July 2021

Six months after its coup, Myanmar now faces a mushrooming COVID-19 pandemic.Deaths have risen sharply daily during the third, delta variant, infection wave that began May 25; 326 deaths were reported July 23, bringing the coronavirus death toll to 6,459. Myanmar reported 5,506 new infections out of 13,487 samples, a 40% infection rate.  Actual numbers may be higher because of those unable to get into hospitals.Cemeteries struggle to dispose of bodies quickly, without safety measures, and hearses carry three or more bodies, also transported by taxis and cars.  Social media videos and photos show bodies piled for cremation at Yangon cemeteries. Volunteers and staff since the coup wear no protective equipment other than masks.Out of capacityFree funeral operators and aid workers in Yangon say they cannot keep up with a death toll they claim is now around 1,000 a day.Sein Win Than, whose charity service transports bodies, told VOA his organization must transport at least 40 bodies to cemeteries daily but cannot keep up with requests.“We cannot take over 50 bodies a day. We have to wait for hours at the cemetery to drop off the bodies but we cannot wait anymore because of high demand. When we get to the cemetery, we must quickly leave for another trip,” he said.The situation is not unique to Yangon.In Mandalay, the death toll has risen daily because of a hospital doctor and nurse shortage.“About 60 patients die per day, but we can take only 30 dead bodies to the cemetery,” an aid worker told VOA.Kalay, in northwest Myanmar, was the first declared stay-home township when the wave hit. Aid workers and residents estimate the daily death toll has reached 20 to 30 since the last week of June.“Over 500 suspected COVID-19 patients died in Kalay and most are Christians,” Lang Khan Khai, head of Kalay’s Zomi Baptist Aid Group, told VOA July 18, referring to deaths since the last week of June.“The local crematorium was overwhelmed with bodies July 16. Now, we cannot dispose of those bodies following religious rites,” he said. At least 30 people had died every day since June, he said.However, the official count is different. A township health department official said, as of July 17, 275 patients had died out of 1,855 who tested positive in the third wave.COVID-19 infections have forced some funeral services and volunteers supplying oxygen to needy patients to suspend services, but there are also other reasons.Tin Maung Oo, whose Yangon-based charity organization provides oxygen cylinders to needy people, stopped oxygen service July 16.Oxygen is difficult to buy, he said, and some people do not return the cylinders — some rent them to friends, some sell them, so the organization ran out of cylinders.Disobeying orders for loved onesA partial July 19-25 lockdown has been extended to Aug. 1. Enforcement is lax, though, and many choose between following regulations and saving loved ones, including obtaining oxygen. Aid workers and funeral service officials said 80% of pandemic deaths were from lack of oxygen.As of July 17, hundreds of people regularly arrived at oxygen plants at 4 a.m. for refills. They say the curfew and orders make it more difficult when they need oxygen at night but they have no choice.“Getting oxygen is the most important thing for me as my mother really needs it. I don’t care about anything else,” said Ko Moe Zaw, in line at a Yangon oxygen plant July 17. He got up at 3 a.m. to line up for oxygen, but 20 people beat him there.Ko Teik, a 50-year-old garment factory employee, has lost family members because oxygen was not available. His grandfather, father and nephew died this month because of lack of oxygen.”My nephew was the last one. On July 12, his breathing level dropped seriously, and he needed more oxygen, but we could not get enough. I searched all over Yangon to get oxygen. Sadly, he was dead when I did get oxygen,” he said.The coup leader, Senior General Min Aung Hlaing, said July 12 there is enough oxygen and blamed people for panic buying, warning the public not to spread rumors.“I want the people to cooperate. The main thing is not to take political advantage of it. This is a social issue, not a political issue. This is health issue and also a matter of human life,” he said.The same day, junta spokesperson Major-General Zaw Min Tun told reporters authorities were limiting sales of oxygen to discourage speculation and risky home treatments — some factories have since suspended operations.