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  • COVID-19: Should Education Hit A Pause Or Are We Just Unprepared In Nigeria? By Olabisi Deji-Folutile

    COVID-19: Should Education Hit A Pause Or Are We Just Unprepared In Nigeria? By Olabisi Deji-Folutile

    Olabisi Deji-Folutile
    Olabisi Deji-Folutile

    COVID-19: Should Education Hit A Pause Or Are We Just Unprepared In Nigeria? By Olabisi Deji-Folutile 1Olabisi Deji-Folutile

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    The world is facing its most trying and unprecedented times as the last few weeks have been most challenging for almost everybody.  What started in Wuhan, China, as an epidemic, has put the entire world in disarray.  Major streets across the globes have become empty. Both the rich and the poor are being ravaged by the plague of COVID-19, which the World Health Organisation has rightly described as a pandemic. Work places have been shut; religious and social gatherings banned and many countries are on total lockdown, in a bid to curb the spread of this viral disease. Expectedly, schools are also affected across board.  Every day people are being told to embrace social distancing and suddenly things like human contacts, hitherto considered as free gifts of life, are becoming very expensive.

    No one knows when this whole chaos will end, so people are making different kinds of adjustments to cope with the situation while it lasts. Many companies have shifted their operations online. Likewise, many schools have opted for e-learning, making use of available technology for teaching and learning.

     Universities around the world are making use of communication technology to ease the effects of the global pandemic on their academic calendars.   In China, universities are going for online teaching instead of in-class teaching; the ones in Australia have moved their classes online just as UK universities have suspended face-to-face teaching.  Turkey started its remote university classes on March 23. In Kenya, universities have activated communication between lecturers and students via social media platforms and emails while classes have gone totally online in the Philippines and Kyrgyzstan.  Teachers in France have been working with their students on Zoom.  

    Just a few days ago, Ghana’s President Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo, directed the ministry of education to collaborate with the ministry of communications in rolling out open learning programmes in response to the closure of all educational institutions in the country. In the same vein, Mount Kenya University’s Vice-Chancellor Peter Wanderi, has announced the extension of online teaching platforms for regular students to facilitate the learning process.  And to take care of the over six million students that have experienced disruption to their studies, ten North African and 12 Arab countries have begun work on an e-learning initiative to facilitate open and online education.

    These are some of the steps being taken across the globe to bridge the gap created by school closure in the wake of COVID-19.  Unfortunately, while all these activities are going on in other parts of the world, Nigerian government has not said anything about steps being taken to take care of its students’ community.  Rather, the only message from the Federal Government was a total closure of all tertiary institutions and FG-owned unity schools till further notice. A statement issued by the National Universities Commission simply said universities would remain   shut   for one month while the Education Minister, Adamu Adamu, said tertiary institutions would remain shut indefinitely.

     Assuming government has been overwhelmed by the burden of controlling the spread of COVID- 19, hence its silence on options for learning for its teeming student population, one would have expected the higher institutions themselves to at least say something, but as it is, they too are not helping matters. The silence in our universities has been deafening. To worsen the situation, the Academic Staff Union of Universities, decided to choose this time, of all times, to embark on an indefinite strike. One wonders how the academic body   manages to feel comfortable being on a strike at a time when researchers across the globe   are busy looking for solution to a pandemic that is ravaging the entire world.  This kind of action makes one query the essence of having Research and Development as a core component of tertiary education in Nigeria when researchers can be nowhere to be found at a critical time of societal needs.

    By now, our researchers should be adding their voices to the various efforts being made towards developing a vaccine or cure for COVID-19. After all, universities are expected to proffer solutions to societal problems.  This is a wrong time for ASUU to embark on an indefinite strike. This should be a time of strategising and proffering solutions. This is really the time for everyone to get involved. Besides, I think Nigerian universities should also be more forthcoming on their responses to the challenges posed to their students by COVID-19.

