Belgium’s vaccination campaign is a prime example, computer scientist Hugues Bersini argues, of how technology can not only improve efficiency, but also, in some cases, make things more fair.
Tag: pandemic
Technology is turning education into a data-driven, personalized learning process. It’s up to humans to be sure it serves the needs of students, and societies.
When I blew the candles on my 29th birthday cake, on March 27th 2020, it was only 10 days after the first lockdown had begun in France. Still, I felt lucky. I remember telling myself that, even though the day included no friends, at least in 2021 for the much more momentous passage into la […]
From a Swiss music box to a Chilean quilt, different projects seek to leave a tangible sign of those we’ve lost.
In this era of plenty (even in the midst of a pandemic), humanity faces a key question: How can we cope with excess without sinking into decline?
The presence of the faithful at Mass, regardless of the threat to their health and lives, is essential for the Church to physically survive. And the state is an accomplice.
A century ago, during the Spanish flu pandemic, Americans were eager let down their guard and get on with normal life. The consequences were enormous.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/embed/SvrqUfd_El8 expand=1] One year into the coronavirus pandemic, Brazil registered its deadliest month in March. In the 31 days that have just passed, 66,573 people were killed by COVID-19, more than double the previous monthly high. The explosion of cases is largely blamed on the local virus variant, believed to be more contagious, having […]
A year after the world’s second most populous nation went into quarantine, a new study aims to calculate the cost in terms of mental health illness, suicide and inability to receive medical care.
A pandemic and a maritime accident teach us the same lessons: humility, fragility and ultimately human ingenuity. Risk is impossible to predict, except that we know it always exists.
Up against a microscopic virus, the world’s leaders have failed myriad different ways to do what was necessary to beat the pandemic. Was another fate possible?
The enduring pandemic has forced the world to develop new ways of working. What once were casual chats at water coolers are now endless WhatsApp group message chains, while cubicles and corner offices have been replaced by everyone’s home kitchen table… not to mention your children doing (or not doing!) their schoolwork beside you. The […]
They haven’t actually gone anywhere. But because of the pandemic, the city’s celebrated cafés are off limits — and sorely missed.
The official announcement came Thursday evening from European Union health officials, but it simply confirmed what we already knew: the AstraZeneca vaccine is safe. And most European countries will recommence distributing the jab, as the vaccination campaigns continue to be far slower than promised. For Guy Vallancien, a member of the French Academy of Medicine, […]
As elsewhere in Europe, Germany’s decision to suspend the use of the vaccine makes no logical sense when you weigh the risks and benefits in concrete figures.
You’re hungry and restaurants aren’t serving because of COVID lockdowns, but at least there are always vending machines. Hmmm? What looks tempting from behind that plexiglass?A Snickers bar or a bag of chips? Or maybe a pair of plastic-wrapped triangle sandwiches and a can of Coke? Otherwise, if you’re in the Franche-Comté region of eastern […]
Like the rest of us, street hustlers are adjusting to pandemic conditions. In Laval, a small city in western France, a young man who might have otherwise been taking passersby for a ride with Three-Card Monte or Find The Lady tricks, concocted a COVID-inspired scam for easy money. The Ouest France daily reports that the […]
Plastic pollution has contaminated our oceans to the point where a new ecological niche of anthropic origin has been coined: the ‘plastisphere’. The bacteria that proliferate there could lead to the next health crisis.
The pandemic has caused an overall drop in clothing sales. But is it also changing how we dress? External shocks have had an impact on fashion trends throughout history.
Authoritarianism allows for swift, decisive action, and when it comes to controlling a viral outbreak, that may be an advantage. But that’s only part of the equation.
Talk about the use of documents proving immunity evokes a measure invented more than a century ago by French authorities.
For Leitizia Moratti, head of welfare policy in the Lombardy region and former Milan Mayor, it wasn’t the first outrageous statement on Covid-19.
What’s an enterprising idea born out of lockdown? Get paid to take online courses for other people, as no teacher can actually see who is taking their course.
