Week #7 {December 28, '20}

Articles written by Ananya Nayar and Misaki Tomiyama, Website edited by Misaki Tomiyama

Articles for this week-

World News-

• UK’s Covid Protocols

• Covid Restrictions During the Christmas Season in Sydney

• Bombing in Nashville, Tennessee

India News-

• Covaxin goes through Trial 3

Other Articles-

• What are animal rights?

• Entertainment for the Holidays!!

• This Week in History

• This Day Signifies...

UK’s Covid Protocols

By Ananya Nayar

Earlier this month, Britain went into a new set of restrictions- called Tier 4 that has been placed in London. This new restriction put an end on everyone’s holiday plans for the winter. On Sunday 20th December, other European countries like France, Italy, Spain banned travels to the UK whether it was by air, the English channel or road. Due to this, many Europeans and British residents were stranded in different areas of Europe. The rest of the world, including India, caught on and have stopped travel to and fro from the UK.

On Monday, the popular grocery store ‘Sainsbury’s’ said that there would be a food shortage due to travel restrictions and food supplying trucks containing salad leaves, fruit and veg being stranded in different areas of the continent.

Restrictions during the Christmas season in Sydney

By Misaki Tomiyama

Australia with a total of 28,296 cases and 908 deaths (as of December 27, '20), has enforced stricter covid restrictions regarding gatherings in Sydney during the Christmas season.

Australia has been one of the few countries which has responded swiftly to the coronavirus pandemic this year. They have conducted many tests and enforced several lockdowns in hotspot areas (A coronavirus hotspot is an area in a district where six or more people have been tested positive of coronavirus infection -Times of India). Other restrictions made by the authorities include applying travel restrictions, continuing border surveillance, screening travellers coming into Australia and making sure they have a quarantine etc.

During the Christmas season, Sydneysiders will be able to have 10 adult visitors in their homes, and children could be added on top of that (between 24-26 December). Authorities have conducted more tests- over 124,000, trying to curb a wave of covid cases in the major cities.

The authorities in Australia have also enforced a lockdown in Australia's northern Beaches regions, as an outbreak was discovered there. Mask-wearing in public was encouraged however, people were discouraged from visiting nursing homes during this period to restrain the spread of virus.

Bombing in Nashville, Tennessee

By Misaki Tomiyama

Image from BBC

On Christmas morning, there was an explosion in Nashville, Tennessee. According to a witness of the incident, there were repeated gunshots that were fired at around 5 am, Tennessee time. The police had arrived, and there was a white RV parked outside, and a computerised voice warned the people on that scene to "evacuate now". The blast occurred at 6:30 am, injuring three people, and damaging a lot of buildings in that area.

Investigators claimed that they had found human tissues near the site, and investigation on this incident and the people related to this is going on. There has been no announcement of whether or not people have died, or who planned this incident. However, many suspect that this was a suicide bombing.

Covaxin goes through Trial 3

By Ananya Nayar

India’s ingenious Bharat BioTech vaccine has successfully recruited 50% of the volunteers required. The Covid vaccine being developed - ‘Covaxin’ started their Phase-3 clinical trials during November, and have reached 13,000 contributors, and are looking for 26,000 participants in total. Covaxin had previously been assessed on 1,000 people and promised immunity and safety in the two previous trials.

The topic of the Week: What are Animal Rights?

By Ananya Nayar

What are animal rights? Now, before we dive into this topic let’s see what human rights are. Human rights are basically the norms that describe human behaviour and are protected by law. They’re the basic freedoms that everybody should be allowed to have- like freedom of speech, right to life, social, cultural and economic rights, right to food, right to work, right to education and more. Basically, what everybody should receive without conditions.

However, animals have rights too. Animals are entitled to their own existence and their basic interests and requirements, and humans should understand this and not come in breach of this agreement and norm. Animal rights is a social movement, and the idea that animals should not be treated badly or suffer in any way.

Some animal rights are that animals should not be experimented on, this has been a major problem in the past that animals, rodents and monkeys especially have been used in laboratories to see if vaccines or certain medicines work.

Another is no hunting or poaching, or killing animals for food, clothes or medicine. Like how humans have the right to freedom and life, so do animals.

It is illegal to poach animals for skin for clothing- zebra skin, crocodile prints, cheetah and tiger skin have all been used as fashion “trends” in the past and later became illegal in most areas of the world since it breaches animal rights and caused many species numbers to plummet and almost become endangered or extinct. Up to this date, billions of animals a year are caged or killed for their feathers, skin, leather, wool, all for fashion.