    As it is, religious organisations are doing far better in terms of their responses to the effects of this pandemic on their primary constituencies.  Many of them have devised other means of getting the attention of   their members following several government directives prohibiting either gatherings or limiting the number of people allowed to congregate at a time.   Almost all the churches have switched to online platforms for their services.  How come religious organisations are working hard to keep their flocks and both government and higher institutions in Nigeria are just moving on as if all is well?  No word on how to keep the students busy or keep them engaged using available online technology! Should teaching and learning be restricted to the classrooms alone in this 21st century?

     Nigeria has always been described as a religious society. Corona Virus has further exposed the smartness of our religious bodies and the dullness of those in charge of our public educational institutions.  This is not an attempt to blame any religious organisation for having the foresight to deploy technology in reaching their audiences. Instead, it is a wakeup call to managers of our educational institutions to adopt and use available technology to help their students at a time like this.

    Apart from the National Open University of Nigeria, which basically runs online, I doubt if there is any other public university in the country that has capacity for online teaching.  This is in spite of the launch of the Nigerian Communication Satellite known as NIGCOMSAT by the Nigerian Government first in 2007 and then NIGCOMSAT-IR in December 2011, to provide critical ICT backbone infrastructure to support e-learning, among others in the country. 

    What is the essence of investing so much money in a communication satellite if it cannot be deployed at a time of need?   Those in charge of NIGCOMSAT, the commercial arm of Nigeria’s space centre, have consistently claimed that the technology has the capacity to cover the entire Africa.  If that is the case, why is the country still struggling to deploy internet connectivity facilities to its schools to aide e-learning?  If we are truly a serious country, by now, all the schools in urban and rural areas should have been connected to the e-learning services.

    No doubt, COVID-19 has exposed Nigeria’s unpreparedness for e-learning. But, we can’t afford to remain where we are. That is why it is important for every institution to start thinking of how to deploy available technology in the world for the good of their students at this critical period.   Universities should as a matter of urgency migrate online. This shouldn’t be another season of waiting and probably wasting for the Nigerian student.  There is no reason why any higher institution worth its name should suspend all academic activities until the end of Corona Virus with all the available resources and technology in the world today. The minimum expected of them is to upload teaching resources online for students to have access to them.  At least this will give the students the opportunity to learn on their own.

    This is also an opportunity for telecommunications companies like Glo, MTN and the rest of them to make a difference in Nigeria’s educational institutions. They can as part of their corporate social responsibility decide to boost internet facilities in universities and other educational institutions; or provide data at cheaper rates to help poor students have access to the internet for online learning.

    I know there are obvious stumbling blocks to digital learning in Nigeria. Many students don’t even have access to devices while the cost of buying data is still high. These challenges and others have provided    telecommunications companies a huge opportunity of making a difference in Nigerian higher institutions by providing e-learning solutions and broadband connectivity to universities and other higher institutions.

    They can as part of their corporate social responsibility decide to boost internet facilities in universities and other higher institutions; or help poor students who have limited or poor internet access to enhance online learning.

    Olabisi Deji-Folutile is the Editor-in-Chief of Franktalknow.com and member of the Nigerian Guild of Editors. Email: bisideji@yahoo.co.uk

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  • The Political Economy Of Coronavirus By Kunle Wizeman Ajayi

    The Political Economy Of Coronavirus By Kunle Wizeman Ajayi

    The Political Economy Of Coronavirus By Kunle Wizeman Ajayi 4

    The Political Economy Of Coronavirus By Kunle Wizeman Ajayi 5


     

    The most powerful person in Aso Rock, Abba Kyari; who is the chief of staff to the president, has tested positive to Covid19. No government official can reach President Buhari without him. There is a ripe suspicion that the kitchen cabinet might have been infected. Likewise in Europe, the most powerful person, Angela Merkel the chancellor of Germany, has been quarantined. While Trump and Boris Johnson took the same path in trying to ignore the pandemic, their governments are in deep crises of the damages and exposures their neglect has caused the citizens.

