Archive for July 31st, 2020

31/07/2020

Corporate Bailout or Cash Transfers for All, including Children?

Human Wrongs Watch

BEIRUT, Jul 31 2020 (IPS)* – The Covid-19 pandemic seems to have spared children from the direct health effects of the virus but the crisis has affected their social and economic rights directly and indirectly beyond what we could have foreseen. And there’s no doubt that children who come from more vulnerable backgrounds will feel the long-term impact of the pandemic and the measures taken to prevent its spread the hardest.

cancollectorsdhaka-629x472Batara slum in a Dhaka suburb. Credit: Naimul Haq/IPS

Social and economic rights are crucial to ensure the fulfilment of basic rights like sustenance, housing, food, education, health, employment and freedom from discrimination.

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31/07/2020

Health Must Come Before the Economy – Top UN Official for Latin America and the Caribbean

31 July 2020 – In Latin America, where much of the region has dealt with years of sluggish growth, the economic crisis brought about by the COVID-19 pandemic is pushing millions more into poverty, says Alicia Bárcena, the head of the UN regional body for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC). (*).
PAHO/Karen González Abril | The Bogotá Ministry of Health have sent a Muisca nurse to Suba, in the north of Bogotá, Colombia, to check on the local indigenous population..

In an extensive interview with the UN communications chief, Melissa Fleming, Ms. Bárcena expressed concern at the disproportionate impact that the pandemic is having on indigenous people in the region, in terms of both the health risks they face; shared her fear that the wisdom and knowledge held by these communities is disappearing; and her dismay at rising inequality and poverty, following a period in which progress has been made on both fronts.

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31/07/2020

Young People ‘Not Invincible’ in COVID-19 Pandemic: World Health Organization

(UN News)* — Although older people are among those at highest risk of COVID-19, the head of the World Health Organization (WHO) has reminded younger generations that they are “not invincible” when it comes to the disease.

UN News/Daniel Dickinson | A park in Brooklyn, New York, has marked out circles in order to enforce social distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Evidence suggests that the spike in cases in some countries is partly due to younger people “letting down their guard during the northern hemisphere summer”, WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said on 30 July 2020.
31/07/2020

Ravages of Acute Hunger Will Likely Hit Six in 10 in Zimbabwe: World Food Programme

Human Wrongs Watch

(UN News)* — The World Food Programme (WFP) is urgently seeking more international support to prevent millions of Zimbabweans plunging deeper into hunger. The COVID-19 pandemic has aggravated an already severe hunger crisis in Zimbabwe, UN humanitarians warned on 30 July 2020.

WFP/Claire Nevill | In Harare, Zimbabwe, a single mother of three relies on food assistance from the World Food Programme (WFP) during the COVID-19 pandemic.
31/07/2020

World Day against Human Trafficking Spotlights Essential – but Often Overlooked – Role of First Responders Who Identify the Millions of Victims Worldwide

(UN News)* — The UN commemorated World Day against Human Trafficking on 30 July 2020 spotlighting the essential – but often overlooked – role of first responders who identify the millions of victims worldwide, helping them secure justice, and rebuild their lives.
© UNHCR/Alissa Everett | Samrawit, a 20-year-old Eritrean asylum-seeker braids her friend’s hair at the UNHCR Emergency Transit Centre in Gashora, Rwanda.

“These are the people who work in different sectors – identifying, supporting, counselling and seeking justice for victims of trafficking, and challenging the impunity of the traffickers,” UN Secretary-General António Guterres said in his message on the Day, which is observed annually each 30 July.

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31/07/2020

Asylum, Now an American Horror Story

Human Wrongs Watch

By Roy Eidelson – TRANSCEND Media Service*

It’s hard to know exactly where the Trump Administration found the inspiration for its newest set of draconian asylum rules. Might it have been a National Geographic special where a giant anaconda encircles its prey, squeezes it to death, and then swallows it whole? Or perhaps a late-night, B-grade horror film in which some evil mastermind drowns his victims by slowly filling a sealed room with water?

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