Tag: European Union

Now anti-vaxxers turn on Pfizer and Moderna after AstraZeneca’s decision to withdraw Covid jab sparks panic about rare but deadly clotting side effect (and pockets the pharma titan £2.5billion)

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Anti-vaxxers today called for Pfizer and Moderna to urgently withdraw their Covid jabs in the wake of heightened safety fears.

AstraZeneca’s landmark decision to withdraw its lockdown-banishing vaccine from global markets sparked hysteria online about the rival jabs – made using pioneering tech never utilised until the virus crisis spawned.

The UK-based pharmaceutical titan insisted its decision was a commercial one due to demand being slim, with its jab no longer being manufactured. 

Ministers favour superior mRNA jabs, like those

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Whatever Happened to All Those Care Robots?

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The first thing Pepper told me was that he was running out of battery. “He’s got about 15 minutes before he dies,” Emanuel Nunez Sardinha, a Ph.D. candidate in robotics at Bristol Robotics Laboratory, told me. That turned out to be plenty. Sardinha greeted Pepper; then I did. I asked Pepper how he was doing, to which he replied, “How are you doing?” Then Sardinha resumed telling me about the sorts of things Pepper, a friendly, wide-eyed robot designed to

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In Guatemala, At Least, Democracy Is Winning

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Democracy could use a win. All around the world, states have been taken over by strongmen dead set on extracting as much wealth as they can from the societies they rule. In Russia and Venezuela, Myanmar and Angola, weak electoral systems have given way to hyper-corrupt autocracies. And democrats haven’t really figured out how to fight back. Successful methods to get rid of criminal regimes are desperately needed but vanishingly rare.

Which is why what’s happening in Guatemala right now

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iPhone 15 is officially UNVEILED: Apple’s new smartphone starts at $799 in five new colors, USB-C charging and upgraded camera technology

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Apple today unveiled the long-awaited iPhone 15 at the company’s ‘Wonderlust’ event in California. 

The device, which starts at $799, features an all-new textured matte finish, a ceramic shield and comes in five new colors – a fetching pink, yellow, green, blue and black.

While the iPhone 15 is packed with new features, the smartphone supports USB-C charging cables that also fit the AirPods Pro, allowing the use of the same charging cables used for iPads and Macs. 

The smartphone

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The End of German Exceptionalism

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Asked what came to her mind when thinking about Germany, former Chancellor Angela Merkel once said, “I think of airtight windows. No other country can build as airtight and as beautiful windows.”

With its history tainted, post-1945 Germany looked to its economy for a positive conception of itself. The goods Germany produced, such as those quality windows, allowed politicians to celebrate the country as an “export world champion.” Germany Inc., was a well-oiled capitalist-corporatist ensemble. Trade-union leaders and CEOs

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The ‘AI Apocalypse’ Is Just PR

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On Tuesday morning, the merchants of artificial intelligence warned once again about the existential might of their products. Hundreds of AI executives, researchers, and other tech and business figures, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and Bill Gates, signed a one-sentence statement written by the Center for AI Safety declaring that “mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war.”

Those 22 words were released following a multi-week

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The Political Aftershock of Turkey’s Devastating Earthquake

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The Rise and Role of Ukrainian Ethnic Nationalism

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The risky food additives banned in Europe but legal in the US

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Americans may be unwittingly exposed to carcinogens and harmful chemicals in their food because of lax food ingredient laws 

It might surprise many Americans that food manufacturers are technically allowed to infuse products with additives that are banned in many parts of the world because they come with some significant health risks such as a higher liklihood of cancer or lower sperm counts affecting fertility. 

Potassium bromate, for instance, is ubiquitous in many store-bought breads. But it can irritate the

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Can Giorgia Meloni Govern Italy?

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Italy’s first far-right leader since World War II—and the first woman ever to lead the country—is small, blond, fierce, street-smart, working-class, and Gen X. Raised by a single mother in Rome after her father took off for a new life in the Canary Islands when she was a toddler, Giorgia Meloni came of age in far-right youth movements. Now 46, she has been a professional politician since she was a teenager.

Her victory in September’s national elections unsettled the

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