World Status Report

This report intends to give the UTD Community a snapshot of international risks, and other issues as reported by the linked official sources from the U.S. and other countries.

Please note the publication date of this report, and go to the direct sources linked for the most up-to-date information.  The information in this report may change without prior notice.

Security

• Afghanistan. More women and children were killed and wounded in Afghanistan in the first half of 2021 than in the first six months of any year since records began in 2009, a United Nations report revealed on Monday (UN News).
• Kashmir. In March 2020, when countries around the world started imposing COVID-19 lockdowns Kashmir was just emerging from a lockdown of its own. Several months prior, in August 2019 the government of India revoked the special status that Kashmir had enjoyed since the partition of India in 1947. This sparked mass protests, violence and a heavy handed government response — including curfews and an internet shutdown. But just as restrictions were slowly being lifted in the early part of 2020, COVID emerged and the Indian government opted to invoke COVID to impose new restrictions on the people of Kashmir. This includes new citizenship laws and restrictions on press freedom (UN Dispatch).
• Ethiopia. Thousands of Ethiopian army recruits paraded in Addis Ababa on Tuesday to bid farewell before leaving for training, potential future participants in a bloody eight-month-old conflict in the north that continues to spread and intensify (Reuters).
• Nigeria. Armed men on motorbikes have killed at least 14 civilians in an attack in western Niger, near the restive border with Mali, the government said (Al Jazeera). The northern Nigerian state of Kaduna has suspended all schooling due to insecurity, state officials said on Monday, amid a spate of student kidnappings in the region that has rocked Africa’s most populous country (Reuters).
• South Sudan. The United Nations on Monday demanded an end to extrajudicial killings in South Sudan after the grisly execution of at least 42 people, including boys, in lawless parts of the troubled country (EastAfrican)
• Germany. Five people were missing and several injured after an explosion rocked an industrial park in the western German city of Leverkusen on Tuesday (CNN on MSN).
• Guatemala. The firing of Guatemala’s top anti-corruption prosecutor and new allegations that someone close to the attorney general was soliciting bribes for protection from investigations have increased concerns that what little capacity the country still had to battle corruption is being dismantled from within (AP).
• Mexico. Amid government inaction, Indigenous communities in the highlands of Mexico’s southern state of Chiapas are throwing their support behind a self-defense group that formed to fend off attacks by organized crime groups on their communities (InSightCrime).

Natural Disasters

• China. Near 300k people require emergency support for basic needs, over 24k houses were damaged, over 850k hectares of farming land were affected, and 63 people died in Henan due to weather related events linked to the torrential rain (ERCC).
• Japan. Tropical Cyclone NEPARTAK is forecast to weaken as it moves north-west. Evacuation orders have been issued for Atami City (south of Tokyo), which has been heavily impacted by recent floods and landslides (ERCC).
• Panama. Heavy rainfall in Bocas del Toro Province (north-eastern Panama) has led to floods and at least 11 landslide events resulting in displacement and damage (ERCC).
• Costa Rica. Heavy rainfall has been affecting northern and eastern Costa Rica, causing river overflow and triggering floods, resulting in casualties, displacement, and damage (ERCC).
• Italy. Heavy rain, strong winds, hailstorms and thunderstorms have been affecting northern Italy over the last 24 hours, causing mudflows and a number of severe weather-related incidents, resulting in injuries, displacement, and closed roads (ERCC).
• Myanmar. Flooding has displaced hundreds of people, slowing efforts to battle a fast-growing coronavirus outbreak amid the chaos that followed the country’s military coup (Guardian).

Health

• Nigeria. 18 out of the 36 states of Nigeria are effected by a cholera epidemic with 3,650 cases and 47 total deaths reported in the last two weeks (ERCC).
• United States. Health officials in Colorado on Thursday urged residents to be cautious around local wildlife after lab reports confirmed the presence of plague in animals and fleas from six counties. The warning comes after a 10-year-old resident recently died from complications of the disease, according to the Colorado Department of Public Health and Environment. The state’s last plague-related death was in 2015, the Denver Post reports (USA Today).

