An Uber ride in Brooklyn last month. The ride-hailing company’s business collapsed in March as shelter-in-place orders spread through Europe and the United States.
Lyft, Uber and Airbnb depend on travel, vacations and gatherings. That’s a problem when much of the world is staying home.
OAKLAND, Calif. — The coronavirus pandemic has gutted the so-called sharing economy. Its most valuable companies, which started the year by promising that they would soon become profitable, now say consumer demand has all but vanished.
US Surgeon General Jerome Adams holds a face mask during the daily briefing on the novel coronavirus, which causes COVID-19, in the Brady Briefing Room of the White House on April 22, 2020, in Washington, DC.
KEY POINTS
The changing recommendations during the Covid-19 pandemic on things such as whether to wear face masks has confused the public and caused them to lose faith in science.
But changing your mind based on new evidence is a badge of honor in the scientific community.
The situation is complicated by the fact that pre-print research is often being debated in public on social media, instead of behind closed doors.
If you’ve tuned into the daily news cycle during the coronavirus pandemic, you’ve probably noticed circumstances where scientists seemed reluctant to share information, debated the latest research on social media or downright changed their views.
The coronavirus pandemic has fast-forwarded the functions and roles of robots and artificial intelligence
Not so long ago, the concept of a fully automated store seemed something of a curiosity. Now, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, the idea of relying on computers and robotics, and checking out groceries by simply picking them off the shelf doesn’t seem so peculiar after all.
Part of my research involves looking at how we deal with complex artificial intelligence (AI) systems that can learn and make decisions without any human involvement, and how these types of AI technologies challenge our current understanding of law and its application.
How should we govern these systems that are sometimes called disruptive, and at other times labelled transformative? I am particularly interested in whether — and how — AI technologies amplify the social injustice that exists in society. For example, unregulated facial recognition in the United States affects almost 120 million adults, with no independent testing for biased error rates; this effectively creates a virtual, perpetual line-up for law enforcement.
The Council of Europe has warned of a potential increase in the use of biological weapons, like viruses or bacterias, in a post-coronavirus world. Terrorists would not forget “lessons learned” during the pandemic.
Security experts from the Council of Europe have warned that the global coronavirus outbreak may increase the use of biological weapons by terrorists in the future.
“The COVID-19 pandemic has shown how vulnerable modern society is to viral infections and their potential for disuption,” the council’s Committee on Counter-Terrorism said in a statement.
The deliberate use of disease-causing agents — like viruses or bacterias — as an act of terrorism “could prove to be extremely effective.”
Japan Lifts Coronavirus State of Emergency Nationwide
Japan’s state of emergency is set to end with new cases of the coronavirus dwindling to mere dozens. It got there despite largely ignoring the default playbook.
No restrictions were placed on residents’ movements, and businesses from restaurants to hairdressers stayed open. No high-tech apps that tracked people’s movements were deployed. The country doesn’t have a center for disease control. And even as nations were exhorted to “test, test, test,” Japan has tested just 0.2% of its population — one of the lowest rates among developed countries.
Yet the curve has been flattened, with deaths well below 1,000, by far the fewest among the Group of Seven developed nations. In Tokyo, its dense center, cases have dropped to single digits on most days. While the possibility of a more severe second wave of infection is ever-present, Japan has entered and is set to leave its emergency in just weeks, with the status lifted already for most of the country and Tokyo and the remaining four other regions set to exit Monday.
Analyzing just how Japan defied the odds and contained the virus while disregarding the playbook used by other successful countries has become a national conversation. Only one thing is agreed upon: that there was no silver bullet, no one factor that made the difference.
US intelligence agencies are investigating mobile phone data which suggests the Wuhan Institute of Virology had an emergency shutdown back in October last year.
NBC News has reportedly obtained records which show that a “hazardous event” at the institute’s high security National Biosafety Laboratory may have occurred between October 6 and 11.
This allegedly led to a shutdown of the P4 laboratory from October 7 to 24, during which there was no mobile activity, news.com.au reports.
The laboratory, located a short distance from the Wuhan wet market at the centre of the coronavirus outbreak, is the facility the Trump administration is blaming for starting the pandemic.
Historically, community college enrollment spikes during economic downturns.
This year, a public health crisis may draw even more students who don’t want to travel or live in a dorm.
The coronavirus crisis has already changed the way this year’s crop of high school seniors are thinking about higher education.
And community colleges across the country are preparing accordingly.
