Greece and Turkey have long been at loggerheads over a host of issues – from a scattering of uninhabited islands in the Aegean Sea that divide them, to the origins of souvlaki.Now, they are trading jabs anew, this time trying to trump each other’s claims to Pfizer’s creation of what may be the world’s first demonstrably effective coronavirus vaccine.Since the company’s announcement earlier this week, media and medical experts from around the globe have hailed the drug’s pioneers, Dr. Ozlem Tureci and Dr. Ugur Sahin, as heroes.While both scientists are children of Turkish migrants who moved to Germany as part of the first guest worker generation in the late 1960s, the pair founded BioNTech in 2008 to develop new types of targeted cancer treatments.Two men wearing masks to help protect against the spread of coronavirus, watch their dogs playing in a public garden, in Ankara, Turkey, Nov. 12, 2020.As the coronavirus pandemic spread earlier this year, BioNTech, which employs 1,300 people, quickly moved to reallocate its resources, teaming up with the U.S. pharmacy industry giant Pfizer to develop 20 candidates for a vaccine.As the world this week breathed a sigh of relief at news that one of the experimental vaccines had shown results, Turkey, like perhaps no other state, went into a frenzy.Since the revelation, Turkish news media have splashed pictures and praise of the “Turkish dream team” on the fronts of newspapers, magazines and websites. Politicians have praised them for contributing to humanity. Even teachers across the nation are said to be aggressively lecturing students about what is being described as the great Turkish feat.On the other side of the Aegean divide, though, Greeks are giving scant coverage and little praise to the scientific duo, largely referring to them as Germans, rather than Turkish nationals.Pundits, press and politicians have instead taken to rejoicing their own national success: Albert Bourla, the Greek veterinarian at the helm of Pfizer and his strategy of striking a deal with BioNTech to produce and globally distribute the landmark drug.“A Greek yields hope of a breakthrough,” shouted the Athens-based Skai television network, featuring reports and special segments about Bourla and his rise from the humble origins in Thessaloniki, northern Greece.“The Greek who steers Pfizer,” blared the Capital.gr news site, as politicians across the divide posted pictures and praises for the leading Greek executive, fanning web chatter that the small and poor country, in the throes of a tragic COVID-19 comeback, would be the first to receive samples of the vaccine.5 Things to Know About Pfizer’s Coronavirus Vaccine Early results look great, but questions remain Having joined Pzifer’s animal-health division in 1993, Bourla became the company’s chief executive last year, striking a string of successful deals. In the first nine months of his tenure, he refocused the company toward patent-protected drugs and vaccines with the potential for significant sales growth.The drug maker’s announcement this week triggered a surge in BioNTech’s stock, pushing the company’s shares up by 23.4%, and rallying markets globally.BioNTech and Pfizer had been working together on a flu vaccine since 2018, but they agreed to collaborate on a coronavirus vaccine in March.Both sides left politics and age-old rivalries aside, bonding more over their shared backgrounds as scientists and immigrants.“We realized that he is from Greece, and I’m from Turkey,” Sahin said in a recent interview, avoiding mention of their native countries’ long-running antagonism. “It was very personal from the beginning.”While both NATO allies, Greece and Turkey have been at odds over air, sea and land rights for decades. They came to the brink of war in September before Washington waded into a standoff in the eastern Mediterranean, urging Ankara to recall a vessel exploring for energy off the coast of a Greek island.    EU and U.S. diplomats have long tried to bridge the Greek-Turkish divide and build trust between the two sides through business. A major thawing of relations in 1999 saw trade between the two countries soar while cultural barriers eroded dramatically.Whether the Pfizer and BioNTech cooperation on good science can serve as a catalyst for improved Greek-Turkish relations remains unclear, pundits and politicians quip on both sides.  For now, though, the rivalries seem to have no impact on Pfizer’s collaboration with BioNtech.“He’s a scientist and a man of principles,” Bourla said of Sahin, in a recent interview. “I trust him 100%.”