    As I type, the fear of corona virus is the beginning of real wisdom as governments are now banning even churches and mosques from gathering. The Nigerian federal ministry of health has announced 42 cases so far. And even the mass of working people who have hitherto doubted our thieving class so far, are now more wary and precautionary over their immediate safety without relying on the failed health institutions. People seldom shake hands now. Corona waves na the way to greet now! That corona virus has turned a corruption racket is what will be duly discussed another day. 

    Industries are closing down as Wall Street falls like pack of cards. US President Donald Trump is shouting “cuts” for the working class and bail-outs for industries and big business. Whereas, Socialist presidential aspirant Bernie Sanders is calling for “healthcare for all” as well as pay for all US citizens staying at home during the pandemic days. The globalised trend of the corona virus needs a global understanding and lessons of how the world is being ruled everywhere. The way US rulers have failed to care for the poor and invest in proper and compulsory healthcare for all but private pharmaceutical companies who make healthcare a commercial quantity that only the rich can afford, is the same way Nigerian rulers failed to build hospitals and kept allocating between 4 to 6% budgetary spending on education while them and their children spend billions on medical tourism. Also, Boris Johnson’s UK government is renting “beds at hospitals.” This is unlike Spain that has nationalized its healthcare!

    The price of crude oil has fallen globally. The global stock exchange has crashed as workers can no longer go to work and make great wealth for their casino. Coronavirus has superceded SARS with its speedy spread and effects globally. So the world economic crises have been, for the first time, propelled by a health crisis. What can the Left and the revolutionaries in Nigeria make out of this global crises that could leave no island untouched? 

    Naomi Klein, the author of the classic ‘The Shock Doctrine: The Rise of Disaster Capitalism’ has come up to warn that “if you’re a hard-core free-market economist, you understand that when market fails it lends itself to progressive change much more organically, than it does (when) the kind of deregulatory policies emerge. Political and economic elites understand that moment of crises is their chance to push through their wish list of unpopular policies that further polarize wealth…”

    I argue that while the government in Nigeria has reduced the cruelly expensive cost of petrol by just #20, and there is lipservice to building new hospitals, there is a larger probability of massive corruption as the federal government has already declared #2trillion intervention fund. Why we the working people have to very much care is because the same elements who created the crises (whichever ways) would end up profiting largely from the crises. This just as many military officers and politicians are billionaires courtesy the Boko Haram war.

    The interplay of methods of these corruptive accumulations on one hand, and the trajectory of working class resistances is critically assessed weighing up why and how the working people were at the loosing ends at the 2008/9 global economic crises that made the Central Bank under the Soludo/Sanusi bail-outs policies made the criminal banks even richer than before. Though a few bank MDs and top officers were detained on “hospital beds” and such other “ajebutter” prisons; no bank owner was even questioned. 

    The fact that both the US and Nigeria are rich governments that have bad healthcare policies, discussing social infrastructures as class struggle under this system of “primitive accumulation” needs to be knocked up as perspectives to guide millions who want an end to crises and build another world that would be for all and not a tiny thieving few.    

    A CLASSLESS PANDEMIC

    The corona virus has shown that the gap between the rich and the poor is just an artificial creation. The nature of humans is more communal than competitive. Plenty of the rich mouth the fact that we are all equal, but some are more equal than others. This virus is a threat to all and shows that the world can organize together and defeat any virus that attacks it. Crises like this shows that there is no policy that is pro-rich that can save society. Most of the capitalists who rule our world have been saying that government cannot help all and cater for the needs of majority. They tend to tell us that getting “healthcare for all” is rocket science. Corona virus has proved that all that is wrong!

    Meanwhile, many Nigerians are debating as to the cause of corona virus, and why it has drawn more attentions than malaria that kills about 800 everyday and child mortality that murders about 300 women daily. These debates became rife when Ibrahim Magu; head of the Economic Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) asserted that “corona virus is caused by corruption.” His position, while quite misleading, is correct to the point that the virus is actually caused by the greed of man in unsettling the animal and forest lives. Most of the viruses live in the wildest of forests but humans go in and destroy their habitats. These make the virus homeless and have to migrate to live with humans. 

