Corona Daily 384: Crowd-Sleuthing from Home

UK Met office has preserved rainfall data from 1820. It contains 3.5 million data points. Once digitized, it would vastly help improve future weather predictions and climate modeling. Unfortunately, this data was handwritten. Though scanned, even the best OCR (Optical character recognition) programmes confuse between 1 and 7, 3 and 8. By March end, expecting people to have more time in a lockdown, the Met launched a Rainfall rescue project. They expected it would take 16 weeks. A total of 65,000 handwritten pages needed to be digitized. The project was finished in only 16 days, with 16,000 volunteers contributing from home.

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Various online platforms facilitate crowd searching to solve mysteries. Find missing people. Catch criminals. Detect war crimes in Gaza. Analyze earthquakes. Estimate the damage in Syria. Identify nuclear warheads in North Korea. Citizen science projects and virtual volunteering are booming in lockdowns.

Tracelab is a Canadian non-profit platform. Their April event attracted 550 participants scrutinizing 15 cases of missing people, generating 8000 new leads. In an earlier event, one participant spent hours studying YouTube footage to discover a clip where the missing person was entering a car. Investigators had missed it. The police traced the car, and found the missing person living there.

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Europol has launched ‘Stop child abuse – trace an object’ where more than 40 million images (clothes, toys) related to child sexual abuse are available. Public is requested to trace the location/country of origin of the items. Through this platform, ten victims were identified, and two offenders successfully prosecuted.

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Hacking is not allowed. Volunteers must use information available in the public domain. But with platforms like Google Earth any satellite imagery can be sourced. With tools like Quantum GIS or Planet, that imagery can be processed and analyzed. Most of these tools are free. From your chair, you can access most satellite images of everything that is outdoors. The world now has too much electronic data, and not enough volunteers to explore it.

After the disappearance of the Malaysian Airlines flight MH 370, an area of more than 1 million sq. km needed to be explored. More than 10 million volunteers contributed to the hunt. Tomnod, a platform, had allocated a small geographical piece to each of them.

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Zoouniverse has several interesting projects any of us can contribute to, without leaving home. You can help find rural homes in Africa that have no electrical access. (By comparing images in day time and night time). A project ‘spot slavery from space’ identifies the location and scale of brick kilns in India and Pakistan. The assumption is that many workers at the kilns are bonded labourers. If you love nature, you can start tracing changes in the coastal environment by identifying marine invertebrates. If you love sound, you may want to listen to and analyse the seismic sounds of earthquakes. Historically, lady doctors and scientists have been unnamed. One photo from an earlier century shows Dr Michael Somyogi, and his five unnamed women doctor colleagues. Online volunteers have so far found the name of one of them.

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Collective effort can work miracles. Wikipedia is probably the best example of what crowdsourced projects can achieve.

The online detective work on Zoouniverse, Europol, Tracelab or Maxar will bring you neither money nor fame. But you can contribute to some good in the world. The joy and purpose of investigation is a reward for the soul. Trapped in your house, it may be an activity more fulfilling than watching Netflix or playing video games.

Ravi

Corona Daily 385: Terror in the Time of Covid

Those unhappy about masks, missing birthday parties, restricted travel may want to look at the happenings in Philippines and Columbia.

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Philippines has the fiercest and longest lockdown in the world. Its president Rodrigo Durerto, 75, declared a national emergency on 9 March. Ten days later, he declared “a state of calamity” for six months. The entire nation was placed under a General Community Quarantine. Armed forces and national police are deployed to ensure discipline. If they see any violent lockdown violators, Durerto has said, “shoot them dead”. Fake news peddlers can be imprisoned for up to 12 years and/or fined up to $ 20000.

Since March, presidential security has implemented a “no-touch policy”. Nobody is allowed to touch Durerte or any of his family members. (Punishment for doing so is not specified.)

On 3 July, the president signed into law an anti-terrorism bill. A council appointed by Durerto is now authorized to designate any individual or group as “terrorists”, arrest and detain them without a warrant or charge for 14 days, extendable by another ten. The bill also allows for 90 days of surveillance and wiretaps and punishments that include life imprisonment without parole.