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The United States set another single-day record for the number of COVID-19 infections on Wednesday.Data compiled by The COVID Tracking Project shows more than 144,000 new cases were reported across the U.S., surpassing the more than 136,000 new cases recorded just the day before.  The data also shows 65,368 people were hospitalized with COVID-19, shattering the 61,964 mark set one day earlier  Another 1,421 people died Wednesday, pushing the 7-day average over 1,000.  Texas Surpasses 1 Million COVID-19 CasesCDC changes advice on wearing masks, saying they benefit both wearer and anyone nearby The new figures add to the United States’ world-leading casualty figures of more than 10.4 million total COVID-19 cases since the pandemic reached its shores earlier this year, including more than 241,000 deaths, according to data from Johns Hopkins University.  The nation’s most-populous state of California is nearing the 1 million mark of total COVID-19 cases, following Texas, which became the first U.S. state to reach the grim threshold on Wednesday.  In Brazil, late-stage trials of a potential COVID-19 vaccine have resumed after the country’s health regulator called a halt due to an “adverse, serious event” involving a participant in the study.  The vaccine, dubbed CoronaVac, is being developed by Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac.  The vaccine had been denounced by Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, a frequent critic of China.   Brazil has the highest coronavirus tally in Latin America, with more than 5.7 million confirmed cases and 168,368 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins University  Coronavirus Resource Center.In Spain, authorities announced Wednesday that travelers from countries considered high-risk areas for COVID-19 will have to show proof of a negative test before they can enter the country.  Travelers must have a copy of the original document, either on paper or in an electronic format, that shows the test was conducted 72 hours before their planned departure.  In Japan, organizers for the 2021 Tokyo Olympics said Thursday that participating athletes will not have to enter a mandatory 14-day quarantine period when they arrive for the games next year.  Games Chief Executive Toshiro Muto told reporters that a decision on allowing foreign spectators to observe the events would be finalized next year, but said it is a possibility the two-week quarantine could be waived for them as well.  The Tokyo Summer Games were initially scheduled to be held this July and August, but organizers in March decided to postpone them for a year due to the pandemic.  
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Texas became the first U.S. state Wednesday to surpass 1 million confirmed cases of COVID-19, with California close behind.Health officials in the country’s second most populous state recorded 10,800 new cases on Tuesday, a one-day record. Although they gave no indication of imminent restrictions to slow the surge, The Associated Press reported that a top county official in Fort Worth, the state’s fifth-largest city, began pushing to halt youth and school sports. Some rural hospitals have set up outdoor medical tents.On Wednesday, state health officials reported 6,779 patients in hospitals, with 609 newly admitted patients — one of the highest single-day spikes since the state began keeping track.The true number of infections is likely higher because many people have not been tested, and studies suggest people can be infected and not feel sick.NationwideThe United States recorded 61,964 COVID-19 hospitalizations on Tuesday, breaking the previous one-day high from mid-April by more than 2,000.As the pandemic worsens across the U.S., the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention revised its guidance on the use of face masks. The federal health agency said Tuesday that wearing a mask not only protects other people but also protects the wearer.FILE – A sign encouraging the wearing of masks and adhering to social distancing stands at a street corner in downtown Nashville, Tenn., Aug. 5, 2020.The CDC cited several studies confirming that “universal masking” helped control the spread of the virus, including one involving two hairstylists who wore masks while suffering from symptoms. The study found that the stylists had not transmitted the coronavirus to 67 customers who were later notified by contact tracers.On Wednesday, White House political affairs director Brian Jack and former White House aide Healy Baumgardner tested positive for the coronavirus after attending an election night party at the White House on November 3. Since then, White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and Housing and Urban Development Secretary Ben Carson also tested positive.The U.S. leads the world with more than 10.2 million total cases, including more than 136,000 new cases reported on Tuesday, according to data from Johns Hopkins University. The U.S. reported more than 1 million new COVID-19 cases in just the first 10 days of November, averaging more than 110,000 new cases a day.WorldwideCOVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, has claimed over 1.2 million lives worldwide since the first cases were recorded in December 2019.According to the