    The corona virus has also made the Nigerian politicians to have no escapist lives again. Most of them used to go abroad for medical tourism. But there is nowhere to run to now! This is why revolutionaries must use this chance to support striking doctors and demand for free, functionally standard and compulsory healthcare for all. We do not want a situation where the ruling class would use state wealth to build defence and cure for corona virus, only for the rich, instead for all. We must avoid repeating case of the last economic meltdown where what we could see is socialism for the rich and leave the poor uncatered for. This is why we must all reject the paltry #20 that was reduced from oil price as well as condemn the full devaluation of the naira. These policies will make the rich eat their cake and have it. Petrol price should be reduced to at least #45 while naira should be strengthened. The time to consider the #RevolutionNow demands of an “economy for the majority” is now! 

    2008/9: A FLASHBACK 

    When the 2008 global economic meltdown stormed Nigeria, the rulers ordered “technocrats” to adopt the Obama measures in bailing out the banks and their thieving managers. After prosecuting five CEOs of Afribank, Oceanic, Finbank, Intercontinental, and Union bank, The CBN went ahead to put #460bn as bail-outs for the banks after recovering just #70bn. The CEOs lost their posts for giving out #700bn loans without collateral. The loans portfolio of the bank, according to CBN, is #2.8tn. The richest guys in the country were involved in this public racket and were never touched. A good instance is Aliko Dangote who had a loan worth $15m with Oceanic Bank but got elected to replace Ndi OKereke as Nigerian Stock Exchange president. The same person has the monopoly of trading in rice, salt, sugar, textiles, and vegetable oil. The same persons who created the crises in the same place got rewarded after the crises. This is what Naomi Klein is warning about. For the rich, socialism is never good for the majority. The rich, in the time of corona virus and other disasters, want bail-outs but never for the working people. Just as Omoyele Sowore noted; “when crises arises, capitalism retires and socialism becomes the messiah!  

    We must start asking for Cost of Living Allowance (COLA) from the federal government. Every Nigerian must each be paid at least #100,000 monthly as the corona virus effect billing. We should also demand a standard hospital per 5 streets with the doctors and nurses paid appropriately! 

    THE TRUMP/BUHARI DISORDER

    President Buhari’s address to Nigerians has failed to address the pandemic. Trump’s tweets are of the same mental disorders like those of the ministers and officials of Buhari’s government.  Trump boasted that the “virus is under total control…The market will take care of itself,” he had to recant after the Dow Jones Industrial closed with its worst one-day decline since 1987; “The market will be very strong as soon as we get rid of the virus.”

    “But even as he was doing so, Trump maintained that he hadn’t said the virus was “under control,” which is something he has most definitely said on many occasions — along with other attempts to play down fears” CNN noted.

    Garba Shehu and other spokespersons of President Buhari have also been speaking from all sides of their mouths. They first downplayed the effect of the virus by revealing that malaria has been killing hundreds…Until they made some allocations of about $1.2trillion to the virus effects. The question remains the goals of the government. Many Nigerians do not trust the same government that has never given as much as 8% budgetary allocation to healthcare since the Buhari regime came into place, just like the PDP governments before it. While the president is one of the most sick, he prefers to betray electoral promises and visit private hospitals in the UK for months instead of building standard public health care. 

    Working people in US,UK, and Nigeria should look beyond their reactionary rulers and make real political demands that will make sure the same rogues who cause the crises don’t come back to claim to be the super heroes of the same crises. The case of Ebola and Lassa in Nigeria are classics in this regard. While Nigeria was lucky to get over the Ebola case with the sacrifice of health officials; Lassa fever has killed thousands so far loosely tackled because rodents most likely cannot enter luxury houses.

    Nigerians should be aware that both Buhari and Trump are exponents of crazy capitalism and prefers to give false answers to real threats and would only be falsely apologetic later. We must understand that the rulers are neither interested in our well being nor our future. Their fear is that the virus should never become for all. They prefer crises for just the masses. But oga corona no mind. This is why despite Trump trying to call it Chinese virus or Buhari trying to boycott addressing the country, nothing matters to the working people than having a healthy society. Arms in arms, we will have to care for one another and defeat the most dangerous virus ever in the history of the world! 

