Urdu News

International business magazine Bloomberg on Saturday said that Pakistan’s decision to loosen Covid-19 restrictions early has helped the country’s exports emerge stronger than its South Asian peers. In a report, the economic journal said the outbound shipments have grown at a faster pace than Bangladesh and India as textiles, which account for half of the total export, led the recovery. The country saw total shipments grow 7pc in September, compared with New Delhi’s per cent and Dhaka’s 3.5 per cent. The report said that Prime Minister Imran Khan’s administration was the first in the region to ease pandemic restrictions, allowing export units to reopen in April, a month after locking them down to stem the spread of Covid-19. This helped draw companies from to the South Asian nation. “Pakistan has seen orders shifting from multiple nations including China, India and Bangladesh,” the report quoted Shahid Sattar, secretary-general at the All Pakistan Textile Mills Association as hav...

A coronavirus strain that emerged in Spain in June has spread across Europe and now makes up a large proportion of infections in several countries, researchers said, highlighting the role of travel in the pandemic and the need to track mutations. The variant, which has not been found to be inherently more dangerous, was first identified among farm workers in the eastern Spanish regions of Aragon and Catalonia. Over the last two months, it has accounted for close to 90% of new infections in Spain, according to the research paper, authored by seven researchers with backing by Swiss and Spanish public-sector science institutions. It was posted on a so-called preprint server here and is yet to be peer reviewed for publication in a scientific journal. The strain has crossed European borders and accounted for 40-70% of new infections in Switzerland, Ireland and the United Kingdom in September, they found. The scientists said the strain’s characteristic mutation did not give it any app...

The US government will pay as much as $1.19 billion to Eli Lilly and Co to secure nearly 1 million doses of its experimental COVID-19 antibody treatment, a drug similar to a treatment that U.S. President Donald Trump received. Lilly will start delivering 300,000 doses of the treatment, for which it is being paid $375 million, within two months of receiving an emergency use authorization from the U.S. health regulator, the company said. After that, the government has an option to buy an additional 650,000 vials for $812.5 million, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services said in a statement. The price per dose amounts to $1,250 as per the contract, but the vials purchased by the government will be free to the American public. The U.S. has also signed deals with AstraZeneca and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals for their antibody therapies, under Trump administration’s Operation Warp Speed program. The deal with Regeneron covers the cost of manufacturing, while the deal with Astra...

From his lab in Toulouse, France, Benjamin Sanderson models the range of extreme risks to humans from climate change — research he hopes can inform policymakers planning for worsening wildfires and floods. It is the kind of work he once performed in the United States — and hopes to again soon. Sanderson is among dozens of US-based climate scientists who shifted their research to France, or sought refuge in academia or in left-leaning states like California after Republican Donald Trump was elected in 2016. They worried his administration’s distrust of science would impact their ability to finance and advance their work. Now, with the presidential election looming — and Democrat Joe Biden ahead in the polls and promising to prioritise the role of science in policymaking — some of these researchers hope for a return to the days when the US was viewed as the best place on earth to do their jobs. Climate science in Europe is not treated as a “political topic”, Sanderson said, adding t...

French drugmaker Sanofi and Britain’s GlaxoSmithKline will supply 200 million doses of their COVID-19 candidate vaccine to a global inoculation scheme backed by the World Health Organization. There is no internationally-approved treatment against COVID-19, which has killed more than 1.16 million people, and the two companies’ vaccine is still undergoing phase 1 and 2 trials, from which first results are expected by late November or early December. They said on Wednesday they had signed a statement of intent with vaccine alliance GAVI, which is coordinating the global scheme, known as COVAX. COVAX, which aims to deliver 2 billion vaccine doses around the world by the end of 2021, has already sealed agreements this year with AstraZeneca and Novavax. It aims to discourage national governments from hoarding COVID-19 vaccines and to focus vaccinating the most high-risk people first in every country. More than 180 nations including China have joined the plan but some, including the Un...