latest figures from Johns Hopkins, more than 51 million cases have been confirmed around the world.A man wearing a face mask walks past a coronavirus sign during the second nationwide lockdown in London, Nov. 10, 2020.Britain on Wednesday became the fifth country in the world to record over 50,000 deaths from the coronavirus and currently has the highest COVID-19 death rate in Europe. British lawmakers mandated a countrywide lockdown last week as the nation began battling a resurgence of the virus.Spain has recorded over 40,000 deaths, while Italy, one of the worst-hit countries earlier this year in the pandemic, surpassed 1 million cases.Elsewhere in the world, Iran and Lebanon joined the growing list of nations that have imposed new restrictions to blunt a growing surge of infections that are pushing hospitals in each nation to the breaking point.Iran has ordered all restaurants and nonessential businesses in Tehran and other major cities to close at 6 p.m. local time for one month. In Lebanon, Prime Minister Hassan Diab has announced a one-month lockdown that will begin Saturday.Iran has more than 700,000 confirmed cases, including 10,339 on Tuesday, according to Johns Hopkins, while Lebanon has 96,907 confirmed cases, including 749 deaths.First case in VanuatuMeanwhile, the Pacific nation of Vanuatu announced its first confirmed infection, ending its status as one of the few places in the world that had been free of the coronavirus.Health authorities said the infected man, a 23-year-old native of Vanuatu, had returned home from the United States last week, with stops in Sydney and Auckland, Australia, and had been placed in quarantine. The man was asymptomatic when he returned but tested positive on Tuesday.Secretary for Food and Health Sophia Chan and other officials attend a press conference in Hong Kong, Nov. 11, 2020. Hong Kong and Singapore will at month’s end allow travelers in both cities to visit the other without having to serve quarantine.Hong Kong and Singapore announced plans to start an air travel “bubble” this month that would allow travelers from each city to visit the other without entering quarantine. Beginning November 22, visitors must have a negative test at every stage of the journey.The two cities say the flights will be limited to one per day into each city, with just 200 passengers per flight. The goal is two flights a day beginning December 7. The bubble will be suspended if either city experiences a surge of infections.Richard Green and Esha Sarai contributed to this report. 
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As the coronavirus explodes again, the World Health Organization finds itself both under intense pressure to reform and holding out hope that U.S. President-elect Joe Biden will reverse a decision by Washington to leave the health agency.
With its annual meeting underway this week, WHO has been sharply criticized for not taking a stronger and more vocal role in handling the pandemic. For example, in private internal meetings in the early days of the virus, top scientists described some countries’ approaches as “an unfortunate laboratory to study the virus” and a “macabre” opportunity to see what worked, recordings obtained by The Associated Press show. Yet in public, the U.N. health agency lauded governments for their responses.
Biden has promised to overturn President Donald Trump’s decision in June to cut off funds to WHO and withdraw the U.S. WHO has also bowed to demands from member countries for an independent panel to review its management of the pandemic response, and WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Monday that the agency welcomed “any and all attempts” to strengthen it “for the sake of the people we serve.”
One of the central dilemmas facing the WHO is that it has no enforcement powers or authority to independently investigate within countries. Instead, the health agency relies on behind-the-scenes talks and the cooperation of member states.
Critics say WHO’s traditional aversion to confronting its member countries has come at a high price. As COVID-19 spread, WHO often shied away from calling out countries, as big donors such as Japan, France and Britain made repeated mistakes, according to dozens of leaked recordings of internal WHO meetings and documents from January to April obtained by The Associated Press.
Some public health experts say WHO’s failure to exert its influence lent credence to countries adopting risky outbreak policies, possibly compromising efforts to stop the virus.
“We need WHO to be bold and to use their political power to name and shame because the consequences are so devastating,” said Sophie Harman, a professor of international politics at Queen Mary University in London. “This is their Spanish flu moment … By not speaking up when countries are doing questionable things, WHO is undermining its own authority while the planet burns.”
Others said it would be politically unwise for WHO to be too outspoken unless countries give the agency more power and the ability to censure countries — an option that Germany and France have recently proposed.
“If Tedros was to take a very aggressive stance toward member countries, there would be repercussions,” said Suerie Moon, co-director of the Global Health Centre at the Graduate Institute of Geneva, referring to WHO’s director-general.
