By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – The coronavirus is reaping a “grim harvest” in Zimbabwe. Those were the words of President Emmerson Mnangagwa acknowledging the deadly reach of the virus in the nation’s highest ranks of government. Zimbabwe’s transport and foreign ministers both succumbed to the coronavirus less than two days […]
Overcoming Vaccine Inequities and Enabling Small States’ Post-Covid19 Recovery
Viewpoint by P. I. Gomes* PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad and Tobago (IDN) – The “catastrophic moral failure” into which the world is seen as heading, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), Director-General, Dr. Tedros Ghebreyesus, can readily be understood as having its ideological basis in the callous principle of “profits before people for optimum […]
2021 Yet Another Testing Year for COVID-19 Hemmed Sri Lanka’s Economy
Viewpoint by Dushni Weerakoon The writer is the Executive Director and Head of the Institute of Policy Studies of Sri Lanka. COLOMBO (IDN) — The unprecedented disruptions of COVID-19 are causing a geopolitical reset — and as the global order is redrawn, small emerging market economies like Sri Lanka are vulnerable to the fallout. Sri […]
People’s Movement Launched in South Africa To Defeat Covid-19
By Lisa Vives, Global Information Network NEW YORK (IDN) – A call to action endorsed by over 500 organizations and individuals in South Africa is aiming to unite millions of the nation’s citizens in order to acquire 40 to 80 million doses of vaccine to defeat the coronavirus pandemic. “The pandemic is wreaking havoc,” organizers […]
One Planet Summit on Biodiversity Pledges Action Commitments
By Jaya Ramachandran PARIS (IDN) – The global health crisis of the COVID 19 came as a dramatic reminder of the importance of Nature for our daily lives and economies: biodiversity is our life insurance. Yet, the damage to ecosystems is unprecedented and will have major consequences on our lifestyles in the decades to come. […]
UN Chief Warns Against ‘vaccinationalism’ As 2 Million Die of COVID-19 Pandemic
By Radwan Jakeem NEW YORK (IDN) – “Our world has reached a heart-wrenching milestone: #COVID19 has now claimed two million lives. Sadly, the impact of the pandemic has been made worse by the absence of global coordination. In the memory of those two million souls, the world must act with far greater solidarity,” tweeted UN […]
A New UN Report Calls for Living in Balance with The Planet
By J Nastranis NEW YORK (IDN) – As the UN Secretary-General António Guterres has repeatedly pointed out, humanity is faced with a “defining moment”, a warning that is highlighted in the 30th-anniversary edition of the Human Development Report (HDR), The Next Frontier: Human Development and the Anthropocene. Though humankind has achieved incredible progress, we have […]
Make 2021 A Fairer, Safer, Healthier World for Children
By Caroline Mwanga NEW YORK (IDN) – More than 371,500 children would be born on the first day of 2021, according to the UN Children’s Fund (UNICEF). The agency’s Executive Director Henrietta Fore said on the eve of the New Year day: “The children born today enter a world far different than even a year […]
The Rich-Poor Gulf Widens 5 Years After Adoption of Sustainable Development Goals
By J Nastranis NEW YORK (IDN) – 2020 will be remembered as a year in which a contagious virus shut down the world, widened the gulf between the rich and the poor, triggered a spike in poverty for the first time in decades, and pushed back the United Nations efforts to create more equitable societies […]
Poor Indoor Air Affecting the Health of Babies in Africa and Other Regions
By J W Jackie RENO, Nevada, USA (IDN) – The recent State of Global Air 2020 report has revealed that pollution leads to half a million deaths among babies on a global scale every year, with poor indoor air quality contributing to two-thirds of these deaths. Particulate matter is a huge problem in Sub-Saharan Africa, […]