The U.N. Secretary-General warned Tuesday that the coronavirus pandemic has caused the largest disruption to education in history and risks creating a “generational catastrophe” if governments do not make education a priority.  “Now we face a generational catastrophe that could waste untold human potential, undermine decades of progress and exacerbate entrenched inequalities,” António Guterres said in a video message.In this file photo taken on Feb. 8, 2020, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres speaks during a press conference at the African Union headquarters.Before the virus began multiplying across the globe, more than 250 million school-age children were out of school. That number soared to over a billion by mid-July, as 160 countries closed schools in a bid to slow the virus’s spread.   Children and babies have developed COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, but many have no symptoms. Those that do get ill tend to have more mild symptoms and do not require hospitalization. However, there have been some fatalities. Scientists also caution that children can transmit the virus to adults.     But as children stay home from school in massive numbers, the United Nations warns that the economic impact of the pandemic could mean that almost 24 million young people may drop out or not have access to school next year.  “We are at a defining moment for the world’s children and young people,” Guterres said. “The decisions that governments and partners take now will have lasting impact on hundreds of millions of young people, and on the development prospects of countries for decades to come.”Students wear face masks as a preventive measure against the spread of the COVID-19 coronavirus in their classroom at the Jean Benoit College in Yaoundé, Cameroon, on June 1, 2020.He urged governments to prioritize education funding in COVID-19 recovery plans, as well as to target those most at risk of losing out on education, including young girls, the disabled, minority groups and persons in emergency situations, such as refugees. “Once local transmission of COVID-19 is under control, getting students back into schools and learning institutions as safely as possible must be a top priority,” the U.N. chief said. “It will be essential to balance health risks against risks to children’s education and protection, and to factor in the impact on women’s labor force participation.”A teacher screens students as schools begin to reopen after the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) lockdown in Cape Town, July 24, 2020.Guterres urged governments to seize the opportunity that the pandemic has presented to reimagine education and build it back in a forward-looking manner, including investing in digital infrastructure.  “As the world faces unsustainable levels of inequality, we need education — the great equalizer — more than ever,” he said. “We must take bold steps now to create inclusive, resilient, quality education systems fit for the future.”  To that end, an international coalition that includes U.N. agencies, NGOs dedicated to children and education, as well international and regional financial institutions, are launching a “Save our Future” campaign. It aims to harness momentum and political will for education as a critical component of pandemic recovery.    
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Egypt is reopening churches for the first time in nearly four months, after a major decline in the number of recorded coronavirus cases in recent days. The number of new cases is also down in Sudan, while Libya, Tunisia and Algeria have been witnessing an increase.Worshippers gathered for the first church service in nearly four months in Egypt’s historic port city of Alexandria. Authorities reopened churches across the country on Monday.Those attending appeared to abide by strict safety rules regarding social distancing and the use of face masks.Mosques are open on weekdays but remain closed for Friday prayers and major holidays.Egypt’s Health Ministry indicated Sunday that there were just 167 new cases during the previous 24 hours and only 31 deaths. Figures for new cases have fallen dramatically in recent days, prompting the government to relax a number of restrictions.Neighboring Sudan has also witnessed a relative drop in the number of cases in recent days with under 100 new cases per day for most of the past week.Nearby Libya, however, is witnessing a rise in the number of new infections, according to Arab media.Libyan news channel 218TV reported that the Islamist militia-dominated port city of Misrata has been placed under curfew by authorities after six people died of COVID-19 over the weekend. Arab media reports say that mercenaries from outside Libya have been entering the country through Misrata. COVID-19 is the disease caused by the coronavirus.Children wear protective face masks as they look at clothes in a shop ahead of the Eid al-Adha celebrations amid the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic, in Misrata, Libya, July 28, 2020.Paul Sullivan, who is a professor at the National Defense University in Washington, told VOA that he thinks the recent increase in the number of cases in Libya “is likely due in part to the movement of mercenaries into the country.”He added that in periods of conflict, “social distancing takes a back seat, particularly if you are a mercenary who is not part of the community.”Meanwhile, Algeria, with a population of about 44 million people, has seen a rise in the number of cases to more than 600 a day in recent days, double the number of infections from just a month ago. The European Union suspended travel from Algeria to the EU last week due to the increase.Said Sadek, well-known Egyptian political sociologist who is now in Tunisia, told VOA that he thinks there has been a rise in the number of coronavirus infections in Tunisia and other parts of north Africa, “because many people began relaxing their behavior after the number of cases dropped.” He added, “Many family members visit from France and other parts of Europe, bringing the virus back with them.”Saudi TV reported that there were “no reported cases of COVID-19” among those who participated in this year’s annual hajj, or Islamic pilgrimage. Saudi Information Minister Majed al Qasseri noted that “the extensive spread of the coronavirus and its clear danger to humanity forced Saudi Arabia to seriously limit the number of people attending this year’s pilgrimage.” 