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Last week, ABS-CBN, the largest broadcaster of Philippines was made defunct. Functioning over 25 years, watched by 60 million viewers, the broadcaster’s fault was its independent views. In more than a dozen court cases, its executives were charged with labour abuse, tax evasion, and biased reporting. Its chairman Gabby Lopez III was born to Filipino parents in the USA. This fact was used to accuse ABS-CBN of foreign ownership. All its TV and radio stations have been shut, its 11000 employees rendered unemployed.

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Despite the longest lockdown, Philippines has 67,000 cases and 1830 deaths. On 13 July, it saw the biggest rise with 3000 infections and 162 deaths in a single day.

This week Durerto has introduced a new plan called “care strategy”. It requires the national police to conduct house-to-house searches. Infected people without an individual bathroom, or with an old person or a pregnant woman in the house will be forcibly relocated to isolation facilities. Citizens have been asked to report suspected people to the police.

The plan has been compared to the drug war tactics Durerto had earlier employed. In the four years as president, he ran a campaign that left 27000 dead.

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On the other side of the Pacific, armed groups are dictating curfew conditions in Columbia. A proxy civil war has been going on in that country for the past fifty years. A Marxist-Leninist guerrilla group “FARC” aimed to overthrow the government. It financed its operations by kidnapping, drugs, extortion and illegal gold mining. That group has disarmed in 2016 and become a political party. But many of its ex-members have formed armed gangs across the country.

These groups, through whatsapp and pamphlets, are imposing their own curfews and lockdowns, more draconian than the government’s. National Liberation Army (ELN) in Bolivar announced they were forced to kill people in order to preserve lives, because the population didn’t respect the orders. At least ten civilians have been killed for breaking curfews or drinking in a bar. Motorcycles that moved during curfew were burnt. Armed groups always seek social and territorial control; the pandemic has provided them with a perfect opportunity. Despite all efforts, Columbia has 190,000 cases and 6500 deaths.

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Perhaps it is better to fall victim to Covid-19 in a democracy where discipline and rules are flouted, than survive in a land of terror.

Ravi  

Corona Daily 386: The Man in the Burqa

Ichamati is a trans-border river flowing through India and Bangladesh. The Rapid Action Battalion (RAB) is Bangladesh’s elite anti-terror/anti-crime unit. At 4 am on 15 July, several armed RAB men lay hidden and watching on the Ichamati’s bank. This was one of several porous points where smugglers ferry citizens fleeing to India. Kolkata is merely 80 km from here. Today was the ninth day of a nationwide manhunt.

At 5 am, a smart army man with night-vision binoculars spotted a black burqa. The Afghani burqa covers everything, including the face. The woman in the burqa looked stout, her walk indelicate. And she walked alone. Four RAB men quickly surrounded her, guns loaded and aimed. The voice gave it away. The removal of burqa revealed a mustachioed man wearing a helmet and bullet-proof vest, carrying a loaded revolver.  

Shahed Karim alias Mahammad Shahed, age 42, is the chairman of two hospitals in Dhaka. His impressive visiting card says he is the chairman of eleven business organizations, editor of a daily newspaper, and on the ruling Awami League’s international affairs committee.

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On 7 July, Italy suspended flights from Bangladesh. The day before, several passengers on Biman (the Bangladeshi airline) had tested positive upon arrival in Rome. Four days later 377 of them were deported and the Italian authorities banned Bangladeshis from entering Italy until 5 October. More than 100,000 Bangladeshis work in Italy, a lot of them concentrated in Lazio, a region near Rome. Italy has started conducting mandatory testing for all 30,000 Bangladeshis in Lazio.

Japan and South Korea also suspended all flights from Bangladesh with immediate effect.

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Shahed Karim, chairman of the two Regent Hospitals in Dhaka, has been working tirelessly since March. On one hand, he agreed with the government to provide free testing and care. On the other, he charged TK 4000-TK 8000 ($50-$100) per test.

Many workplaces require a fresh test certificate for a worker to rejoin. Readymade garment factories require all employees to carry a negative certificate. Last year, a large community of 12 million Bangladeshis working abroad had sent back $19 billion. Many of them trapped in Bangladesh were itching to go back. They needed test certificates before travelling abroad.