Vaccines are slowly arriving, but many of the shifts COVID has created will be lasting. These reverberations are much deeper than just working from home or increased digitization — society’s priorities have evolved. Thanks to the pandemic, people all over the world are completely rewiring their lives. They’re leaving once-vibrant cultural metropolises for serene greenery […]
An elderly COVID-19 victim, presumed to have been dead (and buried) for 20 days, has been located alive in the same Portuguese hospital where he was being treated. The 92-year-old, who had been hospitalized for about two months due to respiratory problems, was infected with COVID-19 while in the hospital the Jornal de Noticias reported […]
-Essay- — What does it say at the bottom of a Norwegian ketchup bottle? — Opens at the other end. As a Swede, I know about a hundred jokes like that, and it wasn’t until I moved to Norway in my early twenties I realized Norwegians tell the exact same ones about Swedes. This fraternal […]
In a rush to bolster its image, the Modi government is giving away coronavirus vaccines that will do little for the country’s international standing and would be better served at home.
German psychologist Stephan Grünewald has some insights on how nearly a year’s worth of coronavirus restrictions are impacting people’s mental health.
It’s stupid to expect people without any medical training to understand how each vaccine candidate has been evaluated. Public accountability offers an alternative.
From The Freedom Of Vanlife To A Pandemic Quarantine — And Back Again? RUE AMELOT Pathogens In The Permafrost: A New Climate Change Health Risk LES ECHOS No Work, No Way Home: Russia’s Migrant Workers Trapped By COVID-19 KOMMERSANT Brazil’s Stranger-Than-Fiction Descent Under Bolsonaro CLARIN Quiet Killer: When Coronavirus Got Inside A Capuchin Convent LE […]
In addition to coronavirus-related deaths, the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) recorded 42 murders of journalists and media workers since the beginning of 2020 in targeted attacks, bombings and shootings.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/embed/RljMJ8QE8dQ expand=1] News broke last weekend of a new, extra contagious strain of the coronavirus rapidly spreading in the UK, prompting several countries to suspend travel from the country. After France deciding to shut its UK border for 48 hours, thousands of trucks were unable to pass through from the Port of Dover via […]
As the sudden arrival of harsh new lockdown restrictions and the closing of borders in European countries coincides with down-to-the-wire Brexit talks, BoJo is facing an all-time low in public confidence.
Seeing Manel de Aguas can prompt a range of reactions. The connected artificial “fins’ implanted in his skull might look silly to some, inspiring to others, or just very disturbing. “I don’t feel 100% human,” the 27-year-old Catalan told the La Razón daily last week. On his Instagram page, de Aguas describes himself as a […]
After a year that’s been as trying as it is troubling, the holidays are finally upon us, and for many there’s a temptation to treat the upcoming festivities as a welcome catharsis. But for governments, this “most wonderful time of the year” represents a real conundrum: How to allow for some much-needed Yuletide joy while […]
PARIS — With much of the world trying to minimize the impact of a COVID-19 second wave, governments are again forced to make impossible choices between relaxing restrictions to avoid total economic implosion or staying shut down to limit death tolls. Even countries typically mentioned as pandemic role models, like South Korea, are seeing a […]
A global pandemic and weariness in many places of cheap, mass tourism may hasten a real paradigm shift in the travel sector. Or not.
It is a speech that stands out from all those we’ve heard from world leaders in the 10 months since the pandemic began — a far cry from the fact-defying rhetoric of Jair Bolsonaro or the cool logic of Emmanuel Macron. As Germany reported a record 590 deaths in one day from Covid-19, Chancellor Angela […]
Sweden was not driven by any libertarian ideas when it chose not to impose lockdowns. It simply opted to play a long-game when on the pandemic, for better or worse.
PARIS — A threshold has been crossed this week as the first vaccinations have been administered, in the UK and Russia, with announcements of others to follow in additional countries in the coming days and weeks. It all sets the stage for the biggest vaccination campaign in world history. But even if the obvious logistical […]