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One of sustainability's biggest paradoxes is the cities of Europe that energise me as a tourist seem so civilised but history shows Europe hosted 2 world wars and Putins Euro of 2022 may be no safer than Stalin's or Hitler's 1920's E. At Queenofhearts.city we wonder if you could time machine to one year in E-history what year would you choose and what report for humanity would you search for? WHAT GOOD CAN PEOPLES UNITE IF THEY HAVE FIRST ACCESS TO 100 TIMES MORE TECH PER DECADE? Back in 1951 my father found this biggest scoop of his life at EconomistDiary.com. It was given to him by Hungarian-American John Von Neumann at Princeton
2006: In dads last 2 years age 84 he hosted a 40 person debate at Royal Automobile Club, a few minutes walk from the Royal Palaces - if the greatest human development advance of his lifetime since meeting Von Neumann was networked by a 1billiongirls (Asian Village mothers 2020-1970) - did anyone in the west or at The UN really know how they did this? 16 journeys to Bangladesh by Graduate Journalists has chalked up 2 resources ABEDmooc.com & Yunusmooc.com where both women empowerment luminaries requested we open learning networkers interpret C for Cooperation (not C for Certification) . We enjoyed more than a little help from many people such as Japan's Ambassador. As Diarists out of St James and alumni of Brother James Wilson have recorded: The UK Royal family left most of the human development of two thirds of beings in Asia to Prince Charles. As a 16 year old he had been assigned the duty to attend the 1964 Tokyo Olympics. 3 happy-good natured seeds were planted from that day on - good relations between Japan Empire and some of Europe's Royals; Sony as Japan's first inward investment in Europe; the birth of whether worldwide sports celebrities are tele2's blessing or a curse as next generations greatest heroines (Tokyo was the first satellite broadcast to a global audience). What if it turns out that in the 21st C European royals value sustainability of millennials more than soundbitimg politicians or professional bureaucrats whose Intel rules have no mathematical or human transparency. This strangely unpopular question is the purpose of events diaries by QueenofHearts.city and education's 3ed co-creative revolution - ed3dao.com Alumnisat.com. EconomistScotland.com thanks Glasgow University Union for marking up one of 2023's main QOH events 265th Smithian Moral Sentiments . If you have an event for our diaries to cooperate around please mail me chris.macrae@yahoo.co.uk. It may be that us far north diaspora scots are more interdependent on you all Europeans than anyone apart from whomever angry nature or angry purtins hurt next??. Sample some Future History Good/bad News Reports? ...1955 report what was Messina (birthing EU) for? 1945 report what was british language world service for?; 2022-1945 what was UN & ITU for; dad. The economist's norman macrae, spent his last days as teen navigating air planes bomber command burma; he tried his best at reparation ever since- wind assisted, so to speak, by the most valuable question media men were ever given - von neumann 1951 asked dad: to ask anyone/everyone what goods will peoples do with 100 times more uniting tech every decade to 2020s? In 1951, VN had 6 years left working on good (ie way above zero sum human development exchages) after the Goats of maths (including einstein turing ..) had spent moist of their life on the bad on nuclear arms racing. They had a reason to defeat hitler. I am no genius (just a listener who ,oves transparent maps/maths) ---but can anyone tell me why are we currently using nuclear races to defaeal all 8 billion of our beings. MUCH MORE IMPORTANT FROM 9/9/2022: if you have time to add positive thinking to our survey QueenofHearts.city - please do

Sunday, February 11, 2001

20 years on

 

https://twitter.com/gsdebinski

We're still not where we want to be," European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said this week about the European Union's sluggish vaccine rollout. It was a sort of concession from the EU chief, who's been criticized for overseeing a bungled inoculation rollout in the world's largest trading bloc.

To date, around four percent of the bloc's population has been vaccinated, compared to 13 percent in the US, and 20 percent in the UK.

Why has the EU rollout been so slow, and what does this mean for Europe and its politics?

