The Netherlands is banning passenger flights from India, where coronavirus infections are surging to record levels.
The government says the ban comes into force Monday evening and initially lasts until May 1. Flights carrying cargo and medical staff are exempt.
About seven flights a week arrive in the Netherlands from India.
Read more at:
The Netherlands Is Banning Passenger Flights from India | heatlh & science , coronavirus | The National Herald
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Showing posts with label India. Show all posts
Showing posts with label India. Show all posts
February 24, 2020
India-US Relations - Love fest in India between Authocrat Trump and Nationalist Modi - by Shant Shahrigian
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| Love Fest in India: Nationalist Modi and Authocrat Trump |
Following the lovefest, the president and First Lady Melania Trump are scheduled to make an evening visit to the Taj Mahal — the model for one of Trump’s infamous failed Atlantic City casinos.
In the capital New Delhi on Tuesday, Trump and Modi are expected to talk trade, though the president tried to keep expectations low.
Trump’s form of belligerent patriotism jibes with the hosting leader’s own desire to turn India, the world’s biggest democracy, into a Hindu nationalist state.
Read more at: Trump heads to India for meet with Prime Minister Modi - New York Daily News
February 5, 2018
Governments would get more done if they bullied people less on issues like anti-vaccination — Sara Gorman
In 2016, in the midst of a devastating measles outbreak, California decided to repeal the philosophical exemption to vaccines, which allows parents to opt out of required childhood vaccines because of “personal beliefs.”
Soon after that law went into effect, the number of exemptions for medical reasons suddenly soared. Some have argued that the philosophical exemption ban may have in some ways made matters worse, since school administrators are powerless against medical exemptions, but may have had more room to question philosophical exemptions.
Responding to complex social issues such as the anti-vaccine movement requires a full view of human behavior and a solid understanding of what it really takes to change minds. We need to let go of the idea that we can just strong-arm people into complying. Policymakers must understand that changing attitudes and behaviors requires a comprehensive approach that doesn’t rely exclusively on punitive measures alone.
These kinds of laws should be familiar to anyone who has followed the evolution of the response to anti-vaxxers in the US and elsewhere.
Last year, France, Italy, and Germany all announced new laws and fines that in each case made more vaccines mandatory and raised the stakes of not complying. In India, Kerala state instituted a new vaccine mandate for the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine after growing resistance led to serious declines in vaccination rates and constituted a major threat to India’s progress toward eliminating measles. Such policy responses to anti-vaccine sentiment are very common and often the first line of defense.
When faced with a viewpoint or behavior that seems completely irrational, it’s often very tempting to essentially “bully” people with facts, overwhelming them with all the reasons why their viewpoint is factually wrong. But recent research has found that not only does this approach often fail to change people’s minds and behaviors, it may even backfire. This is the basis for the “backfire effect,” a phenomenon in which people become more entrenched in their views after being bombarded with evidence against it.
A recent experiment from researchers at Dartmouth illustrates the principle well. Subjects were given fake newspaper articles that seemingly confirmed several very common misconceptions from recent history, such as that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. When they were then given a corrective article indicating that weapons were never found, liberals who opposed the war accepted the new article and rejected the old, whereas conservatives who supported the war did the opposite. In fact, those who did not change their view reported being even more convinced that there were weapons after being exposed to the correct information.
Another recent study showed what goes on in the brain when someone experiences the “backfire effect.” Participants were surveyed about their opinions on particular political issues and then were placed in an fMRI machine to measure brain activity. They were then presented with a large quantity of information that disproved their stated opinions. In a follow-up survey several weeks later, researchers found stronger inclination toward original views in the majority of participants. More importantly for this study, however, is what they found about brain activity during these informational challenges. Regions of the brain associated with strong emotion were heavily activated while parts of the brain associated with cognitive reasoning and comprehension were suppressed. In essence, the parts of the brain needed to absorb the new information were shut down by the parts of the brain associated with strong emotion.
As we can see, when people are faced with challenges to strongly-held beliefs, they may become emotional and dig their heels in. This can be a response to a barrage of new information that challenges what they believe, or a response to new laws that challenge the behavioral outcomes of strongly-held beliefs. Either way, we can see how punitive policies to address strongly-held beliefs might be limited, even if they are necessary.
