Presidential rivals Trump and Biden spar over Covid-19 vaccine - BBC News

Donald Trump and Joe Biden have been trading insults over each other's position on a vaccine for Covid-19.

President Trump again hinted that a vaccine might be available before the November presidential election and accused his Democratic rivals of "reckless anti-vaccine rhetoric".

Mr Biden expressed scepticism that Mr Trump would listen to the scientists and implement a transparent process.

The US has six million cases of coronavirus, the highest in the world.

The virus has also claimed nearly 190,000 lives and fuelled a major recession, double-digit unemployment and sagging consumer confidence.

Last week it emerged the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) had urged states to consider "waiving requirements" in order to be able distribute a vaccine by 1 November - two days before the 3 November election.

No vaccine has yet completed clinical trials, leading some scientists to fear politics rather than health and safety is driving the push for a vaccine.

Both Mr Biden and his running mate Kamala Harris have questioned the president's credibility on the issue. Ms Harris said on Sunday she would not trust Mr Trump's word that a vaccine was safe, and Mr Biden also questioned whether the wider public would trust him too.

"He has said so many things that aren't true I am worried that if we do have a really good vaccine people are going to be reluctant to take it," Mr Biden said in Pennsylvania on Monday, Labour Day.

But he added that: "If I could get a vaccine tomorrow, I'd do it. If it cost me the election I would do it. We need a vaccine and we need it now. We have to listen to the scientists."

Mr Trump, who is trailing in the polls, hit back at a White House news conference, calling Mr Biden "stupid" and Ms Harris "the most liberal person in Congress... not a competent person in my opinion".

He said they "would destroy this country and would destroy this economy", and added that they "should immediately apologise for the reckless anti-vaccine rhetoric that they are talking right now".

The president, at times asking journalists to take off their face masks when asking questions, again suggested a vaccine could be ready next month. "We're going to have a vaccine very soon, maybe even before a very special date."

Mr Trump wants to have 300 million doses of a coronavirus vaccine in stock by January, and has spent hundreds of billions of dollars in the hope of speeding up the development of a vaccine which in ordinary circumstances could take years.

The US top infectious diseases expert, Dr Anthony Fauci, has said that it is unlikely but "not impossible" that a vaccine could win approval in October, and Stephen Hahn of the Food and Drug Administration said it might be "appropriate" to approve a vaccine before clinical trials are complete if the benefits outweighed the risks.

But both scientists, the White House and the executives of five top pharmaceutical companies have made clear there will be no compromises on safety and effectiveness of a vaccine.

Three vaccine trials in the US are in their final stages - each involving 30,000 people who will get shots, three weeks apart, and will then be monitored for coronavirus infections and side effects for anywhere from a week to two years, the Associated Press reports.

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2020-09-08 04:31:01Z
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Australian journalists flown out of China 'amid diplomatic standoff' - BBC News

Two Australian news outlets have removed their reporters from China over what they say is a diplomatic standoff.

The Australian Broadcasting Corporation's Bill Birtles and the Australian Financial Review's Mike Smith landed in Sydney on Tuesday.

Chinese authorities questioned both men before their departure. The ABC reported Birtles was "not asked about his reporting or conduct in China".

Relations between Australia and China have deteriorated in recent years.

Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne said consular officials had provided support to the journalists.

"Our embassy in Beijing and consulate-general in Shanghai engaged with Chinese government authorities to ensure their wellbeing and return to Australia," she said in a statement on Tuesday.

The AFR reported that Chinese authorities had questioned the journalists about Cheng Lei, an Australian journalist for Chinese state media who has been detained since last month.

• Who is the Australian TV anchor detained by China?

What is known?

The ABC reported that Australian diplomats advised Birtles and ABC management last week that he should leave China. He was then booked on a flight due to leave Beijing last Thursday.

But the situation escalated last Wednesday at midnight when seven Chinese police officers visited the reporter's apartment as he held farewell drinks with friends, the ABC reported.