Stronger together? EU states are usually responsible for their own public health policies, but the 27-member bloc shifted course last summer by deciding to procure vaccines as a single bloc. While this approach prevents larger and richer countries (Germany, France) from buying up all the stock and leaving smaller and poorer ones (Bulgaria, Romania) behind, the process has been a bureaucratic and logistical nightmare.

For starters, before it could ink a deal with a pharma company, the Commission had to hold lengthy negotiations, and wait for individual EU countries to sign the contract separately. Hampered by political machinations, the back-and-forth took months, costing the bloc precious time.

The EU's vaccine procurement strategy also appears to have slowed things down. Focused on obtaining drugs at the lowest cost, Brussels — which signed a deal with AstraZeneca two months after the UK did — bargained with drug companies while other governments pursued a whatever-it takes strategy, buying up the jabs first.

When asked about the speedy vaccine rollout in Israel, for instance, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said, we "did not quibble about the price of vaccines." Of course, Israel only had to secure vaccines for 9 million people, compared to the EU's 450 million. Still, during a deadly pandemic, a seven day negotiation delay can result in a large number of deaths.

Aversion to risk. The EU made clear from the start that it was not going to rush the vaccine regulatory approval process. While the US, Canada, Britain and others were willing to give speedy emergency authorizations for use — often bypassing traditional clinical trial protocols — the EU took an unhurried approach, authorizing the Pfizer vaccine on December 21, three weeks after the UK. This was further complicated by supply shortages, with pharma companies reneging on commitments made to the EU.

The Union also has other challenges to contend with. In France, home to a large anti-vaccine movement, some 60 percent of adults recently said they would not get a COVID jab, compromising France's bid to reach herd immunity. Compare that to the US, where 67 percent of residents now say they'll get vaccinated.

These factors complicate the EU's efforts to get back to normal anytime soon. It's no small feat that last summer the bloc passed a 750 billion euro coronavirus relief package, where for the first time, all EU countries agreed to share the financial burden of rescuing some members. (Compare that with the responses of EU governments to the sovereign debt crisis that followed the US global financial market meltdown and migrant crisis in 2015-2016.)

But those funds can only go so far in aiding Europe's economic recovery. Tourism-dependent economies (think Greece, Portugal, and Spain) need to reopen soon to avoid worsening economic crises, and that's not going to happen until most EU residents — 20 percent of whom are over the age of 65 — and visitors alike are protected from COVID-19.

Was this shortfall unavoidable considering the enormous task at hand? Mujtaba Rahman, Europe practice head at Eurasia Group, our parent company, says this outcome "definitely was not inevitable; more the result of several tactical missteps made by both the Commission and the member states." Rahman predicts "a reckoning" post-COVID "just as there was in the aftermath of the Greek debt crisis."

Who's filling the gap? Naturally, Russia and China are eager to help. Hungary, an EU member state often at odds with Brussels that has repeatedly criticized the bloc-wide procurement process, has bypassed Brussels by approving Russia's Sputnik V vaccine for use, and sealing a deal with Chinese-owned Sinopharm. Will other EU states follow suit?

The trade-off: The European Commission has prioritized European unity ahead of vaccine nationalism. This has clearly delayed the bloc's pandemic response. But how will voters in wealthy EU countries respond when they next go to the polls? Will they agree with Euroskeptic parties that EU unity was not worth the botched outcome? Only time will tell.


 

 
 
 

The strength of global democracy was tested by the coronavirus in 2020 — and COVID mostly won. The Economist Intelligence Unit's Global Democracy Index fell last year by an average 0.07 points, the biggest drop since the annual ranking was first compiled in 2006. Government-imposed restrictions on individual freedoms and civil liberties due to the pandemic are partly responsible for the decline, and this is true for a majority of countries regardless of how well they managed the pandemic. We take a look at how democracy performed in 2020 in the 10 countries that handled the pandemic best and in the 10 with the worst responses, as measured by the Lowy Institute.