165 people have so far tested positive for Covid-19 in the Netherlands after a single disco that had 650 guests.
All had had to show proof of a negative test or vaccination to get in (though there are reportedly multiple loopholes, such as sharing screenshots).
"Everyone in front of and behind me in the queue for tests had been to Aspen Valley," Tim, 20, told a local newspaper saying that 9 of his 18 friends who were at the nightclub had since tested positive. "It's one big drama." irishtimes.com/news/world/eur…
The Netherlands has issued Covid-19 certificates to people as quickly as a day after getting a one-shot Johnson vaccine, though the manufacturer says it takes two weeks to work.
"Dancin' with Janssen" was the hashtag used by the health minister last week
I wrote about how Irish MEPs Mick Wallace and Clare Daly use their European Parliament speaking time, media platforms and legislative power to champion the views of authoritarian governments, particularly those of Putin and Assad irishtimes.com/news/politics/…
Some sample amendments from Mick Wallace, seeking to delete a condemnation of Russia's occupation of Crimea, and delete a mention of a Dutch-led investigation that found Russian arms were used to shoot down the MH17 passenger flight.
You can see more here: parltrack.org/activities/197…
Both Clare Daly and Mick Wallace declined to respond to my texts, calls, and emails to them in the hopes of speaking to them for this article. Mr Wallace made it clear he wasn't in the mood to chat.
The grilling of Hungary today by ministers from other member states is said to have been passionate and heated -- at least two in the room were themselves gay.
“It basically links homosexuality with paedophilia," @ThomasByrneTD said of the law irishtimes.com/news/world/eur…
14 member states have signed the declaration proposed by Benelux condemning Hungary's law: Belgium, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Spain, and Sweden; Italy then signed as well
Belgian court finds AstraZeneca "deliberately violated" contract with the EU by excluding British factory Oxford Biomedica in supplying contracted vaccines, and orders it to use the factory if needed to meet orders.
"AstraZeneca did not make its "Best Reasonable Efforts" it finds
In its conclusion the court orders AstraZeneca to deliver vaccines on a fixed schedule, or face a €10 fine per late dose.
However, AZ has already delivered most of these. The court found it couldn't impose a timetable for the outstanding ~220mln doses due (company says end-year)
Confusingly, both sides welcomed the judgment.
- AstraZeneca said it won, because the court says that the EU's order does not have priority over other contracts
- EU claimed victory as well, as the court found AZ violated its contract and that it should use the British factory
In 2019, international vaccine deniers descended on the Pacific island of Samoa.
In the measles outbreak that followed, 1 in every 150 babies aged 6-11 months died.
My piece on a cautionary tale as anti-vaxxers exploit the pandemic for platforms and power. irishtimes.com/news/world/eur…
The WHO produced guidelines to help public health officials deal with vocal vaccine deniers in 2016.
It explains how to counter the false claims, and that the audience is not the vaccine deniers (who will not be convinced) but the broader listening public who.int/immunization/s…
Some interesting observations from the WHO:
- the arguments of vaccine deniers have not changed much since the invention of vaccines
- out-and-out vaccine deniers are a very, very small group. But they can influence a much larger group of people who are persuadable either way
I think the evidence that Covid spreads through air, which has been apparent since the earliest days of the pandemic, was ignored and denied because its implications required institutional change. 'Distance and wash hands' puts emphasis on individual.
I'm not saying there was a deliberate conspiracy or something. Just a kind of laziness, cowardice, preference for whatever requires the least action -- basically a lack of leadership.
France vaccinated 400,000 people in a day this week.
For context, by population size that's the equivalent of the United States vaccinating 2 million people a day, which is the rate the US hit this month.
To compare to a closer neighbour with the same size population, the UK's daily record was 844,285 in a day on March 20. However, the NHS has warned of a "significant reduction in weekly supply" of vaccines in April.
Let's see some other countries.
Belgium vaccinated 39,000 a day in its best week, which is the equivalent of 1.1 million a day in the US in proportion to population -- the rate the US hit in January.
There are strong regional variations in Belgium, with Wallonia currently leading