COVID-19

International preventative measures against COVID-19, including entry restrictions and in-country mobility remain fluid, and can be imposed without prior notice. Details for each country can be found in the travel advisories issued by the governments of the United States, Canada, the UK, New Zealand, and Australia.  The UNWTO and IATA Destination Tracker offers relevant information on a destination status. The Timeline of EU Member States Reopening Their Borders  offers a list of opened EU countries for travelers, and dates of warned opening.

As notable cases:

• Saudi Arabia will impose a three-year travel ban on citizens travelling to countries on the kingdom’s “red list”, state news agency SPA has said (Guardian).
• Germany is planning to introduce tighter controls on citizens returning from holiday in an attempt to control the growth in coronavirus cases (Guardian).
• Australia‘s Victoria state said on Tuesday it will end lockdown after curtailing the spread of COVID-19, but neighbouring New South Wales faced a four-week extension of restrictions according to media reports after new cases hit a 16-month peak (Reuters).
• Malaysia is under increasing strain from an unrelenting surge in the coronavirus, with parliament to convene on Monday after a months-long hiatus and lockdown during which cases and deaths have only worsened, pushing overworked healthcare workers to strike (Al Jazeera).
• United States. The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) and the State Department have warned against travel to Spain, Portugal, Cyprus and Kyrgyzstan because of rising COVID-19 cases in those countries (Reuters).

Global cases and deaths. As of 27 July, Johns Hopkins University counts 194,995,684 COVID-19 cases and 4,172,822 deaths, and the WHO COVID-19 dashboard reports 199,080,019 cases and 4,162,304 deaths.

As notable cases:

• Italy. Almost 99% people who have died of Covid-19 in Italy since February this year were not fully vaccinated, the National Health Institute (ISS) has said (Guardian).
• United Kingdom. Daily reported cases have fallen for a seventh day in a row. But the UK also saw the greatest day-on-day increase in death toll since 17 March, with a further 131 people dying within 28 days of testing positive (Guardian).
• Iraq has recorded its worst daily increase in infections, with 12,185 new cases (Guardian)
• Thailand is transporting some people who tested positive for the coronavirus from Bangkok to their hometowns for isolation and treatment to alleviate the burden on the capital’s overwhelmed medical system (Guardian).
• Senegal’s health ministry has raised alarm at a third wave of Covid-19 cases that has left health services in the capital Dakar nearly overwhelmed (Guardian).
• United States. US President Joe Biden said yesterday that the White House is pushing for those with symptoms of so-called long COVID to be protected against discrimination (Reuters).

Vaccination campaigns around the world continue. As of 26 July, Our World in Data reports 27.5% of the world population has received at least one dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and 13.9% is fully vaccinated. 3.93 billion doses have been administered globally, and 33.04 million are now administered each day. Only 1.1% of people in low-income countries have received at least one dose. The WHO COVID-19 dashboard reports over 3.69 billion administered vaccine doses.

As notable cases:

• Israel. Vaccine efficacy is significantly lower than in March, down to about 80% against serious symptoms and 90% against mortality, compared to over 97% effective against both in prior months (JPost).
• Ireland is set to open its vaccination programme to those aged 12 to 15 after its national immunisation advisory committee made a favourable recommendation (Guardian).
• Russia will test a combination of the AstraZeneca coronavirus shot and the single-dose version of the domestically developed Sputnik V vaccine, according to the country’s registry of approved clinical trials (Guardian).
• Indonesia is considering providing a booster shot of Sinovac vaccine, after a study showed antibodies provided by the Sinovac two-dose shot fade over time, a senior health ministry official has said (Guardian).
• Bhutan has inoculated most of its eligible population with second doses of Covid-19 vaccinations (Guardian).
• South Korea has begun a COVID-19 vaccination drive for workers at vital computer chip and electronic businesses to maintain global supply chains (Reuters). A mixed vaccination programme of AstraZeneca and Pfizer/BioNTech shots boosted neutralizing antibody levels by six-time, compared with two AstraZeneca doses, a South Korean study has shown (Reuters).
• United States. Moderna is in discussion with US regulators to expand its ongoing trial of its COVID-19 vaccine in children between ages 5 and 11 (Reuters).

Please note the publication date of this report and go to the direct sources linked for the most up-to-date information.  The information in this report may change without prior notice.