Surprisingly, there is also a small market for “positive” certificates. That includes the poorest, keen to get into government quarantine to enjoy free meals for two weeks. Also some “essential” servicemen who need an official document to not work.

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Shahed Karim satisfied everyone, and speedily. His hospitals took swabs of 10,500 people. Of those, at least 6300 were given reports without any tests. Graphic designers and IT experts formed part of his team. They scanned and forged the genuine certificates. Shahed targeted long queues, and also gave ads on social media. His customers were happy at the quick service, and a quick negative report. At the Rome airport, many Bangladeshis who tested positive were carrying those negative certificates given by Shahed Karim’s hospital.

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Shahed Karim is not the only one. Dr Sabrina Husain, a government cardiac surgeon, and chairman of JKG health, and her husband were arrested on 12 July. More than 2000 fake certificates were found in their computers.

In a population of 165 million, Bangladesh has 202,000 cases so far. After arresting the criminal syndicates, the country will need to refresh the scoreboard.

*****

Ravi

Corona Daily 387: America’s Good Doctor

Dr Anthony Fauci is the most recognized name in the field of epidemics and immunology. Students wanting to pursue epidemiology as a career should study his fascinating biography.

A leading expert of infectious diseases, he has served in Public Health for over 50 years. He has advised Reagan, two Bushes, Clinton, Obama and Trump. For 20 years (1983-2002), he was the thirteenth most cited from among 3 million academicians. He has more than 1200 papers published. Since 1978, he has held 33 visiting professorships, given over 500 major lectureships, received 31 honorary degrees, 130 awards and honors, served on 41 editorial boards. He earns $400,000 a year, more than Vice-president Pence. Since 1984, he has headed the National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). As its head, he handles a budget of $5.89 billion.

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A Brooklyn boy, both sets of his grandparents migrated from Italy. His father owned a pharmacy. His mother and elder sister worked at the counter. Little Tony delivered prescriptions on a bicycle. An academic topper, he was also the captain of the Regis High school basketball team. His height (5’7’’) meant basketball was a short career. Till today, and he is 79 now, he has a toy-sized net in his office, which he uses to relieve stress. He runs or brisk walks 3.5 miles every day. The school taught him precision of thought, and economy of expression, qualities evident when one watches him on television.

His undergrad degree was classics and philosophy with pre-med. He studied Latin for four years, Greek for three and French for two. One summer, he was a volunteer to build a new library in the Cornell medical institute. During lunch, he peeped into the auditorium, and wondered what it would be like to study there. When confronted by a guard, Tony proudly said he planned to attend this institute next year. The guard laughed ‘Right kid, and next year I am going to be the Police Commissioner.’

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The following year, he was admitted to Cornell and in 1966 qualified as a Doctor of medicine. For years, he worked as a physician and teacher of clinical medicine. (Yesterday, I mentioned epidemiologists better have a back-up. This is the best back-up. Medical doctors are never unemployed). How did Dr Fauci become an expert in epidemics?

On 5 June 1981, he received a report that described a healthy young man dying of a strange pneumonia. More reports followed, describing the death of 26 men, all gay. “It was the first time in my medical career,” says Dr Fauci, “I actually got goose pimples. I no longer dismissed it as a curiosity. There was something very wrong here. This was really a new microbe of some sort, acting like a sexually transmitted disease.”

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One of Dr Fauci’s greatest achievements was PEPFAR (President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS relief), 2003. George Bush launched it, Dr Fauci designed it. He visited several African countries personally. The program for saving Africans and Caribbeans shows what good America can do. PEPFAR has so far spent $80 billion, provided therapy to 15 million infected people, averted 2.2 million HIV infections, and provided care for 6.4 million vulnerable children.

Dr Fauci has helped fight AIDS, anthrax, SARS, 2009 Swine flu, MERS, Ebola, influenza and now Covid-19.

Passion is as important as education. Dr Fauci is the most famous epidemiologist, because he got goose pimples on reading the strange pneumonia deaths caused by an unknown microbe.

Ravi

Corona Daily 388: How does one become an Epidemiologist?