WHO spokeswoman Farah Dakhlallah said that since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, “WHO officials have had and continue to have, frank and open discussions with government counterparts … We are proud of an organizational culture that fosters candid discussion with the aim of reaching life-saving solutions.”
One of the scientists in the meetings, emergencies chief Dr. Michael Ryan, also laid out WHO’s approach in answer to a media question March 11 on whether the agency was willing to say which countries weren’t doing enough.
“The answer to that question is, you know who you are,” Ryan said. “The WHO doesn’t interact in public debate or criticize our member states in public. What we try to do is work with our member states constructively.”
It’s not unprecedented, however, for WHO to publicly question its member states. It threatened to close its China office when the country was hiding cases during the SARS outbreak, loudly called for Nigeria to reverse its boycott of the polio vaccine in 2003 and accused Tanzania of not sharing enough information about an Ebola epidemic last year.
The review of WHO’s role in the pandemic comes at a critical time because the agency is now tasked with helping to buy and distribute coronavirus vaccines around the world once any prove effective, especially to poorer nations. Some countries, including the U.S. and Russia, have refused to join the effort, but on Sunday, WHO chief scientist Dr. Soumya Swaminathan said she hoped Biden’s election would “open the door” to U.S. inclusion.
WHO’s reticence to call out countries started with China, as the AP earlier reported. Despite a January meeting between Tedros and Chinese President Xi Jinping, information on the outbreak was still sparse throughout February. Maria Van Kerkhove, WHO’s technical lead for COVID-19, noted that the agency lacked “enough detail to say what has worked and what hasn’t.”
Yet at a media briefing shortly afterwards, Tedros said, “China is doing many good things that are slowing the virus and the facts speak for themselves.”
Also in February, WHO scientists were concerned about Japan. On Feb. 1, a passenger who disembarked the Diamond Princess cruise ship in Hong Kong tested positive for the coronavirus. At the ship’s next stop in Yokohama, 10 more cases were found and authorities put all 3,711 people on board under lockdown.
Ryan told reporters at the time: “Let’s be careful here not to overreact.” But on Feb. 10, the case count nearly doubled overnight.
“(That’s) not surprising given the nature of the response of the investigation,” Ryan said at an internal meeting, saying only a small number of epidemiologists had been assigned to the outbreak. “If you double the number of cases in a ship in a day, something is not right.”
Dr. Thomas Grein, WHO’s chief of acute events management team, reported to his colleagues that WHO had discussed the outbreak with their Japanese counterparts, but failed to glean much useful information.
“It’s a very, very sensitive issue and we need to tread carefully,” he warned.
Although WHO was keenly aware the situation was deteriorating, scientists said the outbreak could help in understanding COVID-19 transmission patterns.
“(It’s) unfortunate, but a useful opportunity to study the natural history of the virus,” Ryan said.
Several days later, Japanese outbreak specialist Dr. Kentaro Iwata went aboard the Diamond Princess and called the response “completely chaotic.” Soon afterward, WHO announced more than half of the world’s known COVID-19 cases outside China were aboard the Diamond Princess.
“It was very obvious on that cruise ship that things were going badly wrong and WHO should have said something,” said Lawrence Gostin, director of the WHO Collaborating Center on Public Health Law and Human Rights at Georgetown University. “When what countries are doing is flat-out wrong, we need WHO to say so.”
While WHO wasn’t specific, Tedros said on Feb. 26: “One of the biggest challenges we face is that too many affected countries are still not sharing data with WHO.”
Throughout February and March, COVID-19 triggered outbreaks in South Korea, Singapore, Iran and elsewhere. The virus also gained a foothold in Italy, turning Europe into the epicenter of the pandemic.
At WHO, officials worried in internal meetings about the lack of information from European member states. Grein said WHO’s efforts to get more detail about the spiraling outbreaks had “spectacularly failed.”
Yet on March 8, Tedros tweeted that “the government & the people of Italy are taking bold, courageous steps aimed at slowing the spread of the #coronavirus & protecting their country & world.” Three days later, Tedros declared COVID-19 to be a pandemic, saying the announcement was made partly due to “alarming levels of inaction” by countries, which he didn’t name.
Georgetown University’s Gostin said WHO should be obligated to publicly report when countries aren’t sharing enough data.