The officers told Birtles he could not leave the country and would later be questioned over a "national security case", the report said.

He immediately contacted Australian consular officials, who collected him and took him to the Australian embassy, where he spent the next four days.

During that time, he was interviewed by Chinese police in the presence of Australia's ambassador to China, Graham Fletcher.

Smith, who is based in Shanghai, also received a visit by police - prompting him to go to the Australian consulate there. Both men were questioned over Ms Lei, the AFR reported.

They were allowed to leave the country in exchange for agreeing to be interviewed by police.

What's been the reaction?

"It's very disappointing to have to leave under those circumstances," Birtles said in Sydney.

"It's a relief to be back in the country with genuine rule of law. But this was a whirlwind and it's not a particularly good experience."

The AFR's editors, Michael Stutchbury and Paul Bailey, said they were glad both journalists were safe.

"This incident targeting two journalists, who were going about their normal reporting duties, is both regrettable and disturbing and is not in the interests of a co-operative relationship between Australia and China," they said in a joint statement.

Bill Birtles and Mike Smith were the last two correspondents for Australian media working in China. Their evacuation means for the first time since the mid-1970s there are no accredited Australian journalists in the country.

China is not only Australia's key trading partner and the biggest customer for its coal and iron ore, but it's also one of its most important stories to cover. As tensions rise between Beijing and Canberra, the need for journalists on the ground in China becomes ever more crucial.

The ABC's news director, Gaven Morris, said: "The story of China, its relationship with Australia and its role in our region and in the world is one of great importance for all Australians and we want to continue having our people on the ground to cover it."

But as both countries continue to exchange political and diplomatic jabs - and with China's broader crackdown on Western journalists - it's hard to see when Australian reporters will be allowed back.

This development is not only a critical marker in the relationship between the two countries, it will no doubt affect Australian media coverage of this important story.

Related Topics

• Australia
• China
• Journalism
• Australia-China relations

More on this story

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2020-09-08 02:11:00Z
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Trump floats ‘decoupling’ US economy from China - Financial Times

Donald Trump raised the prospect of “decoupling” the US economy from China and claimed that America was experiencing “the fastest recovery in US history”, honing his economic messaging as the presidential campaign enters its final stretch.

Mr Trump, who made China a central focus of his 2016 campaign, previewed a tougher line on trade with Beijing in a press conference held in front of the White House on the Labor Day holiday, with less than two months to go before the election on November 3.

Mr Trump said that “decouple” — which economists have used for a decade to refer to a potential permanent drop in trade between the two countries — was “an interesting word”.

“If we didn’t do business with [China], we wouldn’t lose billions of dollars,” Mr Trump said on Monday. “It’s called decoupling. So you’ll start thinking about it. You’ll start thinking they take our money and they spend it on building aeroplanes and building ships and building rockets and missiles.”

The president also threatened to block companies that outsource jobs to China from receiving federal contracts, and vowed — as he did during the 2016 campaign — to bring manufacturing jobs and crucial supply chains back to the US.

“We will make America into the manufacturing superpower of the world and will end our reliance on China once and for all,” he said. “Whether it’s decoupling, or putting in massive tariffs like I’ve been doing already, we will end our reliance on China, because we can’t rely on China.”

Donald Trump speaks from the north portico of the White house on Labor Day © REUTERS

The president promised to get tough on trade with China during the 2016 campaign and secured a limited “phase one” trade deal earlier this year. But the trade deficit with China has remained stubbornly high. Data released by the commerce department on Thursday showed the US trade deficit with the Asian country increased by $1.6bn to $28.3bn in July.

Mr Trump has said the US would hold China accountable for the devastation wrought by the coronavirus pandemic, which has killed more than 181,000 people in the US. In recent months his administration has taken aim at Beijing over a host of issues, ranging from pro-democracy demonstrations in Hong Kong and alleged abuses against Uighurs in Xinjiang to accounting standards for US-listed Chinese companies.