Grubhub, an American online food delivery company, recently hired an epidemiologist to advise them on how to safely deliver meals. Several companies worldwide are hiring qualified epidemiologists as consultants. The concepts of social distancing, masks and soap hand-wash were introduced by epidemiologists, not by politicians. What is this profession about? If a child wants to become an epidemiologist, how does he go about it?

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The Greek words epi(upon), demos (people), logos (study) combine to make epidemiology. Essentially it is the study of how often diseases occur in different groups of people and why. Epidemiologists investigate outbreaks, identify the viruses, identify ways of their transmission, and engage in constant surveillance of an epidemic.  

Epidemiology falls under the umbrella subject Public Health. Public health focuses on preventing disease, medicine focuses on treating disease. (That is one reason why it is easier for governments to cut budgets on public health. Like cutting budgets on firefighting by saying there was no fire recently).

Any child wanting to pursue the career of an epidemiologist must love Science and Math. He/she will be required to handle messy, complex data. Design, conduct and assess studies and surveys. Must be detail oriented and willing to work in a lab. Also determined, persistent, adaptable and resilient. When working in an international setting, diplomacy is essential. Communication, particularly written, is important. Job survival may depend on how well they write reports asking for grants. Epidemiologists who love their profession describe it as part detective, part prophet.  

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A typical day begins by reading ProMed to see the latest disease outbreaks around the world. Then work on a grant or a research proposal. This is followed by analyzing data and preparing presentations for the next international conference. The nine-to-five job is filled with meetings and discussions. Field work and emergencies can happen at irregular hours.

With a bachelor (4 years), masters (2), and PhD (3-5), and work experience, one can become a Doctor in Epidemiology by the age of 32-35. Oxford now offers MSc in global health science and epidemiology. In the USA, centers for disease control and prevention (CDC) run a two year specialized program in applied epidemiology.

Qualified candidates get jobs with governments, federal agencies, laboratories, hospitals or pharma companies. In the USA, an average annual salary is $71,000, with the salary range $50,000 - $120,000 per annum.

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Until now, young epidemiologists had read about pandemics only in history books. An epidemic curve and testing form two major chapters in textbooks. Now epidemiologists are excited they can apply their learning in real life. They can finally be useful to the world as they are expected to be. People are turning to them with hope to learn about the future.

The New York Times interviewed 511 epidemiologists asking their views on when we can fly, hug, shake hands, dine out, attend a wedding etc. It is an interesting read.

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In the past, epidemiologists were advised to have a back-up profession. When you are at the mercy of politicians like Trump, your employment is not secure. In 2018, it was projected this profession would grow by 5.3% between 2018-2028. Depending on the length and severity of the current pandemic, the projections may change. The demand for epidemiologists may skyrocket.

They may even get upgraded to Pandemiologists.

Ravi

Corona Daily 389: The Dishwashing Lady

57-year old Mary Daniel from Florida is the founder and chief executive of ClaimMedic – a small company that helps people deal with their health care bills. The company kept her busy. She drove across Jacksonville to meet customers every day.

From 3 July, she has taken up the job of a dishwasher with Rosecastle at Deerwood. This is a residential facility for senior citizens, retired or suffering from dementia or other disorders. The dishwashing job will pay Mary $9 per hour.

Before joining, she had to subject herself to a detailed background investigation, biometrics check by FBI and the Florida police. She underwent a 26-hour training on various subjects. She attended an induction and orientation program that explained how to interact with residents. Her dishwashing job didn’t require much of it, but it was all part of the eligibility requirement.  

She gave Covid-19 tests a few times, and fortunately was negative each time. Also a TB and a drug test. A 20-hour video training included information on infectious diseases.

Having legally qualified to do the job, Mary has started scrubbing dishes, mopping floors, cleaning the kitchen. This is the first time she has taken up a manual job.  

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Mary’s husband, Steve, used to work as an orange juice salesman. A very sociable person as salesmen are expected to be. At 59 years of age, he prematurely developed Alzheimer’s. Mary took care of him. In July 2019, when it became impossible to leave him alone at home, Mary moved him to the care centre Rosecastle at Deerwood. He was healthy, moved around the center, chatted with people, and continued to recognize Mary, his companion of 24 years. After Mary finished her ClaimMedic work, she would visit him, watch TV with him, help him get ready for bed each night, and lovingly tuck him in bed before driving home.

