clinic briefed Pence’s team in the last several days about the clinic’s policy requiring face masks, a person involved in planning the visit told CNN. The briefing came after the White House reached out last week about a potential visit. The person said when the clinic told the White House about the policy, it wasn’t clear whether Pence would wear a mask.
When Pence and the team, including reporters, arrived at the clinic, personnel from the facility had masks available for the group, including Pence. During the tour, the rest of the entourage wore masks except Pence.
Another source familiar with discussions said it is clear that — despite what the vice president said in defending himself and not wearing a mask — Pence’s staff understands now it was a mistake. News reports after the visit focused on whether he wore a mask instead of the work being done at the Mayo Clinic, and Pence’s staff believes they should have made sure he wore one to avoid such a news cycle, the source said.
Pence did avoid shaking hands; he elbow-bumped instead with doctors and officials.
But he was mask-less as he thanked workers, conferred with hospital administrators and spoke with a Mayo Clinic employee who was donating plasma after being diagnosed with Covid-19 at the end of March.
Afterward, Pence told reporters that he wasn’t wearing a mask because he’s often tested for coronavirus.
“As vice president of the United States I’m tested for the coronavirus on a regular basis, and everyone who is around me is tested for the coronavirus,” he said, citing guidelines from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that indicate wearing a mask can prevent those who have the virus from spreading it unwittingly.
“Since I don’t have the coronavirus, I thought it’d be a good opportunity for me to be here, to be able to speak to these researchers these incredible health care personnel and look them in the eye and say thank you,” he said.
In an update its website on April 13, the Mayo Clinic said it was requiring “all patients and visitors to wear a face covering or mask to help slow the spread of COVID-19.” It did not distinguish between visitors who had been tested for coronavirus and those who hadn’t.
“Patients and visitors are asked to bring their own face covering or mask to wear. If a patient or visitor does not have a mask, Mayo Clinic will provide one,” the website reads.
The guidance is based on recommendations from the Trump administration. The CDC recommended in early April that Americans consider wearing face coverings when in public to help prevent the virus spread from asymptomatic carriers. For roughly the past month, Pence has been getting tested weekly for the virus.
In announcing the new guidance, however, President Donald Trump repeatedly highlighted the recommendations weren’t mandatory. And he said he would not partake.
“I don’t think I’m going to be doing it,” he said, going on to suggest it was hard to envision such a thing in the Oval Office: “Wearing a face mask as I greet presidents, prime ministers, dictators, kings, queens — I just don’t see it.”
After the Mayo Clinic deleted its tweet saying it had advised Pence of the mask policy, a new message appeared thanking him for visiting.
“We look forward to continued collaboration to develop essential testing and treatment for our patients and communities,” the new tweet read.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8x4LO56VMlY

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