The president painted his Democratic rival, Joe Biden, as a “pawn” of Beijing, saying the former vice-president will “surrender our jobs to China, our jobs and our economic wellbeing”.

Mr Trump and Mike Pence, his vice-president, used the Labor Day holiday to depart from their campaign’s focus on imposing “law and order” and cracking down on civil rights demonstrators to offer an economic message: the virus will be contained soon, and the economy has started to recover.

“The United States experienced the smallest contraction of any major western nation,” said Mr Trump. “Our rise is spectacular and we’re rebounding much more quickly from the pandemic.”

In the US, GDP dropped 9.5 per cent in the second quarter. That is better than Germany or the UK, but worse than South Korea or Japan, where the economy slowed by 7.8 per cent over the same period. Mr Trump also pointed to an encouraging jobs report from Friday, which showed unemployment at 8.4 per cent.

The US has recovered about half of the 22.2m jobs lost during March and April, amid widespread lockdowns.

“We’ve gone through a time of testing,” said Mr Pence, speaking on Monday to about 250 workers and guests at the Dairyland Power Cooperative in La Crosse, Wisconsin. “We’re soon coming to a time of choosing.”

Under Mr Trump, “the era of economic surrender is over”, he added.

Mr Biden and his Democratic running mate, Kamala Harris, also made trips to battleground states on Monday. Mr Biden travelled to Pennsylvania, where he met with union leaders. Ms Harris was in Wisconsin to visit with family members of Jacob Blake, a black man who was shot by a police officer in an incident that has added fuel to anti-racism protests across the US.

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2020-09-07 22:07:00Z
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UK records nearly 3,000 new Covid-19 cases for second day - Financial Times

The UK recorded close to 3,000 coronavirus infections for the second day running on Monday as health secretary Matt Hancock warned “more affluent” young people were behind the increase and risked spreading the disease to older relatives.

Official data showed 2,948 people had tested positive in the previous 24 hours, bringing the total number of recorded infections to 350,100. The one-day total was only slightly down on 2,988 cases reported the day before — itself the highest total since May.

The increase in cases will raise concerns that the UK is on the brink of a resurgence of the virus, following similar patterns of infection in other European countries such as Spain and France.

In an interview with LBC, Mr Hancock said: “The rise in the number of cases we have seen over the past few days is larger among younger people — under-25s, especially between 17 and 21.”

While over the summer there had been “particular problems in some of the areas that are most deprived”, the increase in infections over the past few days “is more broadly spread and is not concentrated in poorer areas — it is actually among more affluent younger people, especially, where we have seen the rise”, he added.

Warning that everyone had a responsibility to maintain social distancing, he pushed back against the argument that young people would not become seriously ill. “Long Covid”, symptoms that can persist for more than six months after infection, was “prevalent” among that group, he added.

Sick youngsters could also infect others, he pointed out. “This argument that we have seen — saying you don’t need to worry about the rise in cases because it's impacting younger people who are less likely to die — firstly they can get very ill and secondly, inevitably, it leads to older people catching it from them — so don’t infect your grandparents,” he added.

Asked if Britain was losing control as cases rose, he said: “It’s concerning because we have seen a rise in cases in France, in Spain, in some other countries across Europe. Nobody wants to see a second wave here. It just reinforces the point that people must follow the social distancing rules.”

He added that in Spain the number of hospitalisations had gone up by 14 times since the middle of July, while in France the number of people in hospital had trebled over the past month or so.

So far that trend has not been seen in the UK where hospitalisations and deaths from Covid-19 have not increased in line with the uptick in infections.

Yvonne Doyle, medical director for Public Health England, echoed Mr Hancock’s warnings to young people, saying that “the vast majority” of new cases were in people in their late teens and early 20s.

“What we don’t want to see is a continuing increase of cases in this age group because it could lead to them infecting their parents and grandparents who are much more at risk of poor outcomes from the virus,” added Dr Doyle.

