global health
Despite advances in medicine this year, fighting global health problems is an uphill battle as diseases such as Covid-19, monkey pox and the Ebola virus affect many parts of the world. According to a New York Times December 18 article, “More than 5.47 billion people worldwide have received a dose of the Covid-19 vaccine.”
For many in the scientific community, this represents a remarkable achievement in the fight against Covid-19 and its devastating effects on the global community. Still, the importance of the global rollout is reduced by the vaccine gap, which shows the disparity in administration between the Global North and the Global South.
In South Africa, the country with the highest percentage of HIV infections, the South African Health Products Regulatory Authority confirmed the registration of an HIV prevention jab by the company ViiV Healthcare, named CAB-LA. Jab is a long-acting version of the antiretroviral drug that is taken monthly and has been shown to reduce the chance of contracting the virus by 79%.
Although the price (R54 000 a pop) is still a matter of debate in South Africa, ViiV Healthcare promises to offer CAB-LA to low-income countries at an unprofitable price. Although Covid-19 remains the biggest health problem for people around the world, mental health ranks second as the top health problem, according to an Ipsos study.
A tumultuous year for technology
The top tech news of the year was the turnaround (and backlash) after Elon Musk closed his $44 billion acquisition of Twitter in October and decided to fire thousands of employees worldwide. But Twitter isn’t the only tech company making headlines in 2022.
Shortly after Musk caused a storm, chief executive of Meta (Facebook’s parent company) Mark Zuckerberg laid off 11,000 employees in response to declining revenue and ad revenue. Zuckerberg sent an email to employees stating that Meta “is taking some additional steps to become a leaner and more efficient company by cutting discretionary spending and extending the hiring freeze through Q1”.
As Amazon and other tech companies continue to lay off workers, Tik Tok received pushback over its use in several US states as officials raised concerns about the Beijing-based company’s alleged mining of personal data from American citizens. Some 19 countries have at least partially blocked access to social media platforms on government computers, although there is no evidence of threats or problems in countries with more than 100 million users.
Bandits and terrorists join forces in Nigeria?
Although the US is again in the spotlight this year for mass shootings, Nigeria is one of the few countries that gained international attention for incidents of gun violence that often result from bandit attacks, herder-farmer clashes and ethno-religious conflicts.
The country started 2022 with the Zamfara massacre, which took place from 4 to 6 January and caused the death of more than 200 people, according to some sources. The attack was led by bandits, recognized by the government as terrorists, for kidnapping, killing and looting in several parts of Zamfara state. The attack is said to be the biggest terrorist attack in the history of Nigeria.
It was followed by the Plateau State massacre in April, another attack in Zamfara in May, and a bomb-shooting attack in Ondo state against a Catholic church in June. Many deaths were recorded in each incident. On December 19, local officials in Kaduna state reported that more than 20 civilians had been killed following two separate attacks by bandits in the state.
Reports attributed the attack to greed, although experts suggested it may have increased ties between bandits and jihadist groups.
Slavery apologizes get backlash
Dutch Prime Minister Mark Rutte in December apologized on behalf of the government for the Netherland’s role in the Atlantic slave trade, which transported more than half a million people from Africa and Asia to America.
“I apologize for the actions of the Dutch State in the past: being a slave, everywhere in the world, who suffered as a result of those actions, and to their sons and daughters, and all their descendants, until now. now,” Rutte said in a nationally televised address.
After the speech, Rutte told reporters that the government would not compensate “people – grandchildren or great-grandchildren of enslaved people”.
Because of this, in addition to the lack of discussion with the descendants of the servants, many criticized and asked for forgiveness. “Reparations are not even mentioned,” said one director of an organization called The Black Archives. “So, nice words, but it’s not clear what the next concrete step is.”
In 2022, several countries, leaders and royals have spoken out or apologized for the abuse of slavery, including speeches by King Charles III and the Prince of Wales.
The Taliban continue to ban women’s education
Since the Taliban takeover last year in August, the liberation of women in Afghanistan has been prioritized as a human rights issue. Since mid-December, the Taliban announced the closure of state universities for women.
“You are all informed to implement the order to postpone women’s education until now,” said the letter signed by the ministry of higher education.
The announcement means women will face further restrictions on their access to education as most secondary schools already bar girls from attending. Other rules in the country require women to travel with male relatives, adhere to a strict dress code and prohibit them from going to places like parks or gyms.
Elsewhere in the Middle East, hundreds of Iranian civilians have died since protests broke out against Mahsa Amini, a woman who died in police custody after being arrested for violating the dress code.
Animals go wild
Animal attack themed movies such as Not, animal and Jurassic World Dominion raked at the box office in 2022. Apparently there is only about watching animals wrear accidents in society. However, in reality, animal attacks, which have increased in reports and occurred in some areas this year, are not pleasant.
Animal attacks are recorded in zoos, vacation spots, villages and especially in neighboring South Africa where pitbull attacks have sparked debates about ownership and banning of the breed. Victims of the fatal attack included Hennenman’s three-year-old and 15-month-old boy from East London.
In Yamaguchi, Japan, residents saw 50 attacks on humans, including children, by Japanese macaque monkeys in an incident that began in July. Conservation efforts are reviving the species’ dwindling population efforts but fail to see the potential effects of the extinction of its top predators, the Japanese wolf and the mountain eagle. In India, 112 elephant attacks were reported in 2021-22 with shrinking forests and urbanization cited as the main causes, while calls for government intervention in several hippo attacks in parts of Kenya increased in December.
Russian-Ukrainian War
Footage captured by a Ukrainian drone was released online on December 19, showing the dire situation in the town of Bakhmut as fighting continued after Russia withdrew from Kherson in November. In the three-minute video, clouds of smoke billowed in the air, fighters clashed and fires surrounded buildings in the city, which had a population of 70,000 before the war.
Reports say that Bakhmut’s value to Russia lies in its location, which will allow President Vladimir Putin’s forces to launch attacks on several major cities in the Donetsk region.
According to the Institute of War Studies and the daily assessment of the invasion, Russia suffered a defeat in maintaining its position in the southern part of the city.
“I want them to be bright, but the situation is very difficult when there is light and then there is not. The main thing is that there is an inner light,” said the President of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelenskiy from the troops who visited the front line of the city.
As the war enters its tenth month, the number of civilian casualties has exceeded 6,000, including the deaths of more than 400 children, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.