Even when new laws are passed, lawmakers must take great care about how they communicate about them, especially if the law touches on “hot-button” issues like childhood vaccines or gun control. For example, recent research has suggested that presenting people with views they disagreed with on paper made them discount the intellect of the person presenting the views much more than when there was a video explanation provided instead. This is just one of many ways in which the medium and the precise content of a potentially controversial message can change the way it is received.
When faced with difficult viewpoints and behaviors of constituents, policymakers must think very carefully about how to respond. Often laws and regulations are needed, but what gets put in place with those regulations also needs to be carefully considered before new laws are implemented, not as an afterthought.
Read more: Governments would get more done if they bullied people less on issues like anti-vaccination — Quartz
Soon after that law went into effect, the number of exemptions for medical reasons suddenly soared. Some have argued that the philosophical exemption ban may have in some ways made matters worse, since school administrators are powerless against medical exemptions, but may have had more room to question philosophical exemptions.
Responding to complex social issues such as the anti-vaccine movement requires a full view of human behavior and a solid understanding of what it really takes to change minds. We need to let go of the idea that we can just strong-arm people into complying. Policymakers must understand that changing attitudes and behaviors requires a comprehensive approach that doesn’t rely exclusively on punitive measures alone.
These kinds of laws should be familiar to anyone who has followed the evolution of the response to anti-vaxxers in the US and elsewhere.
Last year, France, Italy, and Germany all announced new laws and fines that in each case made more vaccines mandatory and raised the stakes of not complying. In India, Kerala state instituted a new vaccine mandate for the measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine after growing resistance led to serious declines in vaccination rates and constituted a major threat to India’s progress toward eliminating measles. Such policy responses to anti-vaccine sentiment are very common and often the first line of defense.
When faced with a viewpoint or behavior that seems completely irrational, it’s often very tempting to essentially “bully” people with facts, overwhelming them with all the reasons why their viewpoint is factually wrong. But recent research has found that not only does this approach often fail to change people’s minds and behaviors, it may even backfire. This is the basis for the “backfire effect,” a phenomenon in which people become more entrenched in their views after being bombarded with evidence against it.
A recent experiment from researchers at Dartmouth illustrates the principle well. Subjects were given fake newspaper articles that seemingly confirmed several very common misconceptions from recent history, such as that there were weapons of mass destruction in Iraq. When they were then given a corrective article indicating that weapons were never found, liberals who opposed the war accepted the new article and rejected the old, whereas conservatives who supported the war did the opposite. In fact, those who did not change their view reported being even more convinced that there were weapons after being exposed to the correct information.
Another recent study showed what goes on in the brain when someone experiences the “backfire effect.” Participants were surveyed about their opinions on particular political issues and then were placed in an fMRI machine to measure brain activity. They were then presented with a large quantity of information that disproved their stated opinions. In a follow-up survey several weeks later, researchers found stronger inclination toward original views in the majority of participants. More importantly for this study, however, is what they found about brain activity during these informational challenges. Regions of the brain associated with strong emotion were heavily activated while parts of the brain associated with cognitive reasoning and comprehension were suppressed. In essence, the parts of the brain needed to absorb the new information were shut down by the parts of the brain associated with strong emotion.
As we can see, when people are faced with challenges to strongly-held beliefs, they may become emotional and dig their heels in. This can be a response to a barrage of new information that challenges what they believe, or a response to new laws that challenge the behavioral outcomes of strongly-held beliefs. Either way, we can see how punitive policies to address strongly-held beliefs might be limited, even if they are necessary.
Even when new laws are passed, lawmakers must take great care about how they communicate about them, especially if the law touches on “hot-button” issues like childhood vaccines or gun control. For example, recent research has suggested that presenting people with views they disagreed with on paper made them discount the intellect of the person presenting the views much more than when there was a video explanation provided instead. This is just one of many ways in which the medium and the precise content of a potentially controversial message can change the way it is received.
When faced with difficult viewpoints and behaviors of constituents, policymakers must think very carefully about how to respond. Often laws and regulations are needed, but what gets put in place with those regulations also needs to be carefully considered before new laws are implemented, not as an afterthought.
Read more: Governments would get more done if they bullied people less on issues like anti-vaccination — Quartz
June 2, 2017
Paris Agreement on Global Warming: Donald Trump Dumps agreement as US Conservatives and Evangelicals applaud move
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| Noah Could Be Back In Business |
He added: "if we can get a deal, that's great. If not, that's fine."