Separately, Mr Hancock said the “best-case scenario” for a Covid-19 vaccine to be approved in the UK was later this year, but it was most likely to happen in the “first few months of next year”.

The Scottish government on Monday extended a ban on indoor meetings between households to two more council areas in the Greater Glasgow and Clyde region amid growing concern about rising numbers of new Covid-19 cases.

Officials said that from midnight, residents in Renfrewshire and East Dunbartonshire would be subject to the same restrictions on social visits that were announced for Glasgow and two neighbouring council areas on September 1.

The Greater Glasgow and Clyde area accounted for more than half of the 146 new cases of Covid-19 reported across Scotland on Monday, Nicola Sturgeon, first minister, said earlier on Monday, adding that six weeks ago the national average number of daily cases had been just 14.

“The current situation in Greater Glasgow and Clyde is a reminder that if we see a resurgence in cases, restrictions may have to be reimposed, rather than being relaxed,” Ms Sturgeon said. 

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2020-09-07 18:44:00Z
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Alexey Navalny out of artificial coma after 'Novichok poisoning' - Al Jazeera English

Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny, who Germany says was poisoned by a weapons-grade Novichok nerve agent, is now out of a medically induced coma and being weaned off mechanical ventilation.

The 44-year-old anti-corruption campaigner and one of President Vladimir Putin's fiercest critics, fell ill on a domestic flight last month and was treated in a Siberian hospital before being evacuated to Berlin.

"He is responding to verbal stimuli," Charite hospital, where he is being treated in Berlin, said in a statement on Monday, adding that the 44-year old's condition "has improved".

However, the hospital said it was too early to determine the long-term effect of the poisoning.

Germany said last week toxicology tests conducted by its armed forces found "unequivocal evidence" that Navalny was poisoned with Novichok - the substance used in a 2018 attack on a former Russian double agent and his daughter in the English city of Salisbury.

German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas then summoned Russian Ambassador Sergey Nechayev in protest and called for a full and transparent investigation.

Navalny's associates say the use of Novichok, a Soviet-era military-grade nerve agent, shows only the Russian state could be responsible, but the Kremlin fiercely denies any involvement.

"Attempts to somehow associate Russia with what happened are unacceptable to us, they are absurd," Putin's spokesman Dmitry Peskov told journalists on Monday.

Russian officials have accused Germany of being slow to share the findings of its investigation, despite a request from prosecutors.

"We expect information [from Germany] to be provided in the coming days," Peskov said. "We are looking forward to it."

Western leaders have expressed concern at what Navalny's allies say is the first known use of chemical weapons against a high-profile opposition leader on Russian soil.

The United Kingdom's foreign office summoned the Russian ambassador on Monday, a spokesperson said in a statement.

"The foreign secretary has made it clear that it is absolutely unacceptable that a banned chemical weapon has been used, and that violence has again been directed against a leading Russian opposition figure," it said.

"There is a case here for Russia to answer. This took place on Russian soil, against a Russian citizen. They have international obligations to uphold. This is nothing short of an attack against the rules based international system which keeps our societies safe.

"Russia needs to conduct a full, transparent criminal investigation into Mr Navalny's poisoning. We will work with our partners ... to hold the perpetrators to account."

Pipeline in crosshairs

Germany has warned a failure by Moscow to thoroughly investigate the incident could have serious consequences.

Maas said on Sunday Germany, which holds the rotating EU presidency, will discuss possible sanctions against Russia if the Kremlin does not soon provide an explanation for what happened to Navalny.

Otherwise, Germany will be compelled to "discuss a response with our allies" including "targeted" sanctions, Maas said.

He did not rule out action relating to Nord Stream 2, a 10 billion euro ($11bn) Russian-German gas pipeline nearing completion.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel's spokesman said on Monday she was in agreement with Maas, who is a member of the junior coalition partner Social Democrats.

