French govt to postpone pension reform talks until 2021- union

Paris, France: Negotiations between the French government and unions over controversial reform to the pensions system will be postponed until 2021 to focus on economic recovery in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, the prime minister said on Friday.

The reform, pushed by President Emmanuel Macron and the single greatest revamp of the pension system since World War Two, was halted in its tracks in February by the pandemic. The proposal angered unions and brought thousands of people onto the streets at the turn of the year. The decision to push it back aims in part to ease those tensions as France grapples with the economic fallout from the coronavirus.

Prime Minister Jean Castex said the reform, which includes raising the retirement age by two years to 64, would not be scrapped. A deferment until after the 2022 presidential elections might defuse union and voter concerns but would undermine Macron's already-weakened credibility as a reformer. "I think it's extremely important in the quite exceptional circumstances in which our country finds itself, and which you are aware of, a health crisis that is not over, an economic crisis that has taken hold, it's very important to show the French people that dialogue exists, that it is by gathering around the table, by listening to each other, by respecting each other that we can hope to find collective understanding and an answer to the crisis." said Jean Castex.

The reform is central to Macron's ambition of creating a more flexible and competitive labour force. But trade unions argue that it will erode hard-earned benefits and leave pensioners worse off. 

"This corresponds to our desire to not make the pension reform a matter for the summer and the autumn, and rather to give ourselves time understand it and first see how we could be capable of responding to the fight against unemployment, the creation and retention of jobs, the fight against rising poverty and, most of all, making young people the priority." said Lurent Berger, Head of CFDT labour union.

Texas and Arizona ramp up measures as U.S. coronavirus cases shatter records

Texas and Arizona officials ramped up measures on Thursday as the United States reported at least 70,000 new COVID-19 cases, a record daily increase for the seventh time this month, according to a Reuters tally.

U.S. deaths are also rising and have recently reached the highest levels since early June, led by Arizona, California, Florida and Texas, according to the tally. There has been an upswing in COVID-19 cases across the American South and West after state and local officials started loosening economic and social restrictions aimed at slowing the spread of the virus.

Moreover, the rate of people testing positive among all those who are screened has exceeded 5% - a level above which health experts say is concerning - and was trending upward in some two dozen states over the past two weeks, according to data collected by Johns Hopkins University.

Arizona has registered the highest positivity rate, with nearly a quarter of everyone tested statewide found to be infected, followed by Florida at nearly 19%, South Carolina at 18% and Texas and Alabama each at 17%.

In Arizona, health officials announced a surge in available testing - up to 5,000 free tests a day - targeted in undeserved and high-need communities. More than half of all states - 30 out of 50 - have reported record one-day increases in cases this month. Infections are rising in almost all states, based on a Reuters analysis of cases the past two week compared with the prior two weeks.

The tally of known infections in Texas jumped by an all-time high of 10,791 cases statewide during the past 24 hours, and the state also reported a record 110 additional COVID-19 deaths, its fourth such daily benchmark this month. In Texas' Rio Grande Valley, officials are bringing in refrigerator trucks and authorities in Hidalgo County have requested additional help from funeral directors in other communities.

Authorities also organized give-aways of masks, hand sanitizer and food as residents struggle with both the health and economic crises. Nationally, the total number of cases surpassed 3.5 million, by far the highest number of any country in the world, and more than 137,000 Americans have died from the highly contagious respiratory illness to date.

Zuckerberg criticizes Trump virus response, Fauci implores young people to stay vigilant

California: The leading U.S. expert on infectious diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, on Thursday implored younger people to continue social distancing and other measures to curtail spread of the novel coronavirus, which has surged in some parts of the country.

"You have to have responsibility for yourself, but also a societal responsibility, that your getting infected is not just you in a vacuum, you're propagating a pandemic," he said in a live interview with Facebook Inc Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg.

Social media platforms including Facebook, which in April removed "pseudoscience" as an option for advertisers, have been criticized for allowing the spread of misinformation about the pandemic, from bogus cures to wide-ranging conspiracy theories.

Zuckerberg criticized the administration of President Donald Trump for its response to the virus.

"It is clear that the trajectory of the US is significantly worse than many other countries, and that our government and this administration have been considerably less effective in handling this." New U.S. cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the virus, have climbed to over 60,000 a day from daily totals under 20,000 in May. The median age of those infected has fallen by about 15 years as younger people, many of whom may show few symptoms of illness, are being infected, Fauci said.

He cautioned that even asymptomatic people can spread the coronavirus to others, increasing the likelihood that the virus could infect a more vulnerable person. Fauci said some states have moved forward with reopening even though they did not meet guidelines issued by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

"We have to regroup," Fauci said, noting that some regions of the country are much less at risk than others. He urged people to wear face coverings, avoid crowds, maintain social distance and remember that being outdoors is always better than being indoors.

"We should be looking at public health measures as a vehicle or a gateway to getting the economy back," he said.

Australia: Victoria state reports highest daily increase in Corona cases

Melbourne: Australia's second-most populous state of Victoria reported 317 new cases on Thursday, the state's highest one-day rise in infections and the country's largest since early April. 