“We understand some people really need oxygen. In that case, they can buy it with the recommendation of relevant township health officers,” he said.The need for oxygen is increasing as more patients are treated at home, and an oxygen aid worker said oxygen tank prices had more than tripled. Speculators, he said, buy large numbers of cylinders wholesale, pushing resale prices up.The shortage has affected charity ambulances.”We also have to wait for hours for oxygen to be refilled so we can’t bring an oxygen cylinder when we pick up patients. Patients sometimes die in ambulances,” said Zar Ni, who works with a social welfare organization.State media announced July 17 that liquid oxygen tanks had arrived from China in Yangon and Mandalay and more tanks would arrive in days, but they would be used only for government hospitals and facilities. They did arrive and others are coming, including some from individuals or imported from Thailand, which are going to government hospitals.Dying at homePatients are being denied hospitalization and have not received adequate medical treatment at private and government hospitals. Private hospitals cannot provide enough care for COVID-19 patients and government hospitals are similarly hobbled because thousands of medical workers have joined the civil disobedience movement and left hospitals.Health Ministry guidelines say patients with symptoms should contact township health departments, and hospitals will not accept patients without a referral. Although the ministry announced township health department contact numbers, they rarely accept phone calls. Some patients who did get through were advised to stay home and refused referrals. Consequently, most people must cope on their own, despite warnings from medical professionals such as Khin Khin Gyi, the director of the Health Ministry’s Emerging Infectious Diseases Epidemiology Unit, who advises against home treatment and warns oxygen should be used only under expert guidance.“The pandemic is spreading around the world. It is not so easy to treat it at home,” she said.Some are resorting to home care because they do not trust the post-coup military.“Everyone is in trouble and everything has collapsed because of military coup. Instead of seeking help from the dictators, I would rather die at home,” Su Myat, the head of a now-closed Yangon garment factory said.Ma Theingi Htike, a resident of Sittwe, in the western Rakhine state, also had concerns about the military.“We tried to send my sister, who lost her sense of smell and taste, to private hospitals but they were full. Finally, we contacted to township health department, but they refused to provide a referral to admit her to the hospital,” she said. Finally, she said, she concluded that seeking help from military was a waste of time. Similar cases have occurred elsewhere.Aid workers found dead bodies at Yangon homes recently. On July 16, the Metta Thingaha Free Funeral Service found a father and son who had died at home in Yangon. The head of the service said the 70-year-old father was in bed, while his 40-year-old son was in a living room chair with an oxygen cylinder. The next day, Ye Thurein, a member of a township reserve fire brigade said a 70-year-old woman living alone was found dead in her fifth-floor apartment.Some health experts say the toll could rise in coming weeks because of the oxygen shortage, rising medicine prices and scarce medical supplies.“These conditions could put the lives of many people at home at risk and the death rate will definitely increase,” a senior physician in charge of a Mandalay hospital told VOA.Meanwhile, there are reports of a rising death toll as far away as Rakhine state, where the Sinbawkaing refugee camp has been shut down, and Kalay, where Lang Khan Khai, of the Zomi Baptist Aid Group cited local death figures, and which is also facing fighting between local forces and the army.“We expect the worst to happen in the coming months if we cannot control the current situation,” Lang Khan Khai said.   
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A scientist says fossils she collected from an ancient seabed in the mountains of northwestern Canada may be the earliest evidence of animal life on Earth ever discovered. In a study published Wednesday in the science journal Nature, Laurentian University geologist Elizabeth Turner detailed how she found fossilized three-dimensional structures that resemble modern sponge skeletons in thin sections of rocks taken from the remnants of a prehistoric ocean reef.Turner said the surrounding rock was 890 million years old, which would make the fossils she discovered about 350 million years older than the oldest undisputed sponge fossils previously found.Many scientists believe Earth’s first animal groups included simple, soft sponges or sponge-like creatures that lack muscles and nerves but have other features of simple animals, including cells with differentiated functions. But scientists often disagree on specifically what the earliest animal life might have looked like.Turner’s discovery will be carefully vetted by other scientists, and it has been greeted with excitement and skepticism.Paleobiologist Graham Budd of Sweden’s Uppsala University told The New York Times the problem was the 350 million-year gap between Turner’s discovery and the next most recently discovered fossil. “It would be sensational. It would be like finding a computer chip in a 14th-century monastery,” he said.Turner herself told the Times she could be wrong. But other researchers said her study was important.University of Southern California paleobiologist David Bottjer said he thought Turner had a pretty strong case. “I think this is very worthy of publishing – it puts the evidence out there for other people to consider,” he said.Some information in this report came from The Associated Press.