“If a country is not providing vital epidemiological or biological information, then WHO and the world are flying blind in an outbreak and we can’t have that,” he said.
WHO also complained in private about Western countries hoarding scarce pandemic supplies.
“We had the terrible situation yesterday with (protective personal equipment) where all the supplies were requisitioned in France and we lost access,” Ryan told his colleagues. He said WHO needed to pressure countries and companies to avoid similar situations.
As countries across Europe moved to adopt social distancing measures and cancel mass gatherings in early March, Ryan noticed one country didn’t: Britain.
“There isn’t a single sports event in Europe and yet all of the Premier League matches in the U.K. are to go ahead as normal,” he said. Ryan described Britain’s pandemic strategy as “problematic” after hearing the U.K.’s chief scientific officer publicly say the country was aiming for herd immunity.
“For that to happen, hundreds of thousands and millions of older people are going to become infected and there is just going to be so much death,” Ryan said. Still, he said, the different approaches to tackling COVID-19 globally could prove to be “a massive ecological study” that would allow WHO to document what worked best.
“It’s macabre in some ways, but it’s reality,” he said.
Going forward, WHO’s role in the continued unfolding of the pandemic will depend in part on the panel review. Harman, the expert from Queen Mary University, sympathized that WHO had enormous responsibility in the early months of COVID-19, but said even greater challenges loom now.
“This is not an experiment for WHO to learn lessons for the future, the stakes are too high for that,” she said. “With the next wave of the pandemic, I think the time for quiet diplomacy has passed.”
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A vaccine for the coronavirus has proved 90% effective after early trials, according to its joint developers Pfizer and BioNTech. It’s raised hopes that the global coronavirus pandemic can be brought under control in the coming months – but as Henry Ridgwell reports, the nature of the vaccine means less developed health systems face major challenges in rolling out any inoculation programs.Camera: Henry Ridgwell    
Producer:  Henry Ridgwell, Mary Cieslak 
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Australia’s most famous radio telescope that played a key role in televising the Apollo 11 moon landing in 1969 has been given a new Aboriginal name. Known as “The Dish,” the telescope near Parkes in New South Wales, 380 kilometers west of Sydney, will also be called “Murriyang,” meaning “Skyworld” in the local indigenous language.   The Parkes Observatory has three telescopes. All have been given new Aboriginal names in respect of the astronomical knowledge of Australia’s original inhabitants, whose stories of creation, known as the Dreaming, are told by the stars.   The largest telescope, which has discovered hundreds of new galaxies and rapidly spinning neutron stars called pulsars, is also to be known as “Murriyang” or “Skyworld.” The others have Aboriginal names meaning “Smart Eye” and “Smart Dish.”   Dr. John Reynolds is the director of the Australia Telescope National Facility, which is run by the national science agency, the CSIRO.   “I think the bestowing of traditional names is very significant because not only does it recognize the traditional custodians of the land where the telescopes sit, but it highlights the link between the oldest science, astronomy, and the longest continuous civilization in the world that has been practicing astronomy for generations. The new name for the familiar Parkes dish — the big 64-meter [dish] — is Murriyang, which represents the sky world in the Wiradjuri dreaming,” said Reynolds.  The names were chosen by Wiradjuri elders, who say it is one of their proudest moments.   While it is operated mainly for astronomy research, the Parkes telescope has a long history of being contracted by international space agencies to track and receive data from spacecraft. In 2012, it helped to monitor NASA’s Curiosity rover during its descent onto the surface of Mars.   But perhaps its most famous mission was its part in receiving television signals on a momentous day in July 1969 during the Apollo 11 moon landing.   The story was made into a popular movie “The Dish” in 2000, which helped to cement the facility’s legendary status in Australian science.   The telescope weighs 1,000 tons and only receives signals from space, but never sends them. It was officially opened in October 1961.  