On 11 March, Mary was told she can’t visit the center any more. Florida governor’s order prohibited visitors to all care homes.

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Through March, April and May, Mary tried everything. She reached out to the governor’s office more than a 100 times, but received a mechanical response pointing to the order. She promised to wear a full PPE before going to see her husband. The governor’s office refused.

She tried window visits. When she stood on the street outside Steve’s room, a thick glass separated them. Steve cried. With dementia, he couldn’t understand why Mary comes to the window, tries to talk, and instead of meeting him, walks away to her car. She stopped for fear of making it worse for him. Facetime didn’t work either.

She wrote to the director of the care center. Could she volunteer please? Could she bring a therapy dog? Could she get a job at the center – any job?

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After more than 100 days of separation, Mary heard about the dishwashing vacancy. She jumped at it. After working, she would be able to see her husband. That was the perk.

On 3 July, after washing the kitchen, she went to Steve’s room. Steve recognized her even with her mask on. Mary, he said, and hugged her. Both of them cried. Later they watched TV. Mary made his bed, and tucked him in.

Ravi

Corona Daily 390: Data Slower than the Disease

Yesterday’s New York Times has a report that sounds fictional, but is not. Set in the USA, year 2020, the report narrates the various ways in which test data is transmitted and processed.

Across America, coronavirus test results arrive at the public health departments by phone, email, post (!), and more commonly, fax. Fax complies with the American privacy standards for health information. The Austin city office receives 1000 faxes every day, many of them duplicate. Some are sent to the wrong address. If sent through a server to a computer, the health department prints the report for someone to manually enter it in a database later.

Fax machines are so overwhelmed, they frequently run out of paper. Office floors are overrun with paper. Washington State called 25 members of the National Guard (a military unit) to enter data manually.

Nationally, 80% of the results are missing demographic information, and half don’t have addresses. The Trump administration has stated that laboratories should report patients’ age, race, and ethnicity, but the rules will come into force only August onwards. Laboratories should also furnish patients’ address and phone number, but this is optional.

When reports come in duplicate, on the fax pages on the floor, the department employees, if physically present, pick the pages up. Most records come only with the patient’s name and birth date. With the address and phone missing, employees start calling the provider or going through directories.

The doctors, labs, and health authorities have different systems; they don’t talk to one another. (Like one Apple charger not fitting another Apple device.) Information is expected to move from the doctor to the lab to the public health authority and back to the doctor. It doesn’t always. Errors are possible when dealing with blurry printouts and analog data.

Many health offices get the necessary information about a test result 11 days after the test. By which time the patient has managed to infect hundreds. Health officials are advising people to assume they are positive, since the faxing system makes the process nearly as long as quarantine itself.

The report has a beautiful quote from a Health department director. “The data is moving slower than the disease.”

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In a 2017 interview, Barack Obama admitted this to be the biggest failure of Obamacare. His administration had desperately tried to get doctors to move from paper to digital, but couldn’t. $27 billion were pumped in to improve the medical system buried under mountains of paperwork. A special HITECH act was passed in 2009. Many American hospitals have some sort of electronic medical system in place, but they can’t transfer the data to another hospital outside their system. In countries like the UK or Canada, a patient has a unique ID number, which makes aggregating data easier. In the mid-1990s, the USA congress passed laws preventing the federal government from creating new ID numbers.

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UK’s National Health Service (NHS) was, until two years ago, the world’s largest buyer of fax machines. By the end of 2018, with more than 11,000 machines in use, the health secretary said he was ashamed of this backwardness. By sheer chance, NHS was ordered to get rid of all fax correspondence and go digital by 31 March 2020. In India, I don’t recall seeing a fax machine in the last ten years.

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Before a national rollout of 5G, the USA may be better off getting rid of their fax machines.

Ravi

Corona Daily 391: The Blue Blooded Savior

We belong to an ecosystem where our lives may depend on a tiny creature called the horseshoe crab – or to be precise, on its blue blood. No Covid-19 vaccine will be approved unless it passes the blue blood test.

