16m people under quarantine

Italy’s Prime minister Giuseppe  Conte has said at least 16 million people are now quarantined and locked down including the Lombardy region and also in 14 provinces until early April. ‘ We want to guarantee the health of our citizens. We understand that  these measures will impose sacrifices, sometimes small and sometimes  very big. But…

High-flying lawyer’s addiction

America’s opioid epidemic has hit the society’s elite, previously associated with the lower class living in trailer parks and other centres of deprivation. Ellene Zimmerman’s husband Peter was a lawyer who, as a partner at a top San Diego intellectual property firm, earned well in excess of $1m a year. He was also a drug…

Taxation, redistribution and debate about inequality

Capital and Ideology by Thomas Piketty contains fascinating descriptions of unknown historical uprisings against inequality such as Haitian revolution and describes societal system through the ages – slavery, serfdom, feudalism, communism, hypercapitalism, colonialism and caste, class collectively as “Inequality regimes” shaping the lives of billions and uses historical sources to chart the distribution of incomes…

Nissan invests £400m despite warning

  Nissan is investing £400m in its Sunderland plant, despite warnings from the Japanese carmaker that tariffs after Brexit might endanger the facility’s exports. The company said a new £52m press line, has been installed ahead of building a revised version of the Qashqai, the family sport-utility vehicle that accounts for two-thirds of the site’s…

Testing started for coronavirus vaccine

In February Moderna Therapeutics, Cambridge-based (near Boston) biotech group, smashed a record for the fastest time between identifying a virus ( Covid-19) and creating a vaccine ready to test on humans in 42 days. Juan Andres, a former Novartis executive to help it ramp up manufacturing of its experimental drugs and vaccine at the new…

75-year-old woman becomes the first coronavirus fatality

A woman in her 70s becomes the first person in the UK to die after testing positive for coronavirus at the Royal  Berkshire NHS Trust said the patient had been “in and out of the hospital for non-coronavirus reasons”. She was admitted and tested positive for coronavirus on Wednesday. This rises the UK people diagnosed with…

IMF earmakrs $50bn in emergency funding

The IMF has earmarked $50bn in emergency financing for countries stricken by a coronavirus, as the fund said the outbreak had forced a cut to its forecast for global economic growth. According to Kristalina Georgieva, IMF managing director, adverse scenarios about the spread of the virus and how it would affect the global economy were…

Flybe collapses after virus weighs on sales

UK’s Exeter-based Airline Flybe has gone into administration, with 2000 job losses after a fresh bid for financial stimulus failed. The carrier also blames the impact of the coronavirus outbreak on demand for air travel for its collapse. Its website advises customers “not to travel to the airport” unless they have arranged an alternative confirmed…

Thermo Fishers acquires Dutch diagnostics group Qiagen for $11.5bn

The  US Scientific equipment maker, Thermo Fisher with a market capitalisation of $122bn, has agreed to buy Dutch diagnostics group Qlagen for $11.5bn in a move to extend their disease testing capabilities as the world is gripped by the Coronavirus outbreak. Qiagen, a provider for sample and Assay technologies for molecular diagnostics, applied testing, academic…