    OPIUMS ON THE CROSS

    Pastors in Nigeria, aside the ban on public and mass gatherings, are seriously on trial! Many a youths are asking what their “God” would do in this time of corona virus to save the followers from untimely deaths. The first pastor to become so fearless had predicted that he would go to China to cure the virus. But by the time the Italian became the first case in view; the pastor got admitted in a hospital for unknown reasons.

    Also, the mosques are closing shop. Even many are contemplating drinking alcohol to help in preventing corona virus. Despite the fact that many a churches and mosques become well attended public places, the belief in better life and a prosperous world without danger have been the egg tacts around the building of these beliefs. Saudi Arabia has stopped religious visitations. Government everywhere is banning all worshipping junctures. If these bans have been summoned by political demands of the left, it couldn’t have sailed through but the struggle is being marshaled by a pandemic. Bernie Sanders was seen as too extreme but most of those pro-establishment strollers must be shitting in their yanshes now!

    Karl Marx was very clear that “religion is the opium of the masses, the soul of the soulless.” The realizations of the fact that the immediacy of the problems of society can only be derailed if the people think that there is an umbrella or belief that can make some magic. With corona now, even the state that employs religion is not apologetic in banning its public activities. Sadly, many priests still in shock as to a possible demarketing have kept on lying to their congregations. A viral video shows a pastor saying “coronavirus cannot enter Nigeria where there is corrosive anointing;” so cocky in ignorance.  Such public ranting must be condemned.

    CONFUSION BREAK BONE; NAIJA HEALTH IN CRISES

    When the deposed emir of Kano, former CBN governor Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, was banned to Awe in Nassarawa State; the town has two (2) doctors to two hundred thousand (200,000) people. Such is the metaphor of health care in Nigeria.  Most doctors, nurses, and other medical personnel have migrated to other climes in an unprecedented brain drain. As Yusuf posited “7 out of 10 Nigerians live on less than $1.25 (~500 Naira) a day and they also live in a country where 70% of health expenditures are out-of-pocket payments. Nineteen years after the Abuja Declaration where African Union states pledged to allocate at least 15% of their annual budget to health, Nigeria continues to default. With over 23,584 public primary health care facilities, 8,290 private primary health care facilities and 200,000 patent and proprietary medicine vendors (PPMVs) in Nigeria, yet the country’s health indices and other health indicators continue to remain abysmal without any significant improvement compared to other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa.

    Citizens are condemned to self-care using several unregulated drugs and African raw herbs. The yearly allocations to health care in the budget never rise beyond 6 and 8%. This is despite the fact that Aisha, wife of President Buhari once publicly complained that Aso rock clinic has no syringe! At the Teaching hospitals, one has to pay heavily to get health care as the state has been practicing health care commercialization. The medical equipments are really not there while there are so poor remunerations of medical personnel. Yet, when Ebola came knocking in 2014, the health workers paid the sacrifices. 

    Corona virus is global and has now halted the medical tourism of the rich class of whom President Buhari is the chief. If not for Covid-19, he would have gone visiting his London doctors for the umpteenth time!  

    The health workers’ unions have been fighting for a better system for years. This has been led by the Joint Health Staffs Union (JOHESU) and the Nigeria Medical Associations (NMA.) JOHESU has led enormous strikes and pickets but the neo-liberal policies of the ruling class keep ignoring these strikes. As I write, doctors in Abuja are on strike. The rulers are now in a quagmire. This is the time for the unions to collaborate with the civil society and revolutionary movements to take up the state and fight for “free health care for all.”

    THE EXAMPLE OF CUBA

    Fidel Castro’s people are the certified global doctors today! 