 
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Big tech companies are making it mandatory for employees in the United States to get COVID-19 vaccinations before entering campuses, as the highly infectious delta variant of the coronavirus drives a resurgence in cases.Alphabet Inc.’s Google and Facebook Inc. said on Wednesday all U.S. employees must get vaccinated to step into offices. Google is also planning to expand its vaccination drive to other countries in the coming months.According to a Deadline report, streaming giant Netflix Inc. has also implemented a policy mandating vaccinations for the cast and crew on all its U.S. productions.Apple Inc. plans to restore its mask requirement policy at most of its U.S. retail stores, both for customers and staff, even if they are vaccinated, Bloomberg News reported.Apple and Netflix did not immediately respond to requests for comments.Many tech companies, including Microsoft Corp. and Uber, have said they expect employees to return to their offices, months after pandemic-induced lockdowns forced them to shift to working from home.In April, Salesforce said it would allow vaccinated employees to return to some of its offices.Google also said on Wednesday it would extend its global work-from-home policy through Oct. 18 due to a recent rise in cases caused by the delta variant across different regions.”We’ll continue watching the data carefully and let you know at least 30 days in advance before transitioning into our full return-to-office plans,” the company said.   
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Britain risks becoming a breeding ground for new variants of the coronavirus that could be resistant to vaccines, according to some scientists. Henry Ridgwell reports from London. Camera: Henry Ridgwell    Produced by:  Barry Unger 
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Somalia lacks a national power grid and relies on imported fuel and wood and charcoal for its energy needs. But energy experts say with the longest coastline in mainland Africa and an average of 10 hours of sunshine per day, Somalia has great potential for onshore wind and solar power. Mohamed Sheikh Nor reports from Mogadishu. Camera: Mohamed Sheikh Nor   Produced by: Marcus Harton
 
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As Britons celebrate the lifting of coronavirus lockdown restrictions earlier this month, some scientists warn that the country risks becoming a breeding ground for new variants of the virus that could be more resistant to vaccines.Most restrictions were removed July 19, including social distancing regulations and the compulsory wearing of face masks. Indoor venues such as nightclubs reopened for the first time since March 2020.For many young people in Britain, the changes marked the return of longed-for socializing and partying, a chance to forget the misery of lockdown.“We’ve been the last ones to get the vaccine, we’ve always been to blame, we’ve been blamed for the spread of the COVID. And it’s just nice to get freedom and just brush it all off,” said one clubgoer in the northern city of Leeds, who did not want to give her name.People walks past shops and restaurants at Leadenhall Market in the City of London on July 27, 2021.But those freedoms could bring added dangers, according to some scientists.While infection rates have declined in recent days, the relaxation of lockdown rules will likely lead to an increase in transmission, says Emilia Skirmuntt, an evolutionary virologist at the University of Oxford.“I think there will be more infections than we have seen in the last days. With more infections, there is a bigger chance that we will see a new variant which might be even more infectious,” Skirmuntt told VOA.Britain has rolled out one of the fastest vaccination programs in the world. Just over 70% of adults are fully vaccinated, meaning millions of people are not fully protected — and unlike in the United States and parts of Europe, those under age 18 have not been offered the vaccine.“If we have groups which are unvaccinated, they are the danger that the variant, which might be more infectious or better at evading our immune response, will appear there. Teenagers and children are unvaccinated and the new variant might appear among them,” said Skirmuntt.The combination of a high infection rate and an incomplete vaccination program poses considerable dangers, argues Sterghios Moschos, a virologist at Britain’s University of Northumbria.“We do know that the countries which have been the most successful in containing the delta variant or the delta+ variant are now seeing transmission in the population amongst the vaccinated individuals,” said Moschos. “It is creating the most perfect fertile ground for the virus, these variants that are present now, to evolve resistance to the vaccine.”So far, British government scientists say there is no evidence that the virus is becoming more resistant to vaccines. And as more people are vaccinated, total infections should decrease — reducing the scope for the virus to mutate.And Britain has one of the world’s most advanced genome sequencing programs so can quickly identify any new variants of concern.Professor Sharon Peacock poses for a photograph at the Wellcome Sanger Institute that is operated by Genome Research in Cambridge, March 4, 2021.Sharon Peacock, executive director and chair of the COVID-19 Genomics UK (COG-UK) consortium, says there are twin threats.“The key thing we need to look out for, actually, is not just a new variant emerging, a brand-new variant emerging, but actually delta (variant) changing to have increasing biological characteristics that could lead to more spread or to increased immune evasion,” Peacock told Reuters.Only 14% of the global population is fully vaccinated against the coronavirus. In some low income countries, just 1.1% of the total population has received a single dose. That poses a risk to everyone, said virologist Skirmuntt.“We need the whole world being vaccinated or having immunity on a certain level. And if only some countries will be vaccinated on that level, that wouldn’t give us this global safety net,” Skirmuntt told VOA.As long as large populations remain unvaccinated, scientists say the coronavirus will continue to pose a risk to the whole world.Some information from this report came from Reuters
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