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The United States on Monday reported more than 1 million new cases of COVID-19 in just the first 10 days of November.The U.S. has recorded over 10 million cases of COVID-19 — the highest of any country in the world — according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.Midwestern states are being hit the hardest, with hospitalization rates in the region reaching record highs. The COVID-19 Tracking Project said more than 59,000 people were hospitalized nationwide on Monday.On the same day that the U.S. recorded this spike, two U.S. drug companies announced developments in the fight against the virus.Pfizer announced that its experimental vaccine was 90% effective in preventing the virus in participants without evidence of prior infection.U.S.-based drugmaker Eli Lilly and Canadian-based biotech firm AbCellera announced a new antibody drug known as bamlanivimab. It is part of a class of treatments known as monoclonal antibodies, which are made to act as immune cells that scientists hope can fight off the virus. The antibody therapy is similar to one given to U.S. President Donald Trump after he tested positive for COVID-19 early last month.The FDA has approved the antibody drug for people 12 and older who are at risk of developing a serious form of COVID-19.FILE – A man holds a mock syringe as demonstrators protest against Sao Paulo state governor Joao Doria and China’s Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine, in Sao Paulo, Brazil, Nov. 1, 2020.Just hours after news of a breakthrough in the effort to develop a safe and effective COVID-19 vaccine, Brazil halted late-stage clinical trials of another potential vaccine.The country’s health regulator, Anvisa, announced Monday that it was pausing tests of CoronaVac, developed by Chinese pharmaceutical company Sinovac, after an “adverse, serious event” with a volunteer participant. The event occurred on October 29, but the statement did not go into any other details.The clinical trials in Brazil are being conducted by Sao Paulo-based research institute Butantan. Dimas Covas, the head of the state-run institute, told a local television station that a volunteer had died but that the death was not due to the vaccine.The Sinovac vaccine is the third to be put on hold after a volunteer became ill after being inoculated. U.S. pharmaceutical giant Johnson & Johnson put a hold on its late-stage clinical trials of its COVID-19 vaccine last month, while another U.S.-based drugmaker, AstraZeneca, halted its late-stage trial of a vaccine developed with the University of Oxford in September after a volunteer in Britain was diagnosed with transverse myelitis, an inflammatory syndrome that affects the spinal cord and is often sparked by viral infections.It is not uncommon for clinical trials to be suspended if a volunteer falls ill so that organizers can determine whether the illness is due to the vaccine. But Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who has often expressed mistrust of China, has openly doubted the effectiveness of the Sinovac vaccine and has insisted that his government will not purchase the drug.People wait next to their cars outside the Cotugno hospital as the battle with the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) intensifies, in Naples, Italy, Nov. 9, 2020.Cases spike in EuropeCOVID-19 infections have spiked in other parts of the world, including in Europe, where some governments have instituted lockdown measures to slow the spread of the virus. Globally the number of confirmed cases is more than 50 million, with 1.2 million deaths and 33 million people recovered.According to The Associated Press, intensive care units in France, Italy and Spain are low on hospital beds and staff as case numbers continue to increase.The situation is worsening in Italy, where five more regions have been placed in the government’s so-called “orange” zone of its new three-tiered system that imposes various degrees of restrictions.The system splits Italy’s 20 regions into three zones — red, orange and yellow — with red indicating the most restricted areas and yellow the least restricted.Abruzzo, Umbria, Tuscany, Liguria and Basilicata will join the southern regions of Puglia and Sicily in the orange, or medium, zone; under this zone, residents can move freely within their towns or cities, but cannot leave them, while bars and restaurants are limited to delivery and takeout service.The northern province of Bolzano has been placed in the red zone, joining its sister regions of Lombardy, Piedmont, Valle d’Aosta and the southern region of Calabria. Residents in these zones will not be allowed to leave their homes except for work or medical reasons.All of Italy is under a curfew from 10 p.m. to 5 a.m., while museums and shopping centers are closed on the weekends and high school classes switch from in-person to online.Italy has 960,373 confirmed novel coronavirus cases, including 41,750 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center.