    A small island at the backyard of the United States of North America; Cuba is a state-capitalist economy led by revolutionary socialists. While the state have yet boomed since 1959 as a result of the prevailing capitalist globe, it has been vociferous on social welfarism especially education, food, health, and housing. This has been the minimum with which the Communist Party has been working on since the revolution. With its third president in charge now; Cuba is the country that is now rescuing the world from the genocide of corona virus. The vessel that is wholly affected by the virus has been shipped to the Cuban shore and Cuba has been treating the patients on board. Italy is receiving about 200 Cuban doctors and nurses as the catholic country leads the population of casualties. The Cuban health statistics shows that 98% is living healthily just as education is 98.5%. 

    Cuba stood by the world on hurricane Katrina; by South Africa against apartheid; by Angola against imperialist Portugal, and now that “God-forsaken communist country” stands by the world with the best of its great medical care against corona virus. This is a lesson that we need to abide by and make the world a socialist island. The current system of “greed and power” is a pandemic. It is ruled by political viruses that live mainly on primitive accumulations of the sweat and blood of the majority. The working class of all lands should unite and fight capitalism to the ruins and replace it with a world led by the people who make the wealth, not those who do nothing but steal the wealth.  

    IN ALL; THIS PANDEMIC WILL FALL

    The struggle for a safer world is in danger of that “common ruins of the contending classes.” Italy, Nigeria, Spain, China, US, and some others have recorded deaths through corona virus. It is currently rumoured that some senators and members of the House of Representatives have contracted the deadly virus. We have 582 deaths in US and 46,145 cases with only 295 recoveries. One death has been recorded in Nigeria with 46 cases recorded. 6,777 are dead out of 63,927 cases in Italy. China has 16,578 dead in 382,570 incidents. Germany has 29,056 with 123 people dead. German chancellor, Angela Merkel has been quarantined. India with over 1 billion population has about 500 cases with no deaths. 

    The Indian case is very peculiar in lessons for Nigeria. Public health care in all tiers is free and subsidized for those below the poverty line. The Indian health sector encompasses 18% of total outpatient care and 44% of total impatient care. Middle and upper class use public health care less than those with a lower standard of living

    The Covid19 pandemic has exposed big countries like Britain, US, China, Nigeria, and others. The pandemic have also exposed capitalism as an idea that is deficient to the mass of working people. The idea does not care for the majority but the thieving minority. The rich continue to be richer while the poor becomes poorer. We need labour and civil society to work together and reconstitute revolutionary relationships to make sure that working people does not be at the receiving end of this pandemic. We must remember that those who destroy the country must not be allowed to continue with their madness after the covid19. We must demand for #FreeHealthCareForAll!

    We must also demand that world-class hospitals are built massively all over the country and we leave the madness of neo-liberalism in the dustbin of ruins. To do these works, we need a movement of the working people dedicated to the revolution that will build a country for all like the Take It Back movement and the Coalition for Revolution (CORE). Socialist organizations like the Socialist Workers and Youth League (SWL) serve as the political tribunes that remind us all on the ideal and alternatives to the rot that is causing pandemics and wars to the world today.

    Capitalist presidents that combine neo-liberalism and fascism are in deep shit today as the covid19 has exposed their inefficiencies and monumental social infrastructural dangers. The health of the world is the safety net to our wealth. Why would we allow those who care about the wealth alone to continue to rule us? Why should we continue to allow those who think of only the individual and never the collective to continue to rule us? When Greta Thunberg was leading the climate change campaigns, Donald Trump was scolding her. Bernie Sanders, Jeremyn Corbyn, Omoyele Sowore, Elvo Morales, Bobbi Wine and other revolutionary change-seeking eggheads have all campaigned for another world; the point is for we the working people and all oppressed, in unity and action, lead #RevolutionNow to get a life warranty of #FreeHealthCareForAll!

    Nigerians should demand for Cost of living allowance (COLA) of at least #100,000 in order to survive as the country is being locked down. We all must observe hand washing regularly; social distancing; avoid touching of faces, and other sophisticated parts of the body. Government should provide water, gloves and hands sanitizers to all. There is no electricity just as there is very poor housing for the majority of the people. We need the majority of empty house in cities and towns to be massively redistributed. Electricity must be renationalized.

