China Invites More People to Attend Olympics, Cites Success of Containment Measures

China said Tuesday it will invite more spectators to attend the Winter Olympics because of the success of strict containment measures within the bubble that separates event personnel from the public.

China did not sell tickets to the public due to concerns over the spread of the coronavirus but chose a limited number of spectators who are required to comply with strict containment and prevention measures.

The announcement was made at a news conference at which Huang Chun, an official with the organizers’ pandemic prevention and control office, said a realistic goal for attendance at some venues before the Games are over is about 30%.

“We will bring in more spectators based on demand because the current COVID-19 situation within the ‘closed loop’ is under control,” he said.

A staff worker disinfects a hotel floor inside the Olympic “closed-loop” during the Beijing 2022 Winter Olympics in Beijing, China, Feb. 8, 2022.

In the southwestern Chinese city of Baise on Tuesday, no new cases of the coronavirus were reported, one day after a strict lockdown was ordered following a spike in daily infections three days earlier.

Authorities ordered residents in the city, near the border with Vietnam, to stay at home, leaving their residences only to buy essential items or to test for COVID-19. Local officials encouraged residents of the city of about 3.6 million to use delivery services rather than travel to a store when possible.

The lockdown comes as China hosts the 2022 Winter Olympics in the capital, Beijing, within a strict bubble to prevent the spread of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19.

Lockdowns in Hong Kong

Hong Kong announced Tuesday its most stringent lockdown measures since the pandemic began as new daily cases of infections have topped 600. Chief Executive Carrie Lam said gatherings of more than two families in private premises will be prohibited and public gatherings will be limited to two people. Places of worship and hair salons will be closed until February 24, when vaccine passes will be required to enter public places such as markets and restaurants, Lam said.

Restrictions in North America

The busiest land crossing from the United States to Canada remained closed Tuesday, Canada’s border agency said, one day after police in the Canadian capital of Ottawa seized thousands of liters of fuel as part of a crackdown to end a protest organized by truckers opposed to COVID-19 restrictions. Mayor Jim Watson declared a state of emergency in the city on Sunday after the demonstrations entered their second week. Truck traffic has been blocking the streets of Ottawa since the demonstrations began on January 28.

Officials in the U.S. states of Connecticut, Delaware, New Jersey, California and Oregon have announced the lifting of indoor mask requirements for schools and other public places in coming weeks, as levels of infections fueled by the omicron variant of the coronavirus subside. The decisions, mostly announced on Monday, came as state and local governments struggle with which restrictions to cancel or maintain.

The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resource Center reported Monday that there are more than 399 million global COVID-19 infections and more than 5.7 million global COVID-19 deaths. The center said more than 10 billion COVID-19 vaccines have been administered.

Some information in this report came from The Associated Press, Reuters, and Agence France-Presse.

In Sucre, students walk kilometers to attend classes - Other Cities - Colombia

Students from the rural area of ​​the municipalities of Since and El Roble in Sucre, they have to walk several kilometers to reach the Educational Institutions and enter classes in person, now with the reactivation ordered by the Ministry of Education.

This has been denounced by parents, inhabitants of the village of Vélez, in the rural area of ​​Since, closer to the municipality of Roble, where their children attend classes.

(Also: Five children and one adult missing after boat crash in Bolívar)

School transportation

We ask the mayor of El Roble to help us with transportation, because our children arrive tired, they no longer want to do their homework.

Lalys Muelas is the mother of one of those students, who starts her journey on foot every day very early in the company of other children to arrive at the Institution on time, since there is no school transport service that distributes the children from corregimientos. , sidewalks and farms.

“We ask the mayor of El Roble to help us with transportation, because our children arrive tired, they no longer want to do their homework because they arrive with a headache. With a car that makes the journey they are calmer, rested, with encouragement and willingness to comply with the Institution”, he says.

It indicates that the route is double, because there are several kilometers to go and the pampering on the way back.

(Also: They attack the Human Rights commission of an indigenous NGO in Riohacha)

“Only that the one on the way back is heavier, because they do it under the inclement sun, which harms the children. The way things are going, they’ll have to withdraw from school. We do not believe that our children can put up with this hustle and bustle, because they will surely get sick, “they indicated.

They were waiting for a response from the directors of the Educational Institution they attend in El Roble and the mayors on duty, to find out if they can count on school transport.

The situation was already registered in the Sincelejito corregimiento, in the rural area of ​​Ayapel (Córdoba), where 300 children do not attend classes but because of the floods.
Mayor Isidro Vergara contracted the services of a river transport to solve this problem.

Schools are in poor condition and do not provide minimum guarantees to students

Photo:

Taken from social networks

in bad shape

Parents and teachers recently made the complaint about the poor state of educational institutions, in the rural area of ​​Sucre (Sucre), where the walls of the Nariño Corregimiento Educational Institution are about to collapse.

In the same way in the Manuela Beltrán Educational Institution, in the Sabanas de Beltrán district, in the jurisdiction of Los Palmitos, where thieves are taking the headquarters to pieces.

(You may be interested: Erosion threatens drinking water service in Salamina, Magdalena)

Added to this is the lack of drinking water in different schools in the rural areas of Sincelejo, Toluviejo, San Onofre, Colosó and the indigenous areas of Sampués and San Antonio de Palmito.

