Overcoming the lockdown: EU looks to apps as way of easing virus lockdown

As the EU's economy reels from virus lockdowns, Brussels unveiled a proposed roadmap Wednesday to ease restrictions on life and businesses, relying in large part on smartphone tracking apps.

That technology aims to spot localized COVID-19 outbreaks in real-time. Already many individual European governments are on the verge of rolling out their own tracking apps.

But the European Commission is concerned those go-it-alone initiatives will provide incompatible data sets, useless for compiling a whole picture across the single market where people and goods are meant to move freely.

It is also worried these apps could fall foul of strong EU data privacy rules and Europeans' deep-seated wariness of technological prying.

"The aim is to get the single market back on track so that it can work properly," Commission chief Ursula von der Leyen told a videolink news conference as she unveiled the 16-page roadmap to phasing out lockdowns that have brought life to a standstill in many countries.

The document puts data collection and contact tracing at the top of its recommended measures, above expanding testing, reinforcing healthcare systems and providing more protective gear.

But it said the use of any apps should be "voluntary" and comply with personal data protection rules.

"Tracing close proximity between mobile devices should be allowed only on an anonymous and aggregated basis, without any tracking of citizens, and names of possibly infected persons should not be disclosed to other users," it said.

An EU official giving more details to journalists later called such apps "very useful to prevent localized flare-ups" of the virus.
 
But, he warned, "they will only work if citizens have full trust in those apps -- this is very important to stress"

Note EU-Digest: It is a good idea - and don't worry about your privacy on the internet, that has already been gone several year ago re: GPS, Bank Cards, Credit Cards, Phone cards etc., which carry just about all your private information.

Read more at: EU looks to apps as way of easing virus lockdown | News , World | THE DAILY STAR

USA: Trump halts World Health Organization funding amid coronavirus pandemic: byJeff Mason

President Donald Trump said on Tuesday he would halt funding to the World Health Organization over its handling of the coronavirus pandemic while his administration reviews its response to the global crisis.

Trump told a White House news conference the WHO had “failed in its basic duty and it must be held accountable.” He said the group had promoted China’s “disinformation” about the virus that likely led to a wider outbreak of the virus than otherwise would have occurred.

The United States is the biggest overall donor to the Geneva-based WHO, contributing more than $400 million in 2019, roughly 15% of its budget.

The hold on funding was expected. Trump has been increasingly critical of the organization as the global health crisis has continued, and he has reacted angrily to criticism of his administration’s response.

Note EU-Digest: In February Trump praised the WHO for the great work they were doing with China on fighting the Coronavirus, while at the same time he did nothing to prepare America for the onslaught of the virus. Trump now blames everyone else, including the WHO for his total mismanagement of the fight against the coronavirus in America. The WHO in Geneva.is a dedicated and professional organization, in service of humanity, to improving health and sanitation around the globe. 

Trump's rambling accusations and lies constantly contradict his earlier TV recorded statements. Trump is a disgrace to America.

Read more at: Trump halts World Health Organization funding amid coronavirus pandemic - Reuters

EU: A virus is haunting Europe - the vector is capitalism- by Brendan Montague

The novel coronavirus is infectious, deadly and invisible to the naked eye. It spreads exponentially, has traversed the globe and today poses a threat to the very foundations of modern civilisation. All these properties it shares with capitalism.

There are three primary ways in which capitalism has escalated the current coronavirus crisis: the transmission of the virus to humans, the spread of the virus globally, and the failure of governments and deregulated markets to contain the spread of infections.

The transfer of this coronavirus from animals to humans, the subsequent infection of populations in almost every country and the collapse of health services would not have been possible without the specific circumstances brought about by our current economic system. Covid-19 is the name we have given the disease. SARS-CoV-2 is the name of the virus. The vector is capitalism.

Scientists in China - the world’s second largest economy - are currently focussing their resources on containing the spread of the virus and finding treatments and vaccinations for its victims. But some information has already been established about the most likely beginnings of novel coronavirus.

The current most likely hypothesis is that Covid-19 or its predecessor originated in the bat population - which is known to carry a virus with a 96 percent match. The bat population was also believed to be the starting place for the SARS (Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome) outbreak in 2003. Covid-19 was then likely transferred to human beings through the sale of wild animals, perhaps slaughtered on site at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan, in Hubei province, China.

James Meadway, a former advisor to Labour shadow chancellor John McDonnall, has argued at Novara Media that “coronavirus will require us to completely reshape the economy”. He warns that a recession is now inevitable. More than that, Covid-19 will produce an even bigger crisis than 2008 because “it threatens the most fundamental institution of all in capitalism: the labour market itself.” 

We have seen that the prospect of workers staying at home has destroyed the value on the world’s stock markets.