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Norway says it will stop all cruise ships with more than 100 people on board from disembarking at Norwegian ports after a coronavirus outbreak on a vessel left 41 people infected.  Health Minister Bent Hoie announced the ban Monday, saying the new rules will apply for the next 14 days. He said ships that have already departed will be able to offload passengers and crew at Norwegian ports but that no new journeys can take place.   “The pandemic is not over,” Hoie told a news conference. Norway’s Hurtigruten cruise line apologized Monday following the outbreak on one of its ships, the MS Roald Amundsen. “We have failed,” CEO Daniel Skjeldam told a news conference. “I apologize strongly on behalf of the company.” He said the company would suspend its cruises until further notice and that it is “now in the process of a full review of all procedures.” The cruise line was one of the first companies to resume sailing during the pandemic. Four crew members on board the MS Roald Amundsen were hospitalized on Friday when the ship arrived at Tromsoe, north of the Arctic Circle. They were later diagnosed with the infection along with another 31 crew members. Passengers aboard the ship were allowed to disembark before anyone had been diagnosed, sending local officials scrambling to locate them. At least five passengers have now tested positive and hundreds more have been told to self-isolate for 10 days. The cruise ship industry has been devastated by the coronavirus pandemic, with ships worldwide shutting down in March after several high-profile outbreaks at sea.  
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Egypt’s minister of international cooperation has extended an invitation to SpaceX CEO Elon Musk after a Musk post on Twitter that the pyramids were built by extraterrestrial beings.  Musk tweeted Saturday: “Aliens built the pyramids obv.” Aliens built the pyramids obv— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) A camel in front of the Pyramids at Giza, Egypt, July 13, 2013. (A. Arabasadi/VOA)Egypt Today reports on its website that famed Egyptian archaeologist Zahi Hawass also weighed in on the topic on social media, saying that Musk’s tweet was a “complete hallucination.” Hawass added that he had “found the tombs of the pyramids builders that tell everyone that the builders of the pyramids are Egyptians and they were not slaves.”  He said ancient Egypt’s pyramid building was “a national project of the whole nation.” Musk had an apparent change of mind and eventually provided a link on his Twitter account about the building of pyramids.  He tweeted: “This BBC article provides a sensible summary of how it was done.” 
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Two U.S. astronauts returned to Earth on Sunday, splashing safely into the Gulf of Mexico after a two-month mission to the International Space Station aboard the commercially developed SpaceX spacecraft Crew Dragon.Astronauts Robert Behnken and Douglas Hurley landed at midafternoon off the western coast of Florida, avoiding the dangers of Tropical Storm Isaias moving along the Atlantic Ocean coast of the southern state.The two men had lifted off to space from Florida in May, the first NASA astronaut launch from U.S. soil since 2011 and the first time a commercially developed spacecraft had carried humans into orbit.Hurley and Behnken, both married to astronauts, departed the International Space Station on Saturday night. They awoke to a recording of their young children urging them to “rise and shine” and “we can’t wait to see you.””Don’t worry, you can sleep in tomorrow,” said Behnken’s 6-year-old son, Theo, who was promised a puppy after the flight. “Hurry home so we can go get my dog.”The Dragon capsule slowed from an orbital speed of 28,000 kph to 560 during reentry into the atmosphere and finally to 24 kph at splashdown.In this frame grab from NASA TV, the SpaceX Dragon capsule splashes down Aug. 2, 2020, in the Gulf of Mexico.More than 40 staff were on a SpaceX recovery ship, including doctors and nurses who planned to examine the two astronauts.  NASA astronauts last returned from space to water on July 24, 1975, in the Pacific, the scene of most splashdowns.Until the SpaceX launch, the U.S. had relied in recent years on Russian rockets to send its astronauts to the space station. The private company is planning its next launch near the end of September, sending four astronauts to the space station for six months. 