Victoria has been isolated from the rest of the country for more than a week following a fresh outbreak of the disease. The 4.9 million residents in its capital, Melbourne, have been ordered to stay home except for essential business.

The record number of cases comes as the Australian government announced their plan to commit a further A$2 billion ($1.4 billion) into wage subsidy and training programs to counter rising unemployment in the country. That decision gives the first indication of how Prime Minister Scott Morrison plans to prop up the economy beyond September when a broader A$60 billion wage subsidy package is still due to expire. 

"Victorian situation is very concerning. But as the, I think the chief health officer in Victoria was remarking today, they are, I think, hopeful that what we're seeing is those figures starting to level out. I said yesterday that I thought this would still be at a high level for some time, but as the effects of the lockdown I think kick in, then hopefully we'll see those new case numbers fall. And so yes it is a big setback in Victoria."- said PM Scott Morrison.

Victoria premier Daniel Andrews said- "it is 317 new cases since we last updated you. Of those 317 new cases, 28 connected and known to be connected to contained outbreaks and complex cases, 289 of those are under investigation by our public health team. I'm very sad to have to report that there have been two further Victorians pass away, bringing the total number of deaths as a result of this virus to 29."

Brazilian researchers recall how they find coronavirus in waste water

Brazil: Researchers at the Federal University of Santa Catarina (UFSC) in Brazil, who had detected the presence of the novel coronavirus traces in the waste water samples collected from last November in the country, recalled the process of finding and offered the plan for the next step.

Their sewage water study in early July showed that sewage water samples from November 27 last year in Florianopolis, the capital and second largest city of the state of Santa Catarina, was found to contain COVID-19 traces. "Particles of the new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, were found in two samples of Florianopolis sewage collected on November 27, 2019," the research group said in a report published on the university's official website.

The finding is three months earlier than the first reported case in Brazil at the end of February, which arouses global concern.

The research team collected urban sewage samples in Florianopolis in six independent sampling events between October 2019 and March 2020.

"Results came back positive for SARS-CoV-2 for the first time for a sample from November 27. And tested samples from December, February and March all came back positive. Our study shows that novel coronavirus was already present in Brazil waste water in November 2019," said Gislaine Fongaro, co-author of the study.

At first, the researchers were skeptical of the result, so they conducted a second test with virus markers in different labs, repeated all data and tracked the virus genome. The test results are the same. Then, the research group also sequenced the full genome of the virus samples. The group leader, Patricia Stoco, a geneticist, said that they found the gene sequence of new coronavirus in samples based on the first phase of full genome sequencing.

Now, researchers have begun to look into older clinical samples taken from patients with similar symptoms of COVID-19, in order to further prove that the virus had existed last year. "If the sequencing results prove the virus is the new coronavirus, we can confirm COVID-19 clinical cases and novel coronavirus in sewage water were present earlier than the official record, which had circulated very early," she said.

Apart from Brazil, coronavirus had been scientifically identified in sewages in Spain and Italy collected on March 12 and December 18 respectively before the first confirmed cases were reported in Europe earlier this year.

'My kids are not guinea pigs': Los Angeles parent supports remote learning

Los Angeles, US: When Brenda Del Hierro realized her two children would be learning remotely in the fall, she was relieved. Even though she wanted them to go back to classrooms so she could resume her normal life, Brenda believes the risk of catching coronavirus is too great.

"I mean, I was excited for them to go back so I can go back to my normal life as well. But I mean, the risk outweighs everything. I can't risk my kids getting sick or possibly getting somebody else sick or their teachers or vice versa. It's not ideal to have them home, but it's what needs to happen. And I'm so thankful that that was the outcome."she said on Wednesday. Brenda was concerned they might bring the virus home to her mother in law, a breast cancer survivor who lives with the family in the Highland Park area of Los Angeles. 

After weeks of online learning in the spring, the 33-year-old homemaker is hoping for greater communication with teachers and other parents in the fall. She says one of the biggest challenges of home-schooling is keeping her 8-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter engaged.

"My daughter's easier, a little bit easier to motivate, she self-motivates herself, and for my son, it's harder to keep him just engaged. He suffers from ADHD. So, it's he's constantly losing track of what he's doing, or he gets distracted by the littlest thing or a sound from outside or whatever it may be." Del Hierro said she's bothered by the President Trump mandating for all schools in the country to open in the fall.

"I think he should really let the, let schools figure out what they need to do, and he should focus on himself and focus on running other things instead of worrying about the school districts. Everybody's need is different, and for him to really say, hey, schools, you know, teachers are irresponsible. They need to go back to school." said Del Hierro. "But my kids are not guinea pigs. I'm not going to send my kid to school to see if they're going to get COVID and to see if they're going to survive COVID. It's unfair to put that risk on our kids."

Del Hierro said she understands the social aspect of being at school physically, but prefers to have her children home until the school provides a plan for a safe return. Her 10-year-old daughter, Emma, says the school workload at home can be stressful, but thinks it will get improve in the fall.

"I feel like we get more work here than at school because it's not like something where we just go. And if we don't finish our work that time or that day, then we started out the next day," said Emma.