She too would not rule out consequences for the pipeline beneath the Baltic Sea, which is set to double Russian natural gas shipments to Germany, Europe's largest economy.

The Navalny poisoning is the latest in a long series of assassination attempts against Kremlin critics. Navalny's aides have said they suspect he drank a cup of spiked tea at the airport.

The charismatic Yale-educated lawyer was initially treated at a Russian hospital, where doctors said they were unable to find any toxic substances in his blood, before he was flown to Berlin for specialised treatment on August 22.

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2020-09-07 17:33:00Z
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Transport Secretary announces regional travel corridors - The Independent

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1. Transport Secretary announces regional travel corridors  The Independent
2. Coronavirus: Seven Greek islands added to England's quarantine list  BBC News
3. BREAKING: Seven Greek islands go on England's COVID quarantine list  Sky News
4. New hope for holidays as individual islands WILL have quarantine-free status under new air bridge plans  The Sun
5. Seven Greek islands axed as Government announces new quarantine policy  The Telegraph
6. View Full coverage on Google News

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2020-09-07 17:24:25Z
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Coronavirus: Seven Greek islands added to England's quarantine list - BBC News

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Travellers arriving in England from seven Greek islands will have to self-isolate for 14 days from 04:00 BST on Wednesday, Grant Shapps has said.

The islands affected are Crete, Lesvos, Mykonos, Santorini, Serifos, Tinos, and Zakynthos (also known as Zante).

Mr Shapps said "enhanced data" allowed the UK to pinpoint risk in islands, providing flexibility to add or remove them as infection rates change.

Travellers arriving in Wales from six Greek islands must already quarantine.

The islands affected are Crete, Lesvos, Mykonos, Paros and Antiparos and Zakynthos.

The Scottish government has imposed quarantine restrictions on the whole country of Greece. Northern Ireland currently has Greece on its list of countries exempt from quarantine.

Speaking to MPs in the Commons, the transport secretary said: "Through the use of enhanced data we will now be able to pinpoint risk in some of the most popular islands, providing increased flexibility to add or remove them - distinct from the mainland - as infection rates change.

"This development will help boost the UK's travel industry while continuing to maintain maximum protection to public health, keeping the travelling public safe."

Mr Shapps said the coronavirus infection rate was still too high in Spain's Balearic and Canary Islands.

He said the government was "working actively on the practicalities" of using coronavirus testing to cut the 14-day quarantine period for people arriving in the UK from high-risk countries.

Purely testing people on arrival "would not work", Mr Shapps said, but quarantine combined with testing was "more promising."

"My officials are now working with health experts with the aim of cutting the quarantine period without adding to infection risk or infringing our overall NHS test capacity," he said.

He added that if someone was unable to quarantine for 14 days after returning to the UK "it might be best not to travel".

'Too slow'

But Labour's shadow transport secretary Jim McMahon described the government's handling of the pandemic as "chaotic".

"For months, even when the virus was at its peak, millions of passengers were coming from all over the world without any restrictions placed upon them at all," he said.

"By the time restrictions were introduced, we were one of only a handful of countries in the world who up to that point had failed to take action in bringing restrictions in place."

A spokesman for British Airways' owner IAG said it was "evident" in July that islands should be treated separately, saying the government was "too slow in making obvious decisions".

"For most families, summer is now over and the damage to the industry and the economy is done," he said.

"On testing, we need to get on with it. We are way behind other countries on what has to be a more nuanced approach."

Heathrow Airport said it welcomed the announcement that testing to shorten quarantine was being considered by the government and that air bridges to islands will be instated where appropriate.

"If introduced, these vital policy changes would show the government understands how critical the restoration of air travel is to this country's economic recovery," a statement said.

Are you on one of the seven Greek Islands? Will you struggle to get home before the quarantine deadline? Share your experiences by emailing haveyoursay@bbc.co.uk.

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2020-09-07 15:48:03Z
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