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Results for Opinion

Monday 26 October 2020

Chicago, USA
Throughout US President Donald Trump's first term, there has been constant hand wringing over a "constitutional crisis" that never arrived. The irony is that an administration led by Joe Biden would almost certainly confront such a crisis, owing to Trump's transformation of the Supreme Court into a right-wing redoubt. A constitutional crisis, properly understood as a turning point that might lead to collapse or transformation of the system, has not occurred. But such a crisis does now appear increasingly likely. By Eric Posner.
Friday 23 October 2020

Melbourne, Australia
With the exception of decent New Zealand and arguably Australia, the rich, European ethnicity countries of the US Alliance have been involved in intentional Gerocide (mass killing of the elderly) in which their deliberate Covid-19 pandemic policies have resulted in “Covid-19 deaths per million of population” 10-180 times greater than in New Zealand (5). Expression of a deliberate intention to cause avoidable death of large numbers of people, and specifically of elderly people, would be unacceptable in politically correct Western democracies. But, unspoken and publicly unacknowledged, Gerocide is what has been happening in North America and Western Europe during the Covid-19 pandemic. By Dr Gideon Polya.
Thursday 22 October 2020

Nuku'alofa, Tonga
The Tonga Law Society is deeply concerned at the amendment to the Constitution of Tonga passed unanimously by Parliament on 15 October 2020. In bypassing the consultation process, Parliament has denied the Tongan people the most fundamental right to be heard on a matter of elemental importance to every Tongan subject. - Sione Tu'itavake Fonua, President, Tonga Law Society
Tuesday 20 October 2020

Chicago, USA
For all the hand wringing over Donald Trump's authoritarian rhetoric, the 2020 US election is not really about the incumbent. It is about deep-seated suspicion regarding the national government's role, which makes populism a recurring feature of American political history. By Eric Posner.
Saturday 17 October 2020

Stockholm, Sweden
The announcement of this year’s Nobel Prize laureates should remind us of the many contributions basic science has made to contemporary life. With COVID-19 ravaging much of humanity, and the world anxiously awaiting a breakthrough that can end the pandemic, we can no longer take science for granted. And the global science community, for its part, has risen to the occasion in unprecedented ways, not only to develop vaccines, therapies, and diagnostics, but also to improve our understanding of the virus and the best strategies to protect ourselves. By Lars Heikensten, Marcia McNutt, and Johan Rockström.
Thursday 15 October 2020

Queensland, Australia
At the start of the year, when COVID-19 was ravaging Wuhan, China, and beginning to envelop the West, I warned that the crisis would likely be replicated across much of the developing world, with significant long-term consequences for us all. Sadly, this prediction was correct....At the global level, the challenge is to ensure that vulnerable people everywhere are protected. Failing that, we will be entering a much more dangerous world, and the prospects for a robust global economic recovery will be severely diminished. By Kevin Rudd
Friday 9 October 2020

Kigali, Rwanda
Health-care delivery in nearly every country has been disrupted by policymakers’ mistaken initial assumption that health systems would quickly win the fight against COVID-19. As the pandemic’s caseload and death toll are increasing daily, it is often stalling or reversing hard-won progress on minimizing the impact of other diseases, from diabetes to malaria. By Anatole Manzi.
Thursday 8 October 2020

New York, USA
Without a vaccine, COVID-19 won't "go away" through a strategy of herd immunity. Two scientific case studies have already confirmed that the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 can reinfect an individual and that our immunity to coronaviruses is alarmingly short-lived. I have previously called herd immunity a “reckless and ineffective strategy.” Now that COVID-19 reinfections are not just a possibility, but a reality, I would add “lethal” to my description. By William A. Haseltine
Friday 2 October 2020

Decatur-Alabama, USA
In 1984, I had the privilege of meeting the Hon. Tasi Fakafanua at the Otago University in Dunedin. His memory has stayed with me for almost 40 years, as has my love for Tonga. I hope to visit one day before I am too old. Rev. Cameron Reeder.
Monday 28 September 2020

Nuku'alofa, Tonga
Stunning sand loss at Ha'atafu Beach on Tongatapu is revealed in two photos taken nearly 50 years apart.
Monday 28 September 2020

