COVID-19

Big Business Loves The Housing Crisis

August 22, 2021 Nick Bano, Tribune Magazine. Educate! COVID-19, Finance and the Economy, Gentrification, Housing

What’s your favourite type of landlord? It’s an odd question, but it’s one that commentators keep asking as housing crises of various types continue to take shape across the world. In a recent series of articles, economist Brett Christophers analysed the workings of Blackstone, a New York-based asset management firm which has become a phenomenally successful (and deeply harmful) institutional player in American housing markets. At the moment, the picture in the UK is very different—small-scale individuals vastly outnumber institutions in the buy-to-let market—but there are signs that this is starting to change. Last week, Lloyds Bank announced its plans to become one of the UK’s biggest landlords by buying 50,000 homes over the next four years – roughly equivalent to buying every dwelling in Exeter.

Latin American Socialism And The Fight Against COVID-19

August 22, 2021 Sasha Gillies-Lekakis, MR Online. Educate! COVID-19, Cuba, Nicaragua, Venezuela

Latin America has been one of the regions worst-hit by the COVID-19 pandemic, in every sense. Not only are countries like Brazil, Colombia, and Peru suffering epidemiological catastrophes, the result of right-wing neoliberal policies, but the World Bank and other financial institutions have reported that the region has suffered the most serious economic crisis as a result of the pandemic. The 2020s in Latin America are set to be a “lost decade,” with little social, economic, or political advancement in a number of nations. The failures of capitalism have become glaringly obvious during COVID-19, even though they were already apparent prior to the outbreak of the pandemic. And while there has been an overwhelming focus on the deaths, violence, and instability wracking numerous Latin American states, far less attention has been paid to the three countries that have, against all odds, defied this norm: Cuba, Venezuela, and Nicaragua.

What AIDS Activists Can Teach Us About The Covid Pandemic

August 16, 2021 Ria Modak, In These Times. Strategize! Activism, COVID-19, Health Care, HIV/AIDS

While health advocacy organizations have urged the federal government to learn from the HIV/AIDS crisis to more effectively respond to the Covid-19 pandemic, both within America and abroad, many HIV/AIDS organizers argue that the government has now failed twice in its responsibility to the nation’s — and the world’s — most vulnerable people.

Open Letter By Cuban Scientists To Biden

August 14, 2021 Prensa Latina. Resist! COVID-19, Cuba, Joe Biden, Vaccines

You recently referred to Cuba at a White House saying: 'I would be prepared to give significant amounts of vaccines if… an international organization would administer those vaccines and do it in a way that average citizens would have access to those vaccines.' You also called Cuba a 'failed state'. These statements surprised many, including those in the U.S. who have first-hand exposure to Cuba's health system. They also rankled with frontline Cuban health workers risking their lives to contain the COVID epidemic in our country. They do not reflect Cuban reality, and we deplore that disinformation by malicious political players is influencing your policy decisions. As scientists, doctors, and concerned citizens, we believe it's worth fact-checking three assumptions implicit in what you said.

Atomic Bomb Survivors—A Model For Us In COVID-19 Era

August 13, 2021 Robert Jay Lifton, The Bulletin. Strategize! COVID-19, Hiroshima, Survivors, Wars and Militarism

Survivors of Hiroshima are a dying population. People who were 20 years old at the time of the bomb would now be 96. The survivors still alive were mostly children then, and they too are dying out. Does this suggest that the message of hibakusha, the original survivors, has come to an end? I do not think so. Consider the message that Hiroshima survivors have brought to the world. A history professor I interviewed during my 1962 study of hibakusha — “explosion-affected people” — described how, soon after the bomb, he looked down at the city from a high suburb: “Hiroshima had disappeared. … I was shocked by the sight. … Hiroshima didn’t exist — that was mainly what I saw — Hiroshima just didn’t exist.”

Garment Workers In Bangladesh Forced To Return To Factories

August 11, 2021 Peoples Dispatch. Educate! COVID-19, health, India, Worker Rights and Jobs

Despite a strict lockdown, at least four million garment workers in Bangladesh were ordered to resume work from Sunday, August 1. The announcement made two day earlier led to thousands of workers rushing back to major production centers in overcrowded trains and buses due to the threat of job loss, increasing the risk of COVID-19 spread. A large number of workers complained of paying more than the normal rates for transportation, which was resumed by the government only on July 31. On July 30, the Sheikh Hasina-led government issued a notice allowing garment export factories to resume operations. Following this, garment workers were seen returning to major cities from their villages in overcrowded trucks, ferries and other means of transportation. Several others traveled on foot.

Virginia State University Unveils Student Debt Cancellation Initiative

August 10, 2021 News One. Create! COVID-19, Education, HBCUs, Student Debt, Virginia

The debt elimination effort was financed through the CARES Act. For scholars who attended the institution during 2020 and spring 2021, all debt owed to the school will be erased. Donald Palm, Ph.D., who serves as Senior Vice President of Academic and Student Affairs, says the effort will play a pivotal role in shaping their financial futures. He also mentioned students should be solely focused on learning without feeling the burden of unaffordability. “We care about our students and their academic success and want to provide them the privilege of moving forward with a zero balance,” he said in a statement. “We believe that relieving them from these balances will provide much-needed relief that will allow our scholars to focus more intently on their academics and degree completion.”