Did you know that letting animals live actually helps solve the climate crisis we are facing? When animals are raised well, and provided with basic needs they often reduce environmental damage by nurturing soil and can actually help cut greenhouse gases emissions.

Many animal rights organisations have appeared, such as the World Animal Protection Organisation, Humane Society of the United States and more. These organisations are valid and crucial because they not only raise awareness about animal cruelty in the world, they provide and donate for a better livelihood for all animals. These organisations have created animal hospitals free of charge to heal, they make sure all animals are being treated with justice and get food. They also make sure animals are free of any chances of being used for entertainment, food, fashion, scientific advancements and being kept as exotic pets.

Holiday Entertainment Pack:

Since most schools are on the winter holiday break we’ve curated some games to play during your break while staying home and staying safe!

Monopoly:

I think many will agree when we say Monopoly is the best competitive board game! It can last for hours on end and at the same time is very entertaining and productive! You’ll always want to play! Most people have the game at home, but you can get it off amazon quickly, there are many versions of the game so choose which one you want to play. Monopoly is a classic time pass and is fun for all ages. The game is all about strategy and improves your logical thinking too, it teaches you about negotiation, economic inequality, about loans, taxes, property ownership, financial basics and also improves math skills! It’s a win-win! In this, players roll the dice to move spaces around the board- buying, lending, selling, renting, trading properties as they go. Players collect rent from their opponents and the goal of the game is to try to survive and not end up bankrupt. This game will be so fun to cheer up this stay home holiday season!

Scrabble:

This is another must-have board game, it’s perfect for children just starting to write too! This family board game is a classic word game, and very easy to find on online sites! In Scrabble, you collect points by making words from the seven tiles you get each round, you add letters onto letters or words already on the board, and collect more points depending on the letters you choose, how long your word is or if you place a letter on a place on the board where you can get more points! For example, the ‘triple letter’ tile on the board will make my letter ‘A’ worth one point in my word, worth 3 points! The game involves deep thinking and it is very competitive too!

Cluedo:

Cluedo is a family board game that requires logical thinking, strategy and in a way- perseverance. It is a mystery, crime-solving, deduction game, and the aim of the game is to find who the killer is during the game. It can take hours to play too, the game has 3-6 players investigating a murder by collecting evidence and narrowing down possibilities of the murderer on the way. There is one winner, who uses elimination to find out what happened, the answers are in an envelope.

This Week In History:

By Ananya Nayar

On the 22nd of December 1956, Colo, a baby Gorilla, was the first to be born in captivity. He weighed around 4 pounds and was a western lowland Gorilla. Colo was also the oldest Gorilla to this date, and sadly passed in 2017.

Dutch Painter Vincent Van Gogh, chopped off part of his lower left ear during the period when he was very depressed and suffering with mental health issues. This happened on the 23rd of December 1888, and Van Gogh documented the incident later where he depicted himself in a self portrait with an injured ear painted. The painting was called ‘Self Portrait with Bandaged Ear.’

On the 24th of December 1979, the Soviet Union (consisting of 15 different countries including Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and Moldova) invaded Afghanistan. They put President Amin to death and replaced him with their own leader- President Babrak Karmal.

25th of December is known as Christmas day (you may read more about this date on the ‘This Day Signifies…’ column.) On Christmas day in 1914, there was the event of the ‘Christmas Truce.’ Just after midnight on Christmas morning, most of the German troops participating in World War 1 put down their arms, guns and artillery and began to sing Christmas carols. Majority of German soldiers made their way to no-man's land at the crack of dawn to wish Merry Christmas to the other allies in their respective native tongues. The Christmas Truce occurred 5 months after the outbreak of the war.

Christmas; it’s significance and why it is celebrated.

By Misaki Tomiyama

Christmas, celebrated annually on December 25th, is a religious holiday loved by people worldwide. On this day, many people put up a Christmas tree, watch Christmas movies, get gifts, decorate their homes and much more. It is celebrated to honor the birth of Jesus. However, the exact date of the birth of Jesus is unknown. Many believe that the Church had chosen to celebrate the birth of Jesus on the 25th because it was the same day as the "Saturnalia", or the ancient Roman festival of Saturn. The exact year people started to celebrate Christmas is still unclear, however, there is evidence that people in Rome celebrated Christmas from 336 AD, when Rome was under the rule of Constantine.

Christmas is an important day for Christians as they celebrate the birth of Christ, who Christians believe as the son of god, or god himself. He is the foundation of he Christian faith, and celebrating his birth on Christmas is extremely important and significant for Christians.