A NASA-Boeing partnership took its next steps toward deep-space exploration. Two commercial space flight companies reached new heights, and China says “foreign scientists” can inspect lunar samples it recently collected. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi brings us the Week in Space.Produced by: Arash ArabasadiCamera: NASA/AP/Reuters/Virgin Orbit/Blue Origin …
Pakistan said Thursday it will receive half-a-million free doses of China’s Sinopharm COVID-19 vaccine by January 31. Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi made the announcement at a news conference, saying his Chinese counterpart, Wang Yi, shared the “good news” in a phone call between the two officials. “He told me, ‘Send your aircraft and immediately airlift this drug.’ So, this is a welcome news for us. And we will, God willing, succeed in saving many lives,” Qureshi said. He stressed that the Chinese vaccine is being …
Fire erupted Thursday in a building under construction in India that is owned by the world’s largest vaccine maker, but the company said it would not affect production of a COVID-19 vaccine.The fire broke out at a Serum Institute of India (SII) building in the western city of Pune.Fire official Prashant Ranpise said the cause of the fire was not immediately clear, but it was contained to a facility under construction to boost production of the AstraZeneca coronavirus vaccine.SII CEO Adar Poonawalla sought to reassure the global community the fire …
The leading infectious disease expert in the United States says the country will participate in the global initiative to provide COVID-19 vaccines to poor countries. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and the chief medical adviser to new U.S. President Joe Biden, told the executive board of the World Health Organization Thursday during a videoconference that the U.S. will join the COVID-19 Vaccines Global Access Facility, or COVAX, an international alliance led by WHO, the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations and Gavi, …
Chile is getting a new weapon to help in its fight against the spread of the coronavirus.Health regulators approved the emergency use of the CoronaVac vaccine made by China’s Sinovac Biotech Ltd.Heriberto Garcia, director of Chile’s Public Health Institute, said very encouraging data from late-stage trials and the Health Institute’s independent investigations suggested CoronaVac was a “safe and effective vaccine to fight the pandemic.”Chile paid $3.5 million to host a clinical trial of the Sinovac vaccine and has ordered 60 million doses of the vaccine, according to Reuters.Garcia said Sinovac …
Zimbabwe is mourning the death of Foreign Affairs and International Trade Minister Sibusiso Moyo.The government said the country’s top diplomat died Wednesday after contracting COVID-19.Moyo gained international notoriety as an army general, becoming the spokesperson of the 2017 coup that ousted longtime President Robert Mugabe, who was replaced by Emmerson Mnangagwa.Moyo is the third cabinet minister to succumb to COVID-19 in the past six months.Minister of State for Manicaland Provincial Affairs Ellen Gwaradzimba died last week, and Agriculture Minister Perrance Shiri died of the disease in July.The 61-year-old Moyo was …
Twitter has locked the account of China’s U.S. embassy for a tweet that defended China’s policies in the Xinjiang region, which the U.S. social media platform said violated the firm’s policy against “dehumanization.” The Chinese Embassy account, @ChineseEmbinUS, posted a tweet this month that said that Uighur women were no longer “baby making machines,” citing a study reported by state-backed newspaper China Daily. The tweet was removed by Twitter and replaced by a label stating that it was no longer available. Although Twitter hides tweets that violate its policies, it requires account owners …
When Joe Biden was sworn in as the 46th U.S. president Wednesday, he inherited several social media accounts, including the @POTUS, @WhiteHouse, @FLOTUS and @VP Twitter accounts. Unlike after the last inauguration in 2017, when then-President Barack Obama’s followers were transferred to his successor Donald Trump, Biden inherited none of the @POTUS account’s existing 33 million followers. Biden’s current official Twitter account, @PresElectBiden became @POTUS, bringing with it all followers. President Biden’s first tweet shortly after he was sworn in Wednesday said, “There is no time to …
This week the head of the World Health Organization warns the world is on the brink of a “catastrophic moral failure” over the distribution of COVID-19 vaccines. This comes after some countries are already well underway with their vaccination campaigns, while others do not know when they will get their first shots. More from VOA Correspondent Mariama Diallo. …
A massive Antarctic iceberg that last month threatened a penguin-populated island off the southern tip of South America has since lost much of its mass and broken into pieces, scientists say. The main ice mass, called A68a, and its “child bergs” are still on the move, swirling in waters near South Georgia Island, said scientist Ted Scambos at the University of Colorado in Boulder. Scambos and other scientists have been tracking the iceberg — one of the largest-ever recorded — since it broke off from Antarctic’s Larsen C ice shelf in July …