    With all unity and actions, we will defeat the yet another genocidal virus. This also tells us that we must choose to build the world for all and not for the few as the threat of grand barbarism stares us all in the face once again. Rosa Luxembourg would be rolling and smiling in her grave as we are condemned to learn from her battle cry: “socialism or barbarism!” 

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  • How do you power billions of sensors? By converting waste heat into electricity

    How do you power billions of sensors? By converting waste heat into electricity

    Interconnected healthcare and many other future applications will require internet connectivity between billions of sensors. The devices that will enable these applications must be small, flexible, reliable, and environmentally sustainable. Researchers must develop new tools beyond batteries to power these devices, because continually replacing batteries is difficult and expensive.

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    https://techxplore.com/news/2020-03-power-billions-sensors-electricity.html

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  • U.S. providers offer free Wi-Fi for 60 days

    U.S. providers offer free Wi-Fi for 60 days

    U.S. internet and wireless providers have announced temporary measures to make getting online less expensive and onerous as enforced social distancing due to the new coronavirus forces more human interaction online.

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    https://techxplore.com/news/2020-03-free-wi-fi-days.html

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  • World fritters away half trillion dollars on coal support

    World fritters away half trillion dollars on coal support

    Nations around the world risk wasting $640 billion by continuing to prop up the coal industry rather than investing in less expensive and environmentally friendlier wind and solar power initiatives.

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  • Researchers organically engineer solar cells using enzymes in papaya fruit

    Researchers organically engineer solar cells using enzymes in papaya fruit

    Titanium dioxide (titania) thin films are commonly used in various types of solar cells. The fabrication methods that are currently used to create such titania films require high temperatures, as well as expensive, high-end technologies. Researchers at Delft University of Technology (TU Delft) have now developed a fully organic method to engineer porous titania thin films at relatively low temperatures.

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  • WHO Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer: progress on all fronts

    WHO Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer: progress on all fronts

     Peru shows the way forward and the courage of Ander Martinez

    “When Ander was diagnosed, I didn´t have the possibility to cover the cost of the treatment. It was very expensive, and I had nothing,” says Rosalina Tocto, 29 years mother of Ander Martínez Tocto. Ander had just been diagnosed with acute leukemia at the young age of 6 years. From the beginning, the odds were stacked against him. He and his family lived in a rural town, six hours from the nearest city. His parents did not have a formal job, placing the family under financial strain.

    Ander and his family were not alone in this situation. “In Peru, nearly 1800 children and adolescents are diagnosed with cancer every year; however, up to 70% will have a late stage, often metastatic due to delays in diagnosis,” says Dr. Juan García, medical chief of the Pediatric Department of in the National Institute of Neoplastic Diseases (INEN) in Lima, Peru. “Most of our patients come from outside Lima and the majority of parents do not have formal employment and therefore do not have any type of insurance.”

    Fortunately, Peru has made a strong commitment to Universal Health Coverage. In 2009, a law was passed to improve access to care by introducing a mandatory health insurance system and registering everyone living in extreme poverty under Seguro Integral de Salud (SIS), regardless of age or circumstance.  

    Dr. Reina Bustamante, Executive Director of the Division of Prevention and Control of Cancer of the MINSA says “UHC is an important step in public health particularly for those who lack public or private insurance like Ander. In this context, we are trying to follow WHO guidance to achieve UHC and ensure all individuals and communities receive the health services they need without suffering financial hardship.”

    In 2019, Peru was selected as a focus country for the WHO Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer as the first focus country in the Region. The Global Initiative aims to improve survival for all children with cancer to at least 60% by 2030 while reducing suffering, altogether with the potential to save an additional one million lives.

    Four main goals were formulated for the national pediatric cancer plan: (1) improve early diagnosis of childhood cancer, (2) decrease treatment abandonment, (3) implement a national pediatric cancer registry and (4) improve the quality of services in pediatric oncology units.

    Dr. Liliana Vasquez, pediatric oncologist who works as an external consultant for the Division of Prevention and Control of Cancer of MINSA said, “Ten working groups have been established to achieve the goals.”