The COVID Challenge − Cooperation Or Competition

August 9, 2021 Sara Flounders, Workers World. Educate! Bioweapons, China, COVID-19, US Imperialism

Once again, in confronting the greatest immediate challenge facing humanity, U.S. imperialism has played only a disruptive role. The drive to maximize profits and assert global dominance has pushed Washington to recklessly exacerbate the deadly COVID-19 health crisis. What does U.S. imperialism hope to gain by blocking the World Health Organization’s inquiry into COVID with the demand that the WHO Inquiry focus on blaming China? This intentionally blocks an international initiative which needs full cooperation. Regarding the 18 intelligence agencies, nine report directly to the U.S. military. The rest cooperate. They provide means to instigate and fight U.S. wars rather than neutral, unbiased scientific information.

PEACH Provides Palliative Care For Homeless And Vulnerably Housed

August 9, 2021 Tracey Tong, The Toronto Star. Create! Canada, COVID-19, Health Care, Homeless

A child of refugees who fled war-torn Uganda in the 1970s, a young Naheed Dosani grew up having conversations about social injustice, inequity and poverty at the family’s Scarborough home. “I have always pondered what a life is worth,” he says, “and why our health and social systems are designed to value some lives over those of others.” This was especially the case after the challenges of the last year. A palliative care physician who works with some of the city’s most vulnerable, Dosani said that “COVID-19 has disproportionately impacted people who experience structural vulnerabilities. Pandemics are like guided missiles. They target the most vulnerable. The disproportionate effects of COVID-19 on three groups — racialized communities, essential workers and people who experience homelessness — are all textbook examples of its devastating impact.”

China Eradicates Absolute Poverty While Billionaires Go For A Joyride To Space

August 6, 2021 Vijay Prashad, Tricontinental Institute for Social Research. Educate! China, COVID-19, Finance and the Economy, Worker Rights and Jobs

Confounding news comes from the flagship World Economic Outlook report of the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The report highlights many of the pressing issues facing our planet: disruptions in the global supply chain, rising shipping costs, shortages of intermediate goods, rising commodity prices, and inflationary pressures in many economies. Global growth rates are expected to touch 6% in 2021 and 4.9% in 2022, driven by higher global government debt. According to the report, this debt ‘reached an unprecedented level of close to 100% of the global GDP in 2020 and is projected to remain around that level in 2021 and 2022’. Developing countries’ external debt will remain high, with little expectation of relief.

How The West Is Keeping The Covid-19 Pandemic From Ending

August 6, 2021 Robert Scheer and Achal Prabhala, ScheerPost.com. Educate! COVID-19, Global South, Health Care, Pandemic

Even though thousands of Covid-19 vaccines are being administered daily, the delta variant of the coronavirus is wreaking havoc around the world. This is in large part, say activists like Achal Prabhala, due to wealthy countries’ reluctance to address global vaccine apartheid and put an end once and for all to the pandemic. Prabhala, the head of AccessIBSA, has written numerous articles for the New York Times, The Atlantic, Project Syndicate and elsewhere, advocating for equitable distribution of vaccines, their recipes and technologies. Most recently, he and several other activists spoke to In These Times about the many different ways rich countries, like the U.S., can proactively address vaccine shortages in most of the world.

Tenants Fear ‘Tsunami Of Evictions’ As Moratorium Ends

August 3, 2021 Morgan Artyukhina, Sputnik International. Educate! COVID-19, Housing

After a federal eviction moratorium was allowed to expire over the weekend, thousands of eviction proceedings filed by landlords are working their way through court systems across the United States. The vast majority of federal funds meant for rental assistance, which could forestall an eviction, were never even disbursed.

Parks For The People

August 2, 2021 Olivia Riggio, The Indypendent. Organize! COVID-19, New York City (NYC), Parks, wealth inequality

It’s a mid-July evening in Maria Hernandez Park in Bushwick, Brooklyn and people are out, enjoying the final few hours of daylight. The sounds of basketballs bouncing and sneakers squeaking echo in the nearby courts. Some people sit placidly on benches, others walk their dogs along the paths. Parents chase children teetering on their bicycles and teenagers skateboard over the cobblestone pavement. A group of 20-somethings sits talking on a blanket in the grass, which, in certain patches, is overgrown and littered with soda cans and plastic bags. Over by the volleyball court, a match has drawn a rowdy crowd along its perimeter. Maria Hernandez Park may not be a tourist destination, but it is a staple for the surrounding neighborhood, which is largely Hispanic and working class.

Biden Has Abandoned His Covid Worker Safety Pledge

August 2, 2021 Christopher D. Cook, In These Times. Educate! COVID-19, Joe Biden, Walmart, Worker's Rights

Until she got her first Pfizer shot on July 16, Cindy Cervantes toiled in the Seaboard Foods pork processing plant in Guymon, Oklahoma for most of the pandemic without a vaccine — working unprotected in an industry devastated by Covid-19 illnesses and deaths. “In one day, at least 300 people were gone” from the plant, sick from Covid, Cervantes says. Still, “Seaboard wanted a certain number of hogs out. They kept pushing people, the chain was going even faster. People were getting injured, and we were losing even more people.” Six of her coworkers have died from Covid-19, and hundreds have gotten sick, she says. Ravaged by the pandemic, the roughly 500,000 U.S. workers in meatpacking, meat processing and poultry are not getting much help from the industry or the government.

Democrats Let US Eviction Moratorium Expire

July 31, 2021 Trévon Austin, WSWS. Educate! Biden administration, COVID-19, Housing

The Biden administration announced Thursday that it would allow the nationwide ban on evictions to expire on Saturday declaring that it was up to Congress, with just two days to go, to extend the measure. The White House claimed that the President’s hands are tied, and there was nothing Biden could do for the more than six million families that have fallen behind on rent, citing the Supreme Court’s decision last month to only allow a moratorium extension until the end of July.

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