News

French President to “hassle” the unvaccinated as cases hit records

Published

2 years ago

January 5, 2022

As COVID cases surge across the world amid Omicron, French President Emmanuel Macron has warned he intends to make life difficult for people in France who haven’t yet been vaccinated

The French President revealed he will increase pressure on those that hav not yet received a jab as his government acts swiftly to avoid outbreaks seen within other nations like the UK and US.

“I really want to hassle them, and we will continue to do this – to the end,” he told France’s Le Parisien newspaper.

The opposition however has responded, with political opponents stating that the strong language the President has used within the interview was not worthy of a president.

His comments came as a bill on COVID-19 passes was delayed by opposition MPs uniting against the government.

A debate in parliament on the bill, which would bar the unvaccinated from much of public life, was prevented from continuing after midnight.

The legislation was expected to be approved in a vote this week, but it has angered vaccine opponents and several French MPs have said they have received death threats over the issue.

France has one of the highest vaccination rates within Europe, with around 90 percent of the adult population fully vaccinated against the virus.

In his interview with Le Parisien on Tuesday, Mr Macron said that while he would not “vaccinate by force”, he hoped to encourage people to get jabbed by “limiting as much as possible their access to activities in social life”.

France has been requesting people to show either proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test in order to access many public venues.

But the French government wants to remove the option to show a negative test in response to record increases in infections, driven by the highly contagious Omicron and Delta variants of the coronavirus.

On Tuesday, the country reported 271,686 new daily Covid cases – the highest number of daily infections recorded in France since the start of the pandemic.

News

President Biden signs TikTok bill – what’s next?

Published

9 hours ago

April 26, 2024

ticker NEWS

TikTok users could soon find that the popular social media service is either under new ownership or could be outright banned in the United States.

President Joe Biden signed a bill into law that requires TikTok to find a new owner—or face a ban in the United States.

Over the past several months, Washington D.C. has been under pressure to ban the popular Chinese-owned social media app.

Lawmakers and security experts have long raised concerns that the Chinese government could tap TikTok’s trove of personal data about millions of U.S. users.

TikTok’s CEO said the bill is disappointing and reiterated that the company has committed to challenge it.

David Zhang from China Insider. joins Veronica Dudo to discuss

News

Threading the needle: Meta’s new platform finally dethrones X

Published

11 hours ago

April 26, 2024

ticker NEWS

Threads, the social media platform owned by Meta, is gaining traction with a surge in daily active users, outpacing X in the U.S.

With Threads averaging 28 million daily active users compared to X’s 22 million, Meta’s ambitions to reach a billion users seem within reach despite a slowdown in growth. While X still boasts 550 million monthly active users globally, Threads’ focus on user experience and avoidance of real-time and political content could position it as a formidable competitor moving forward.

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Zendaya is serving in saucy sports drama “Challengers”

Published

12 hours ago

April 26, 2024

ticker NEWS

This weekend’s entertainment lineup has something for everyone.

Apple TV+ brings “Sugar,” a drama set in New York City, while “Civil War” offers historical intensity.

“Challengers” with Zendaya brings a saucy sport drama to life, and superhero buffs can catch the trailer for “Deadpool and Wolverine” for action-packed fun.

With options spanning drama, history, reality, and superheroes, there’s excitement in store for all this weekend.