Mr Trump, who had made pulling out of the pact - which has been signed by almost 200 nations - a central plank of his run for the presidency, said that in withdrawing he was "keeping his campaign promise to put American workers first".
He said he wants to talk to citizens of "Pittsburgh, not Paris" to cheers in the crowd of the Rose Garden at the White House.
The President had been put under extreme pressure by allies around the world to stay in the agreement, and though administration said his views on the subject were "evolving" - having previously claimed climate change was a "hoax" - Mr Trump refused to be backed into a corner.
He has said that the deal would hit the US coal industry hard and that it would prove "too costly" for US to stick to the Paris accord to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
But Mr Trump ignores the fact that new money in renewable energy outpaced new investments in fossil fuels for the first time in 2015 to the tune of $350bn.
Pulling out of the agreement outright would take four years under the standard cooling-off period for new international treaties - the route Mr Trump is likely to take, but he said that the US is out "as of today."
Note EU-Digest: Of the world's countries, the climate change denial industry is most powerful in the United States.
The Koch brothers, industry advocates and libertarian think tanks, often in the United States. More than 90% of papers sceptical on climate change originate from right-wing think tanks.The total annual income of these climate change counter-movement-organizations is roughly $900 million.
Between 2002 and 2010, nearly $120 million (euro 136 million) was anonymously donated via the Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund to more than 100 organizations seeking to undermine the public perception of the science on climate change.. In 2013 the Center for Media and Democracy reported that the State Policy Network (SPN), an umbrella group of 64 U.S. think tanks, had been lobbying on behalf of major corporations and conservative donors to oppose climate change regulation.
Since the late 1970s, oil companies have published research broadly in line with the standard views on global warming. Despite this, oil companies organized a climate change denial campaign to disseminate public disinformation for several decades, a strategy that has been compared to the organized denial of the hazards of tobacco smoking by tobacco companies.
Also for millions of Americans evangelical Christians belief in the science of global warming is well below the national average.
Recent data from the Yale Project on Climate Change Communication suggests that while 64 percent of Americans think global warming is real and caused by human beings, only 44 percent of evangelicals do.
Evangelicals in general, tend to be more politically conservative, and can be quite distrusting of scientists (believing, incorrectly, that they’re all a bunch of atheists). Plus, since some evangelicals really do go in for that whole “the world is ending” thing—not an outlook likely to inspire much care for the environment.
EU-Digest
November 25, 2016
Press Freedom Award: International Press Freedom Awards go to journalists from India, El Salvador, Turkey and Egypt
The Committee to Protect Journalists honored journalists from India, El
Salvador, Turkey and Egypt on Tuesday with its annual International
Press Freedom Awards for their commitment to a free press despite death
threats, imprisonment and exile.
CPJ executive director Joel Simon said threats against journalism are increasing around the world, including in the United States following the presidential election victory of Republican Donald Trump, who has branded mainstream media dishonest and who hasn't held a news conference since his election.
"It's a very intimidating, hostile environment,'' Simon said before the ceremony. "Now, we're not going to compare it to some of the things we're going to see tonight, but certainly the climate's changed and the notion that we're here living in this First Amendment paradise defending the rights of our more vulnerable colleagues around the world, that gap has closed considerably.''
Turkey's Can Dundar, chief editor of the daily Cumhuriyet, was another honoree. He was arrested on November 26, 2015, after publishing an article alleging the government intelligence service sought to send weapons to Syrian rebel groups.
He was charged with disclosing state secrets, espionage and aiding a terrorist group and was sentenced to five years in prison. He remains free, after spending 92 days in jail, while his appeal is considered. His wife however was not allowed to travel outside the country.
Read more: International Press Freedom Award goes to Malini Subramaniam
CPJ executive director Joel Simon said threats against journalism are increasing around the world, including in the United States following the presidential election victory of Republican Donald Trump, who has branded mainstream media dishonest and who hasn't held a news conference since his election.
"It's a very intimidating, hostile environment,'' Simon said before the ceremony. "Now, we're not going to compare it to some of the things we're going to see tonight, but certainly the climate's changed and the notion that we're here living in this First Amendment paradise defending the rights of our more vulnerable colleagues around the world, that gap has closed considerably.''
Turkey's Can Dundar, chief editor of the daily Cumhuriyet, was another honoree. He was arrested on November 26, 2015, after publishing an article alleging the government intelligence service sought to send weapons to Syrian rebel groups.