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A top Pakistani government scientist says Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine is not suited for Pakistan, or other developing countries because of the -80°C temperatures it needs to be kept at, and the need for a second shot.The American pharmaceutical company announced Monday that late-stage testing on its potential two-dose vaccine indicates it is more than 90% effective in preventing the virus in participants without evidence of prior infection.The revelation is being hailed as a rare piece of positive news in the fight against the pandemic that has globally infected more than 50 million people, with 1.2 million deaths and 33 million people recovered.But Professor Atta Ur Rahman, who heads Pakistan’s Task Force on Science and Technology, said Tuesday it is “premature at least” for his country or others in the developing world to celebrate the Pfizer vaccine.“This is a messenger RNA vaccine and it has to be transported at -80°C, so this vaccine is not suited for developing countries,” Rahman told VOA. “The cold storage infrastructure and chains to take this from the airport across the cities and across the countries are missing in the developing world,” the professor explained.He went on to note that COVID-19 patients would require two doses of the Pfizer vaccine three weeks apart and “a low-temperature carriage” requirement makes it all the more difficult in Pakistan, where average summer temperatures in southern and southwestern regions soar to between 40°C and 50°C.COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.FILE – Students wear protective face masks, maintaining a safe distance as they attend a class amid COVID-19 pandemic in Peshawar, Pakistan, Sept. 30, 2020.Own clinical trials on Chinese vaccinesRahman said Pakistan is also conducting its own final-phase clinical trials on two Chinese-made single-dose vaccines in partnership with China. He says that the vaccines can be transported in normal temperatures, unlike the Pfizer vaccine.“Our trials are going on very well. The results are very positive as far as I am aware… Both these vaccines do not have this -80°C transportation problem. I expect the vaccines to be better suited for Pakistan than the Pfizer vaccine.” One of the vaccines under trial in Pakistan has been developed by Chinese biotech firm CanSinoBio and is already undergoing Phase 3, or large-scale, testing on humans in several countries, including China, Russia, Chile and Argentina.Rahman said the clinical trials in Pakistan, which began in September, will take at least three months and that the results will then be sent back to China to be evaluated.Pakistan has documented nearly 347,000 infections, with 7,000 deaths and almost 320,000 people recovered since the pandemic hit the country of about 220 million in February.The number of cases in Pakistan has steadily declined to a few hundred a day since mid-June, when the daily rate of infection spiked at more than 6,000.But officials in recent days have warned the South Asian nation is experiencing a second wave of infections, reporting 1,637 new cases and 23 deaths Tuesday. The resurgence has prompted the government to revive some restrictions on public movement to stem the spread of the ailment. 
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The U.S. Supreme Court heard oral arguments Tuesday in a Republican effort to strike down the Affordable Care Act health care law.The hearing comes weeks after Justice Amy Coney Barrett joined the court, giving conservatives a 6-3 majority.At the center of the case is a requirement in the 2010 law for most people to have a minimum level of health insurance or face a financial penalty.In a 2012 case, the Supreme Court ruled that provision was allowed on the basis that it represented a tax that Congress is allowed to levy. In 2017, the Republican-controlled Congress and set the penalty to zero.A group of states, led by Texas, is leading the current charge to dismantle the health care law, commonly known as Obamacare.  They argue that the mandate for individuals to purchase health coverage is unconstitutional, and that without that provision, the entire Affordable Care Act must be struck down.Part of the original congressional intent in requiring people to have coverage was that it would bring more healthy people into the system who would pay premiums without using many services, helping to offset costs of individuals who needed more care, including those with pre-existing conditions who had previously been denied coverage.Texas and its partners argue that eliminating the individual mandate would create an imbalance and push health costs unfairly higher.The opposition is led by California, and points to the 2017 action by Congress as evidence that lawmakers had no problem with removing only the penalty for the individual mandate while allowing the rest of the Affordable Care Act to remain in place. They further argue that as the law stands, with no penalty in place, it merely encourages people to have health insurance, and thus cannot be seen as an unconstitutional imposition by the government.The court is expected to issue its ruling in the case by late June or early July.Of the justices who were members of the court during the 2012 case, Justices Samuel Alito and Clarence Thomas voted to strike down the entire law.  Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Stephen Breyer, Elena Kagan and Sonia Sotomayor voted to uphold it.Justices Barrett, Brett Kavanaugh and Neil Gorsuch have since joined the court. If the court strikes down the law, up to 20 million people could lose their health coverage and insurance companies could be allowed to deny coverage to people with pre-existing conditions. 
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