Parents and teachers expect the solution to the requests they have made, so that children can access to receive classes in the midst of the highest possible quality.

Francis Xavier Barrios
Special for WEATHER
sincelejo

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As Fewer Americans Attend Church, Can Coffee Shops Fill the Void?

Churches and other houses of worship have historically played critical social and political functions in American society. But fewer people are attending religious services, and the decline of churches and other houses of worship threatens to leave a void that could potentially be filled by coffee shops.

“For so much of American history, the church has really been — or their congregations have really been — essential, providing an unheralded role in providing cohesion and connectedness in communities … encouraging civic engagement and political participation,” says Daniel Cox, director of the Survey Center on American Life and a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute.

“It was not happenstance or luck that the civil rights movement emerged out of the church,” Cox says. “And you see that cross-culturally … whether it’s in predominantly white rural communities, in the suburbs, wherever, churches have historically been really, really important.”

The number of Americans who say they belong to a church, mosque or synagogue has steadily declined in the United States since 1999, according to a Gallup poll.

Churches and other houses of worship have also played a role in helping immigrants assimilate once they arrive in America, Cox says.

In 1999, 70% of Americans said they belonged to a church, mosque or synagogue. By 2020, that number had dropped to 47%. A 2019 survey found that only about three in 10 Americans say they attend weekly religious services.

Third places

Lack of involvement and affiliation with churches, mosques and synagogues means people might be missing out on what urban sociologist Ray Oldenburg dubbed as “third places” — public gathering spots that offer something that home, the “first place,” and work, the “second place,” might not.

Oldenburg argued that third places are critical to a community’s social vitality. An October 2021 survey conducted by the American Survey Center found that commercial spaces like coffee houses foster trust and connection in American communities and could help fill the void left by churches.

“If you’re a regular at a cafe, the barista may know what you usually order, and they can make it for you, and that feels good,” says clinical psychologist Dr. Maria Espinola, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Neuroscience at the University of Cincinnati College of Medicine.

“It feels good to be recognized, to know that people are expecting you, to know that people care about you, to know that you belong, because the need for belonging and human connection is a fundamental need that we all have, and it’s important to have that fulfilled in different ways,” Espinola says. “So, places like third places can allow us to do that.”

Customers gather at Cafe Cosmos in downtown Seattle, March 15, 2020, in Washington.

In the past, churches and other houses of worship have been a third place for many Americans. In 2019, 67% of people surveyed said they have a third place — a coffee shop, bar, restaurant, park or other place in their community that they visit regularly. That number dropped to 56% in 2021 — a number that could have been affected by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“What we found was that people who had a third place were much more connected to their community,” says Cox. “They’re much more likely to engage in other activities there. They are much more trusting of their neighbors. There’s a whole great array of positive social outcomes that were connected to having a third place … and for a lot of Americans, it’s a coffee shop or a cafe.”

What coffee shops have in their favor is that they can be found almost everywhere, all over the country, and anyone who wants to can stop by regularly. And many are open most days of the week.

Cox says even brief coffee shop encounters can increase a sense of belonging.

“I think there’s a lot of potential here, and a lot of it is unrealized potential,” Cox says. “But in terms of what they could do, there’s a lot there. I’ve been in places where the same group of folks come in there to play chess. Or they have their informal bunch of retirees. … They just got together, and they talked and chatted and caught up with each other. … I don’t know where else they would have gone — maybe a church, but maybe not — to share information, to encourage each other to maybe get involved in an activity. And I think that is what is so powerful about coffee shops.”

US Vice President Harris to Attend Inauguration of Honduras’ First Female President

WASHINGTON — 

U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris will travel to Honduras on Thursday to attend the inauguration of Xiomara Castro as the Central American nation’s first female president.

Harris attendance at the historic event underscores her role in leading President Joe Biden’s efforts to curb the migration of hundreds of thousands of people from Honduras and neighboring El Salvador, Guatemala and Mexico into the United States each year, many of them traveling on foot over thousands of kilometers. Harris has been specifically tasked with addressing the root causes of the mass migration, including poverty and crime.

Biden pledged to adopt a more humane stance on migration than that of his predecessor, Donald Trump, who expelled migrants back to their home countries and separated children from their families.

Also attending Castro’s swearing-in will be Vice President William Lai of Taiwan. Castro has talked of switching Honduras’s diplomatic relations from Taiwan to China, which claims the self-ruled as part of its territory and has pushed to isolate Taipei from the international community.

Castro campaigned on a platform of ending the corruption that had clouded the 12-year rule of the right-wing National Party, which took power after her husband, Manuel Zelaya, was overthrown by the military. But her tenure has already gotten off to a rocky start after a breakaway faction of her Liberty and Refoundation Party, or Libre, elected lawmaker Jorge Calix to be their congressional leader last weekend.

The move went against an agreement Castro reached with the Partido Salvador de Honduras party, a key part of her political alliance that helped her win last November’s election, to choose PSH lawmaker Luis Redondo as congressional leader.

Some information for this report came from The Associated Press and Reuters.