    Dr. Vivian Perez, advisor of the Non-Communicable Diseases Office in PAHO-Peru added “the initial focus for the Initiative will be on six cancers selected as tracers for monitoring progress across the health system, alongside engagement of at least six focus countries with a record of strong political commitment and foundational efforts supporting children with cancer.”

    For Ander, his health care team, the commitments from the government of Peru and partners and Global Initiative have made it possible to be successfully treated and will now allow him to dream of a healthy future though better access to surveillance monitoring and psycho-oncological support aimed at childhood cancer survivors.

    Peru is showing what is possible for all countries. By concerted action and promoting universal health coverage, every child in the world can have access to high-quality care with the greatest likelihood of survival, and every family should be protected from financial hardship. We can do more together. 

     

    WHO Global Initiative for Childhood Cancer: progress on all fronts
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    https://www.who.int/news-room/detail/14-02-2020-who-global-initiative-for-childhood-cancer-progress-on-all-fronts

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  • Researchers explore epigenetic influences of chronic pain

    Researchers explore epigenetic influences of chronic pain

    Chronic pain is one of the most prevalent, disabling and expensive public health crises in the United States. It affects more than 100 million Americans, with annual costs estimated at $635 billion, says a 2014 report from the American Pain Society.

    Despite the enormous societal impact of chronic pain, present treatment options are limited to nonsteroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDS), opioids, anticonvulsants and antidepressants, which provide pain relief to only about half of patients. Furthering the problem, prescription opioid overdoses have quadrupled since 1999. There were more than 45,000 painkiller-related deaths in 2014 alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

    Now, researchers at Drexel University College of Medicine are aiming to identify new molecular mechanisms involved in pain. Their latest study, published this month in Epigenetics & Chromatin, shows how one protein – acting as a master controller – can regulate the expression of a large number of genes that modulate pain.

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  • How to Make Money Fast by Retrieving and Returning Shopping Carts

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    Are you looking for a way to make money fast? If you have a large utility vehicle, like a pick-up truck, you can retrieve and return shopping carts for a cash reward.

    Most every mid to large retail grocery, variety and department store has a stock of shopping carts on hand. They are purchased by the store, of course, so that customers can use them when shopping in their store.

    Shopping buggies are expensive. The average cost to the retailer for just one is between 75 and 100 dollars. Large ones like the kind you find at wholesale and club stores can run upwards of 200 dollars or more.

    Most retail stores have dozens of them; busy big-box stores may even have hundreds of them. Purchasing enough of them to meet a store’s demand and traffic levels requires a significant expenditure of cash.

    It is, therefore, in the best interest of the retailer to protect that investment. Most retailers do their best to make sure that carts remain on store property. However, shopping buggy theft is all too common. The average store loses about $8,000 $10,000 to per year to this problem.

    Because they are so expensive to buy, many store owners and retail companies pay cash rewards for the return of their carts which have been stolen (or “borrowed”) and not returned. Cash rewards typically range from 25 to 50 dollars per cart.

    Here’s how you can retrieve and return those buggies for cash: contact retailers in your area which have shopping carts. Find out if they pay for returned carts. Many do, but won’t give cash rewards to just anyone. (Store owners don’t want the public to abuse the reward system by stealing carts themselves in order to get the reward.) Usually you have to sign a cash-for-retrieval contract.

    You’ll have to provide some forms of identification, usually a driver’s license plus one other item (like a Social Security or credit card). You may have to sign a waiver absolving the store of liability in the event of something unforeseen.

    You can make arrangements with any or all of the retailers in your area. The more contracts you have, the more money you can make.

    If you’ve lived in your city for any length of time, you’ve probably seen common dump sites for stolen shopping buggies. Visit these areas regularly. Additionally, get in the habit of keeping your eyes open every time you’re out and about town. You’ll probably spot discarded shopping carts regularly. You can pick these up and return them as you come across them, or store them at home until you have several of them.

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    Source by Scott Lindsay

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