Facebook-owned Instagram on Tuesday announced extending the maximum length of a stream to four hours. This extended timeframe will be available to all Instagram users globally, so long as they have no history of IP or policy violations. Explaining the reason behind extending time limits on live steams, the company said that change is meant to help those who’ve had to pivot to virtual events, like fitness instructors, teachers, musicians, artists, activists and among others. Related to this change, Instagram will also update the “Live Now” section in IGTV and at the end of live streams to help direct users to more live content. Instagram also today pre-announced another feature which has yet to arrive. It says that it will “soon” add an option that will allow creators to archive their live streams for up to 30 days. http://rspcb.safety.fhwa.dot.gov/pageRedirect.aspx?RedirectedURL=https%3A%2F%2Ftipssinurdu.blogspot.com/%2F http://onlinemanuals.txdot.gov/help/urlstatusgo.html?ur...

The US Trump administration will this week announce a plan to cover out-of-pocket costs of COVID-19 vaccines for millions of Americans who receive Medicare or Medicaid, Politico reported late on Monday, citing four people with knowledge of the plan. According to the plans, Medicare and Medicaid will now cover vaccines that receive emergency use authorization from the Food and Drug Administration. The changes are expected to be announced on Tuesday or Wednesday by the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the report added. The planned rule will also address other COVID-19 related issues like expanding flexibility for Medicaid patients seeking care for the coronavirus, Politico reported. CMS did not immediately respond to a request for comment outside regular working hours. Medicare is a federal program that provides health coverage if you are 65+ or under 65 and have a disability, no matter your income. Medicaid is a state and federal program that provides health coverage if...

A US appeals court on Monday rejected a Justice Department request that it allow the government to immediately ban Apple and Google from offering Tencent’s WeChat for download in US app stores. The three-judge panel for the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals said in a brief order the government had not demonstrated it would “suffer an imminent, irreparable injury during the pendency of this appeal, which is being expedited.” On Friday, a U.S. judge in San Francisco rejected a Justice Department request to reverse her decision preventing the WeChat ban sought by the U.S. Commerce Department in response to a lawsuit filed by WeChat users. The WeChat users said the ruling will avoid an “unprecedented shutdown of a major platform for communications relied on by millions of people in the United States.” The Commerce Department order, which had been set to take effect Sept. 20, would also bar other U.S. transactions with WeChat, potentially making the app unusable in the United States. Th...

The widely-used messaging application WhatsApp will not be free for all anymore, as it has now announced to charge business customers for some of the services it offers. According to the press release issued by WhatsApp, the app has taken the decision to "charge business customers for some of the services" to continue building a business of their own as the company plans to provide and expand free end-to-end encrypted text, video, and voice calling for more than two billion people. "We’ve provided the WhatsApp Business app and WhatsApp Business API to help businesses of all sizes manage their chats. We’ve listened to feedback on what’s worked and believe WhatsApp can help make messaging the best way for consumers and businesses to connect," read the official document. Highlighting that the global pandemic has made clear that businesses need fast and efficient ways to service the social media users and make sales, WhatsApp said that over 175 million people every...

Dubai is introducing a facial recognition system on public transport to beef up security, officials said Sunday, as the emirate prepares to host the global Expo exhibition. “This technology has proven its effectiveness to identify suspicious and wanted people,” said Obaid al-Hathboor, director of Dubai’s Transport Security Department. The emirate already operates a biometric system using facial recognition at its international airport. Dubai, which sees itself as a leading “smart city” in the Middle East, has ambitions to become a hub for technology and artificial intelligence. Both sectors will be on show when it opens the multi-billion-dollar Expo fair. “We aspire to raise our performance by building on our current capabilities, to ensure a high level of security in metro stations and other transport sectors,” said Hathboor. Earlier this week, under the watch of Dubai’s Crown Prince Sheikh Hamdan bin Mohammed, the city’s police used facial recognition in a simulated scenario ...