Workers need to defend themselves against the economic crisis. Trade unions and activists must fight for better sick pay, protection against redundancy, a fair benefits system at the very least and better still a universal basic income. We need a functioning National Health Service, we need to nationalise those useful corporations and industries that would otherwise go to the wall. 

In the US, Sanders has called for $2,000 monthly payments for US households to deal with this crisis. Every one of these measures represents a return to health of the body politic, and the fighting back against the capitalist infection.

The solutions we need today are profoundly non-capitalist, perhaps the seeds of post capitalism. The solution is community activism. The primary example is the hundreds of mutual aid groups that arose simultaneously. A nation of volunteers organised through mutual aid groups are preparing to support neighbours - often strangers - during the hardest of times. There has also been a rapid political grassroots response to the crisis. And the climate movement continues, albeit online. 

But we do have to go even further. Capitalism is the vector for coronavirus, but has itself become sick. But we need to kill it. If capitalism does survive, if it can revive, it will once again again drive climate breakdown, biodiversity collapse, the devastation of our croplands.

Read more: A virus is haunting Europe - the vector is capitalism

Suriname: Economic Crisis Prompts a Showdown, and a Shutdown, in Suriname - by Harmen Boerboom and Anatoly

From the New York Times comes the report that the Suriname ground to a halt recently as its banks, shops and factories shuttered in a showdown between its beleaguered private sector and its authoritarian government over how to respond to a deepening economic crisis.

The closures brought a new and unpredictable tension to the streets of Paramaribo, the capital of this nation in the north of South America. Most people stayed home to comply with measures to fight the coronavirus pandemic. ran dry in the cash-based economy and supermarkets, afraid of being overrun by nervous shoppers, were closed. The showdown made Suriname, a Dutch-speaking ethnic melting pot of 600,000, the latest and most extreme example in South America of how the pandemic and a plunge in commodity prices are destabilizing weak economies and polarizing political systems

The slide in the price of Suriname’s two main export commodities, oil and gold, over the past month has effectively left the country without enough hard currency to pay off its debt and import basic goods, leaving the country on the verge of default. In addition, the departure of Dutch tourists as a result of the pandemic, which has sickened eight people in Suriname so far, has deprived the street economy of a significant source of euros.

 Suriname’s economy has gone into a tailspin just as the country is preparing for a crucial vote. In May, its president, the former military dictator Dési Bouterse, will seek another term despite being convicted of homicide by Surinamese judges and of drug trafficking charges by the Dutch.

His son, Dino Bouterse, is serving time in an American prison on drug- and terrorism-related offenses.

 In an effort to shore up the local currency, stem inflation and stop capital flight ahead of the vote, the government imposed strict new restrictions on foreign currency transactions. The governing party pushed the measure through Parliament at last month and it took effect 4 days later.

 The restrictions outraged business people and bankers, who say they repeat the currency controls that ruined neighboring Venezuela, a rare regional supporter of Mr. Bouterse. To repudiate the new limits, they brought commerce to a screeching stop.

“What has happened cannot and will not be tolerated,” said the Association of Surinamese Industry and the Association of Surinamese Manufacturers, which called on its members to strike in a joint statement. One of Suriname’s biggest food companies, Fernandes Group, closed most of its businesses on Wednesday, provoking a run on bread.

 The new measure made black market currency transactions punishable by up to three years in prison, and created a militia to stamp out illicit trading. But even as these measures were rolled out on, the cost of a dollar on the black market jumped to double the official rate as Surinamese rushed to get the scarce hard currency.

Read more at: Economic Crisis Prompts a Showdown, and a Shutdown, in Suriname

The Netherlands: The Dutch Consider The Hyperloop — Amsterdam To Paris In 90 Minutes

Hardt Hyperloop and North Holland are exploring a hyperloop system to connect Amsterdam with Belgium, France, and Germany. They foresee enormous economic opportunities, but is their plan realistic?

Read more at:
https://cleantechnica.com/2020/04/10/the-netherlands-considers-the-hyperloop-amsterdam-to-paris-in-90-minutes/

EU - Coronavirus Debt: Netherlands refuses to 'Go Dutch' on EU coronavirus debt

As the European Union spars over an emergency economic package for countries reeling from the COVID-19 pandemic, the Dutch have revived their image of thriftiness by refusing to support a plea by southern members to take on collective debt.

Read more at:
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-eu-netherlands/netherlands-refuses-to-go-dutch-on-eu-coronavirus-debt-idUSKCN21R31J

EU - Germany confirms that Trump tried to buy firm working on coronavirus vaccine

Read more at
Germany confirms that Trump tried to buy firm working on coronavirus vaccine – POLITICO