Nuku'alofa, Tonga
Yes, our isolation has been a distinct advantage, but keeping Tonga COVID-19 free, comes with much hard work at the borders to keep it that way. World Environmental Health Day reminds us of the importance of public health intervention in preventing people becoming ill with COVID-19. We are preparing for the novel coronavirus to reach our shores. No country is immune. By Sela Akolo Fa'u, Viliami Tongamana and Denise Tully.
Wednesday 16 September 2020

New Delhi, India
The World Bank should no longer publish its Doing Business index, owing to its flawed design and vulnerability to manipulation. The Bank also owes the developing world an apology for all the harm this misleading and problematic tool has already caused. By Jayati Ghosh.
1 comment
Wednesday 9 September 2020

Auckland, New Zealand
In many Tongan households in Aotearoa where the children have lost their Tongan reo, it is likely to be because the parents, despite their fluency in the reo, do not use it with their children at home. But Tongan is never irrelevant because it carries thoughts and feelings, knowledge and understanding, world-views and identities, dreams and aspirations – and what it means to be a Tongan human being. By Dr Melenaite Taumoefolau for Tongan Language Week 6 – 12 September 2020.
Thursday 3 September 2020

Zurich, Switzerland
Proponents of digital identification see the COVID-19 pandemic as a once-in-a-century opportunity, with a potential “jackpot market” of nearly eight billion people. In these dangerous times, using digital IDs to help control the spread of the virus and eventually to manage the distribution of a vaccine is often deemed appropriate and necessary. But there are ethical pitfalls. Rather than submitting people to a data-driven and AI-directed system that relies on surveillance and control through digital IDs, we should create more decentralized participatory frameworks. Collaborative approaches, based on the power of civil society, form the backbone of a strategy that uses our social talent to achieve humanity’s collective goals. By Dirk Helbing and Peter Seele.
Friday 28 August 2020

Abuja, Nigeria
Growing evidence shows that COVID-19 survivors can suffer from long-term health effects, not least heart-related complications. All countries with high rates of obesity should be considering programs encouraging weight loss, healthier eating, and physical activity. The more we can reduce the heart-related and other complications of COVID-19, the more lives we will save. By Ifeanyi M. Nsofor.
Wednesday 19 August 2020

Islamabad, Pakistan
By combining phones, Internet connectivity, and national IDs, a digital, demand-based social-protection system can be created to enable those in distress to seek support during crises. And it demonstrates how cash transfer programs can be deployed to counter the adverse socioeconomic consequences of external shocks, such as COVID-19. For Pakistan, this was a watershed moment in terms of government functioning. The crisis compelled the government to be more responsive, data-driven, experimental, and ambitious. At the same time in order for democracies to ensure progress, a culture of integrity and openness must be ingrained in government institutions and processes. By Sania Nishtar
Monday 10 August 2020

London, United Kingdom
This week's dialogue on economic strategies by the Forum Economic Ministers' Meeting, 11-12 August, is critical to building back better, or differently, for the Pacific Forum Islands. By Amelia Kinahoi Siamomua. (Tonga’s candidate for the post of Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat).
1 comment
Monday 10 August 2020

Melbourne, Australia
Many ethicists conclude that fully informed volunteers should be allowed to sign up for a potentially dangerous trial that will reduce the time required to bring an effective vaccine to everyone who could be exposed to SARS-CoV-2. The alternative is that the virus will continue to impose much higher levels of risk on other people, especially health care workers, older people, and people with underlying health conditions that reduce their chances of surviving infection. We should praise the young and healthy volunteers for risking their safety in order to save others. By Peter Singer and Isaac Martinez
Tuesday 28 July 2020

New York, USA
While ample resources – and high hopes – are being invested in the race to develop a COVID-19 vaccine, policymakers and the public should be preparing for a scenario in which no silver bullet is possible. But even in that case, writes renowned infectious disease expert William A. Haseltine, there are strong grounds to believe that we can control the virus and its spread.
Wednesday 22 July 2020

Geneva, Switzerland
During the 2009 swine flu pandemic, a few countries cornered the vaccine market, leaving the vast majority of the global population with no vaccine at all until the outbreak was effectively over. This scenario must be avoided at all costs during the current crisis – and, thanks to the COVID-19 Vaccine Global Access Facility, it can be. By Seth Berkley, Richard Hatchett, and Soumya Swaminathan.

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