Pakistan has not shared the final draft of the proposed social media rules with the umbrella group of internet and technology companies in Asia-Pacific region, according to the Asia Internet Coalition (AIC). In a strong statement released on Friday, the AIC called upon the ministry of information technology not to create hurdles in the growth of digital economy in Pakistan. The statement by Jeff Paine, the AIC’s managing director, referred to the “Removal and Blocking of Unlawful Content (Procedure, Oversight and Safeguards) Rules”. “We urge the ministry of IT to adopt policy approaches that will support, and not impede, the growth of Pakistan’s digital economy,” Mr Paine said. “We request that the ministry release the latest version of its rules and hold extensive and broad-based consultations.” Prime Minister Imran Khan had himself called for initiating such a process in February, the AIC recalled. However, a senior official of the IT ministry told the final version of “Re...

Facebook’s Oversight Board has announced that users can now submit appeals on content removal to the global body for an independent review. In May, Facebook appointed 20 people from around the world to serve on what will effectively be the social media network’s “Supreme Court” for speech, issuing rulings on what kind of posts will be allowed and what should be taken down. The list features a former prime minister, a Nobel Peace Prize laureate and several constitutional law experts and rights advocates, including the Pakistani lawyer and founder of Digital Rights Foundation (DRF), Nighat Dad. The Oversight Board is a global body that will make independent decisions on whether specific content should be allowed or removed from Facebook and Instagram. Facebook can also refer cases for a decision about whether content should remain up or come down from either Facebook or Instagram. “The board is eager to get to work,” said Catalina Botero-Marino, Co-Chair of the Oversight Board, in ...

The US government filed a blockbuster lawsuit on Tuesday accusing Google of maintaining an “illegal monopoly” in online search and advertising in the country’s biggest antitrust case in decades — and opening the door to a potential breakup of the Silicon Valley titan. The politically-charged case, which could take years to play out, draws new battle lines between the US government and Big Tech with potentially major implications for the sector. Deputy Attorney General Jeffrey Rosen said the case filed with Republican state attorneys general from 11 states takes aim at Google’s dominance of the online ecosystem. “Google is the gateway to the internet,” Rosen told reporters. “But it has maintained its monopoly through exclusionary practices that are harmful to competition.” The suit said these agreements include long-term agreements requiring that Google search be pre-loaded on devices and making it impossible to delete some of its apps. The government claims Google pays billions ...

The first batch of Pakistani health professionals has reached Kuwait following an agreement signed between Pakistan and Kuwait in July. The first batch comprised of 208 healthcare professionals including 15 doctors, 152 staff nurses and 41 medical technicians, said the spokesperson of the Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resources Development. The health professionals were received at Kuwait airport by the Pakistani ambassador Sajjad Haider. The departure of health professionals was made possible to Gulf countries after 10 years following the joint efforts of the Ministry of Overseas Pakistanis and Human Resources Development, Overseas Pakistanis Foundation and Bureau of Immigration. Earlier on Wednesday, it emerged that the federal government started fulfilling its promise for providing employment to nationals in foreign countries as the first batch of more than 200 health professionals will depart for Kuwait on Thursday after 10 years. The second batch will comprise of...

UK scientists seeking approval to deliberately infect healthy people with COVID-19 in trials must first convince ethics specialists that, among other things, they have potential “rescue therapies” or antidotes to halt the disease. The problem is that, for the novel coronavirus, there is still no effective treatment or cure. That means, for now, that the best scientists planning the so-called human challenge studies can offer is Gilead’s remdesivir - an antiviral drug that was found in a large trial to have no impact on COVID-19 death rates. Chris Chiu, a scientist at Imperial College London co-leading the COVID-19 challenge experiments, said the plan was to give remdesivir to infected volunteers based on a “strong belief” it will be effective if given in the very earliest stages of disease. Some ethics and medicine experts said that posed problems. “As an effective rescue therapy does not yet exist for SARS-CoV2, there is a serious ethical dilemma ... to address here,” said Step...