“Under the circumstances, families may turn to us as the gateway of opportunity, and we’ve been ready,” said Michael Baston, the president of Rockland Community College in Rockland County, New York.
What it’s like being unemployed because of coronavirus
Since early March, over 36 million Americans have filed for unemployment due to the coronavirus crisis, marking the biggest spike in unemployment in U.S. history.
In response to these claims, states have paid a record $48 billion in unemployment benefits to people out of work but several recent studies have found that this total could have been much higher.
According to an analysis by One Fair Wage, a nonprofit organization that advocates for restaurant workers, only 56% of those who have applied for unemployment insurance are receiving benefits, meaning about 44% have been denied or are still waiting.
To be sure, states are dealing with an unprecedented volume of unemployment applicants, causing delays. Additionally, it is possible that some people have filed incorrectly, but advocates and experts are increasingly calling attention to workers who are being left out.
Several coronavirus antibody tests have been authorized for public use, but so far their accuracy has been iffy. A new test created by Roche and cleared by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for emergency use today, May 3rd, significantly ups the standard.
Roche announced that its test is 100% accurate at detecting coronavirus antibodies and 99.8% accurate at ruling out the presence of those antibodies, meaning only one in 500 tests will get a false positive. Antibody tests use blood samples to assess whether a person had been previously infected, so they’re useful to determine the true spread of coronavirus.
In comparison, the first test the FDA approved for emergency use, created by Cellex, is 93.8% accurate at detecting coronavirus antibodies (this is known as sensitivity), and 95.6% accurate at ruling out the presence of antibodies (known as specificity.) Meanwhile, Premier Biotech’s test has sensitivity of 80.3% and specificity of 99.5%.
Though the coronavirus has temporarily reshaped the world we live in and set into place a “new normal,” the pandemic could also have major lasting effects on the way we go about our day-to-day months, or even years, down the road. For example, Avio Interiors, an Italy-based airline design firm, just proposed a new plan for “reverse” airplane seats, which could become the new way to fly in a post-pandemic world.
The design, called “Janus” after the two-faced Roman god, is a new take on the three-seater plan. Rather than all three seats facing toward the front of the plane, the Janus design proposes that the middle seat face backward. This ensures “maximum isolation between passengers seated next to each other,” as Avio Interiors explains in a April 20 Instagram post.
Whether we like it or not, masks are the new normal at least for the foreseeable future. It is now a universal guideline that everyone has to wear a mask when they step out. Designers, architects, fashion brands all over the world are using their software, laser cutters and 3D printers to make mask production faster (mass-k production, get it?) to fight shortages. New York-based designer Joe Doucet envisions the face shield creatively and takes it from being a symbol of our toughest days to a seamless part of our everyday fashion. When asked what influenced him to create the conceptual face shield, it was this question – how do we encourage the mass adoption of an unwanted necessity?
Due to the longterm effects of COVID-19 on our lives, the way we dress and interact will evolve. Till a vaccine is available globally, we will be governed by the laws of social distancing, and wearing PPE is crucial for our safety and of those around us. Studies show that visors & face shields are more effective than surgical masks but happen to be uncomfortable and obtrusive-looking. The ability to adapt and evolve are also the pillars of good design, so Doucet has designed a face shield that people will actually want to wear instead of feeling awkward or conscious about it. Just like everyone, Doucet is also in quarantine and has been learning new 3D design tools, he says “I modeled these in Fusion 360 and rendered in Blender, no photoshoots happening these days.”
Google exec says science drives decision to return to offices
Elon Musk wants people to return to work. Google and Facebook Inc. have another message for their staff: get ready to stay home for all of 2020.
Sundar Pichai, chief executive officer of Google and its parent, Alphabet Inc., told employees on Thursday to prepare to work remotely through October and possibly to the end of the year, according to people familiar with the decision. A spokeswoman confirmed that the majority of staff is expected to work from home until 2021.
Two weeks ago, Pichai wrote an email to his workforce that said some offices would open as soon as June. On Friday, Pichai told employees only about 10% to 15% of the workers would be on-site in June, with more returns varying by division and location, according to an internal memo. About 5% of employees now are working in Google offices, Pichai said. CNBC reported earlier on the memo. Most of the workforce won’t return until at least the end of October, according to the people, who asked not to be identified because they weren’t authorized to speak publicly.
On Thursday, Facebook told employees that they can work remotely through 2020 if they like. The social media company doesn’t expect to open most offices until July 6 at the earliest.