Horseshoe crabs have existed for 450 million years. Unlike us, they may have coexisted with dinosaurs at one time. Which is why they are called living fossils. Horseshoe crabs have nine eyes- two compound, and seven simple. Their name is deceptive. They are closely related to spiders and scorpions. The world’s largest population is concentrated in the Delaware Bay off the coasts of New Jersey and Delaware.

They are useful in at least three ways. First, they are used as fishing baits. Nearly a million are caught and killed in the bait fishery every year. Secondly, they help migrating birds survive. Guided by the full moon, hundreds of thousands of horseshoe crabs gather on beaches across the US mid-Atlantic to lay their eggs. The 9000 mile travelling birds, particularly the Red Knot, are totally dependent on the fat content of those eggs to maintain the energy required to fly further north.

The third, the most important use for us, is their ability to detect harmful bacteria in drugs and vaccines.

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These primordial creatures are first transported to labs. A horseshoe crab is plucked from the water tank. Its helmet-shaped shell is bent in half to reveal a soft white membrane. A needle is inserted in to draw blood. The blood is pure blue, because of its copper content. Nearly 30% of blood is drawn out in this involuntary donation.

This blood has an invaluable talent for finding infection. As soon as it comes into contact with endotoxin (a poisonous substance), the blood clots. Since the 1970s, this property has been used to apply a test known as LAL (Limulus Amebocyte Lysate). This distinctive blood test is used for injectable drugs such as insulin, implantable medical devices such as knee replacements, hospital instruments such as scalpels and IVs. The presence of endotoxin, even in small amounts, in drugs or vaccines can be fatal.

About 70 million endotoxin tests are performed every year in a $ 1 billion market. The blood is so critical that its current price is $16,000 per liter. Not jokingly, some refer to it as Blue Gold.

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This is the only natural thing known to us that can test the safety of drugs and vaccines. In 2016, a synthetic alternative has been developed in Europe. However, on 1 June 2o20, the American Pharmacopia, which sets the standards for drugs and vaccines in the USA, declined any alternatives, saying their safety is still unproven. Any Covid-19 vaccine, (and currently hundreds of projects are working on it), to be sold in the USA must be tested with the horseshoe crab blue blood.

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After drawing one third of the blood, the horseshoe crabs are sent home – back to the ocean. Even with the utmost care, the journey to the lab and back takes its toll. Nearly 30% die. The females’ ability to spawn may get impaired. Some studies have found the bled crabs becoming disoriented and debilitated for a long time. Environmentalists have expressed concerns that excessive blood testing may endanger this valuable species.

It is in our own interest that we take every measure to ensure the survival and growth of horseshoe crabs.

Ravi

Corona Daily 392: Van Gogh Kidnapped

The Dutch museum ‘Singer Laren’ had organized an exhibition “Mirror of the Soul” to run from January to May 2020. Museums routinely borrow famous artworks from other museums to make exhibitions more attractive. The Groninger museum lent “The parsonage garden at Nuenen (1884)” better known as the “Spring Garden” to Singer Laren. This was the only Van Gogh Groninger had, and the museum was delighted the rare piece would be viewed for five months. Indeed, until 13 March, hundreds of art lovers admired it at Singer Laren. Then the museum and the nation went into lockdown.

On 30 March, at 03.15 am, an unexpected visitor, face fully covered, smashed a glass door with a sledgehammer, went inside, picked up the Van Gogh, and left in his vehicle. The entire operation, caught on CCTV, took less than two minutes. The shrill alarms went off loudly, and the police arrived a couple of minutes too late.  

The Spring Garden is oil on paper on panel, 25 cm X 57 cm, easy to carry under arms. It is not known if the thief had targeted that particular painting. 30 March was the birth anniversary of Van Gogh, which simply may be an uncanny coincidence. This early picture of Van Gogh, before Arles and before Paris, is darker and less recognizable. Still, it is valued at $ 6.6 mn.

Usually, in a few weeks, the art thief learns how difficult it is to sell a stolen painting. No art lover would want to hang it in his living room. A casual thief becomes frustrated and destroys the stolen piece, the only evidence of his crime. After two months neither the painting nor the thief was found, and art lovers mourned the disappearance. Destroyed paintings and killed human beings never come back.

