UN blames Syrian regime for gas attack

May 15: Global deaths linked to the novel coronavirus passed 300,000 on Thursday, while reported cases of the virus are approaching 4.5 million, according to a news agency tally.

About half of the fatalities have been reported by the United States, the United Kingdom and Italy.

The first death linked to the disease was reported on January 10 in Wuhan, China. It took 91 days for the death toll to pass 100,000 and a further 16 days to reach 200,000, according to the Reuters tally of official reports from governments. It took 19 days to go from 200,000 to 300,000 deaths.

By comparison, an estimated 400,000 people die annually from malaria, one of the world’s most deadly infectious diseases.

The United States had reported more than 85,000 deaths from the new coronavirus, while the United Kingdom and Italy have reported over 30,000 fatalities each.

While the current trajectory of COVID-19 falls far short of the 1918 Spanish flu, which infected an estimated 500 million people, killing at least 10% of patients, public health experts worry the available data is underplaying the true impact of the pandemic.

For the first time in the 15 years of the Global Risks Report, the climate change and environment risk has occupied all the top five slots.

According to the 15th edition of the World Economic Forum's (WEF) Global Risks Report, the top five risks in terms of likelihood are extreme weather, climate action failure, natural disasters, biodiversity loss and human-made environmental disasters. They all fall in the one category of climate change and related environmental disasters.

WEF President Borge Brende said the world was feeling long-mounting and interconnected risks.

The report also points to how citizens are protesting across the world as discontent rises with failed systems that are creating inequality. The citizens' discontent had hardened with systems that had failed to promote advancement, it said.

"Disapproval of how governments are addressing profound economic and social issues has sparked protests throughout the world, potentially weakening the ability of governments to take decisive action should a downturn occur. Without economic and social stability, countries could lack the financial resources, fiscal margin, political capital or social support needed to confront key global risks," it said.

Listing the grim scenario, Borge said the global economy was faced with "synchronised slowdown", the past five years had been the warmest on record and cyber attacks were expected to increase this year.

The report warns that while the myriad risks were rising, time was running out on how to prevent them.

Borge said the growing palpability of shared economic, environmental and societal risks indicated that the horizon had shortened for preventing "or even mitigating" some of the direst consequences of global risks.

"It's sobering that in the face of this development, when the challenges before us demand immediate collective action, fractures within the global community appear to only be widening," he said.

The report points to grave concern about the consequences of continued environmental degradation, including the record pace of species decline.

Pointing to an unsettled geopolitical environment, the report said today's risk landscape was one in which new centres of power and influence were forming and old alliance structures and global institutions were being tested.

"While these changes can create openings for new partnership structures in the immediate term, they are putting stress on systems of coordination and challenging norms around shared responsibility. Unless stakeholders adapt multilateral mechanisms for this turbulent period, the risks that were once on the horizon will continue to arrive," it said.

Calling it a "an unsettled world", the WEF report notes that powerful economic, demographic and technological forces were shaping a new balance of power. "The result is an unsettled geopolitical landscape in which states are increasingly viewing opportunities and challenges through unilateral lenses," it said.

"What were once givens regarding alliance structures and multilateral systems no longer hold as states question the value of long-standing frameworks, adopt more nationalist postures in pursuit of individual agendas and weigh the potential geopolitical consequences of economic decoupling. Beyond the risk of conflict, if stakeholders concentrate on immediate geo-strategic advantage and fail to re-imagine or adapt mechanisms for coordination during this unsettled period, opportunities for action on key priorities may slip away," the WEF said.

In a chapter on risks to economic stability and social cohesion, it said a challenging economic climate might persist this year and members of the multi-stakeholder community saw "economic confrontations" and "domestic political polarisation" as the top risks in 2020.

The report also warned of downward pressure on the global economy from macroeconomic fragilities and financial inequality. These pressures continued to intensify in 2019, increasing the risk of economic stagnation.

Low trade barriers, fiscal prudence and strong global investment, once seen as fundamentals for economic growth, are fraying as leaders advance nationalist policies. The margins for monetary and fiscal stimuli are also narrower than before the 2008-2009 financial crisis, creating uncertainty about how well countercyclical policies will work.

The strategic partners for the WEF report included Marsh & McLennan and Zurich Insurance Group. The academic advisers were National University of Singapore, Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford and Wharton Risk Management and Decision Processes Center, University of Pennsylvania.

Kolkata, Feb 4: A Thailand national on Tuesday gave birth during a flight from Doha to Bangkok.

The unnamed woman passenger went into labour and delivered the baby with the help of a cabin crew of Qatar airways at around 3 am.

The aircraft made the emergency landing in Kolkata and the woman was admitted to a private hospital here. Both the mother and the baby are doing fine.

"An unscheduled flight from Doha to Bangkok QR-830 landed around 03:09 am at Kolkata airport in medical priority landing. The pilot of Qatar flight had asked SOS to ATC for medical priority landing. The flight landed safely, the airport team with the doctor was attending the concerned." Kolkata Airport official said while speaking to news agency.

More details in this regard are awaited.