He was charged with disclosing state secrets, espionage and aiding a terrorist group and was sentenced to five years in prison. He remains free, after spending 92 days in jail, while his appeal is considered. His wife however was not allowed to travel outside the country.
Read more: International Press Freedom Award goes to Malini Subramaniam
December 12, 2015
Pollution: Dirty deeds: The world's biggest polluters by country - by Sarah Wolfe
After years of decline, US carbon dioxide emissions increased slightly last year, according to a new report by the US Energy Information Administration.
That said, America is still a little better than the world's worst polluter: China.
The 2 percent jump in CO2 emissions in the United
States was largely the result of higher natural gas prices last year,
which prompted some utilities to switch back to a dirtier energy source —
coal, according to The Washington Post.
Read more: Dirty deeds: The world's biggest polluters by country | GlobalPost
August 30, 2015
EU economy is bigger than the US - by Bob Bryan
As a single country, the US is the biggest economy in the world.But given its close ties, you could easily argue that the countries of the European Union make for one big economy. Indeed, you would be arguing that it's the world's largest economy.
The adjusted GDP of the 28 EU member nations is bigger than both China and the US, the traditional list of world's economic super powers.
"In nominal U.S. dollar terms, the European Union (plus Norway, Switzerland, Iceland) accounted for 25.4% of world output in 2014 according to data from the International Monetary Fund. That was greater than America’s share (22.5%) and well in excess of China’s—13.4%," said Quinlan.
The EU consumer is also on top. The EU, plus periphery nations, accounted for 28.5% of all consumer spending in 2014, according to Quinlan, above both the 26.6% spent by US consumers and the 15.6% spent by the emerging economies of the Brazil, Russia, India and China combined. This attracts global companies to the region.
"Gaining access to wealthy consumers is among the primary reasons that US companies venture overseas, and hence the continued attraction of Europe to US firms," wrote Quinlan.
So while Greece has little direct impact on the US, stabilizing the massive EU economy should still be a huge concern for Americans and the rest of the world.
October 12, 2013
Sweat Shops:You should care where your T-Shirt was made: The true cost of a T-shirt - by M. MacKinnon and M. Strauss
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| Your T-Shirt is probably made in this "sweatshop" |
Work had just begun at the welter of garment factories when the power went out. So a manager on the seventh floor, home to the New Wave Style factory, was quick to stand up as the lights went back on and announce that the building was safe. Everyone should continue doing their jobs.
But this time, Rana Plaza didn’t stop shaking.
“He died on the spot as he was announcing that we should keep working,” Raehana Akhter recalls. Then she fell, too. “It was like stepping into an elevator [shaft]. I felt this feeling in my stomach, and then everything fell.”
When she landed, Ms. Akhter, a 22-year-old mother who worked as a quality control officer for about $2 a day, was in complete darkness, with her left leg trapped under shattered cement.
“The ceiling was just here,” she says, putting her hand about 30 centimetres above her face. “I felt like this would be my little grave.”
The building did become a grave – for 1,129 people. Its collapse was the world’s worst industrial accident in almost three decades. Fatal accidents in the garment-trade belt around Dhaka have become all too regular.
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| Sweatshop |
The collapse of Rana Plaza spotlighted the potentially tragic costs of the cheap T-shirt – now a staple of fast fashion – and sparked debate about just how much responsibility retailers should have for the supply chain that moves product onto their shelves.
Yet as the ties between countries have become stronger, accountability has become a loose thread. The Globe’s investigation shows how companies such as Loblaw place their orders through middlemen, who in turn source work to a network of far-flung factories. The retailer whose shelves are stocked with cheap T-shirts in many cases does not know where in the world it or its materials is going to be produced when an order is placed. Inspecting buildings and working conditions has been beyond the retailer’s scope.
Note EU-Digest: Maybe it is high time that the EU Parliament approves legislation which only allows in products made overseas into the EU that have a 'Trade Mark' which says: "This product has been produced in a workplace which meets EU approved standards for safety". Just talking about the issue with the Governments in question that allow these sweatshops or corporate entities which import these products has had very little effect.
In the meantime consumers should check the label of the products they are buying and think twice about buying the product if it is not clearly specified that it was produced in a safe workplace.
Read more: Spinning tragedy: The true cost of a T-shirt - The Globe and Mail
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