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Arthur Brand is a Dutch art crime detective. During his career, he has recovered more than 200 art works, including a Picasso and a Dali. As part of his work, he maintains contacts with the underworld. In June, he got one photograph from a source he can’t disclose.

The photograph shows the stolen painting, now taken out of its frame, a New York Times of 30 May next to it, and a biography of Octave Durham, an art thief who in 2002 had stolen two Van Goghs worth $100 million.

Brand was happy to find this “proof of life”. Like in a kidnap situation, a newspaper front page is attached to show how recent a photo is. The museum has confirmed the painting is genuine. Because the thief has also attached a photo of the label behind the painting, not available in any catalogue. The other clue, the Durham biography, is not yet well understood. Durham was in hospital when the robbery happened.

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Such stolen paintings can only be sold to criminal networks. The maximum price fetched can be between 2% and 10%.  Mafiosi buy them not for display, but as a bargaining chip. The two Van Goghs stolen in 2002 were recovered in 2016 from an Italian mafia boss. Raffaele Imperiale had tried to offer the paintings back in exchange for a reduced sentence.

The art world is happy Spring Garden is alive. It will be recovered at some point. If it means some mafia man spending less time behind bars, art lovers wouldn’t really mind that.

Ravi

Corona Daily 393: You Can’t Stay at Home

Yesterday, I talked about employees fortunate enough to retain their jobs by working from home. At the other end of the spectrum are those living in rented houses, who have lost their jobs. Low-income, daily wage workers are the worst affected. They risk being kicked out of their homes.

USA, England and Wales (not UK), were quick to announce a ban on evictions (landlords removing tenants) and foreclosures (banks confiscating the house for non-payment of a mortgage). In August, the moratoriums will come to an end.

In India, informal requests were made to landlords to be compassionate and delay or waive rent. No ordinance has been passed. This was one reason why daily-wage migrants desperately tried to return to their villages. Reserve Bank of India allowed delay of mortgage payment, though warning that interest for delayed payment will be charged.

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Evictions have now started in the USA. In the middle of May, the Texas Supreme Court ordered resumption of evictions and debt collection. The Sheriff of Oklahoma County tweeted: “This is difficult… Deputies will start serving judicial eviction notices this week and enforcing evictions on May 26. Once the order is served, tenants have 48 hours to leave. We will be compassionate & respectful during evictions.”

One institute estimates 28 million renters risk evictions (22.5% of American households). Undocumented and illegal migrants prefer to be evicted, rather than deported, by letting the authorities know about them. The dreaded scenario of an eviction notice on the door, a knock from the sheriff’s deputies, and family possessions landing on the street is already happening. Evicted people are worried about being taken to homeless shelters. These crowded shelters are infamous for being Covid-19 hotspots.

UK has 8 million tenants, of whom 4.5 million have private landlords. Others rent from councils and housing associations. England moved the moratorium from 25 June to 31 August. (The expression kicking the can down the road was made famous by Brexit).

Rent is not waived in any country, only eviction delayed.

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It is generally assumed that the landlord is wealthier than the renter. That is not always the case. For some widows, property rent is their only income for survival. Many house owners have hefty mortgages to pay. In England buy-to-let is quite common. Reportedly, these mortgages are not covered under the moratorium.

This is one of the pandemic’s irresolvable issues. To be fair to renters is to be unfair to landlords. And those two have a contractual relationship. In a domino chain, the tenant pays rent to the house owner, who may be paying mortgage to the bank. The bank has lent that money from the depositors’ savings. In similar crises, banks may end up with lots of foreclosed (confiscated) properties which are not sellable. Liquidity is affected, and depositors may not be able to withdraw their own money.

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With campuses and hostels shut, students have moved back to their parents’ houses where possible. With no government support, evicted Indians will need to move to the houses of their relatives/friends or be homeless.

For renters without jobs and savings, eviction is only a matter of time. USA and UK will have to stop issuing stimulus checks at some point. The moratorium on evictions and foreclosures ends in August.

From September, we may see a flood of evictions and an epidemic of homelessness.

Ravi