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Who gets to be first in line for a COVID-19 vaccine? U.S. health authorities hope by late next month to have some draft guidance on how to ration initial doses, but it’s a vexing decision.”Not everybody’s going to like the answer,” Dr. Francis Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health, recently told one of the advisory groups the government asked to help decide. “There will be many people who feel that they should have been at the top of the list.”Traditionally, first in line for a scarce vaccine are health workers and the people most vulnerable to the targeted infection.But Collins tossed new ideas into the mix: Consider geography and give priority to people where an outbreak is hitting hardest.And don’t forget volunteers in the final stage of vaccine testing who get dummy shots, the comparison group needed to tell if the real shots truly work.”We owe them … some special priority,” Collins said.Huge studies this summer aim to prove which of several experimental COVID-19 vaccines are safe and effective. Moderna Inc. and Pfizer Inc. began tests last week that eventually will include 30,000 volunteers each; in the next few months, equally large calls for volunteers will go out to test shots made by AstraZeneca, Johnson & Johnson and Novavax. And some vaccines made in China are in smaller late-stage studies in other countries.For all the promises of the U.S. stockpiling millions of doses, the hard truth: Even if a vaccine is declared safe and effective by year’s end, there won’t be enough for everyone who wants it right away — especially as most potential vaccines require two doses.It’s a global dilemma. The World Health Organization is grappling with the same who-goes-first question as it tries to ensure vaccines are fairly distributed to poor countries — decisions made even harder as wealthy nations corner the market for the first doses.In the U.S., the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, a group established by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, is supposed to recommend who to vaccinate and when — advice that the government almost always follows.But a COVID-19 vaccine decision is so tricky that this time around, ethicists and vaccine experts from the National Academy of Medicine, chartered by Congress to advise the government, are being asked to weigh in, too.Setting priorities will require “creative, moral common sense,” said Bill Foege, who devised the vaccination strategy that led to global eradication of smallpox. Foege is co-leading the academy’s deliberations, calling it “both this opportunity and this burden.”With vaccine misinformation abounding and fears that politics might intrude, CDC Director Robert Redfield said the public must see vaccine allocation as “equitable, fair and transparent.”How to decide? The CDC’s opening suggestion: First vaccinate 12 million of the most critical health, national security and other essential workers. Next would be 110 million people at high risk from the coronavirus — those over 65 who live in long-term care facilities, or those of any age who are in poor health — or who also are deemed essential workers. The general population would come later.CDC’s vaccine advisers wanted to know who’s really essential. “I wouldn’t consider myself a critical health care worker,” admitted Dr. Peter Szilagyi, a pediatrician at the University of California, Los Angeles.Indeed, the risks for health workers today are far different than in the pandemic’s early days. Now, health workers in COVID-19 treatment units often are the best protected; others may be more at risk, committee members noted.Beyond the health and security fields, does “essential” mean poultry plant workers or schoolteachers? And what if the vaccine doesn’t work as well among vulnerable populations as among younger, healthier people? It’s a real worry, given that older people’s immune systems don’t rev up as well to flu vaccine.With Black, Latino and Native American populations disproportionately hit by the coronavirus, failing to address that diversity means “whatever comes out of our group will be looked at very suspiciously,” said ACIP chairman Dr. Jose Romero, Arkansas’ interim health secretary.Consider the urban poor who live in crowded conditions, have less access to health care and can’t work from home like more privileged Americans, added Dr. Sharon Frey of St. Louis University.And it may be worth vaccinating entire families rather than trying to single out just one high-risk person in a household, said Dr. Henry Bernstein of Northwell Health.Whoever gets to go first, a mass vaccination campaign while people are supposed to be keeping their distance is a tall order. During the 2009 swine flu pandemic, families waited in long lines in parking lots and at health departments when their turn came up, crowding that authorities know they must avoid this time around.Operation Warp Speed, the Trump administration’s effort to speed vaccine manufacturing and distribution, is working out how to rapidly transport the right number of doses to wherever vaccinations are set to occur.Drive-through vaccinations, pop-up clinics and other innovative ideas are all on the table, said CDC’s Dr. Nancy Messonnier.As soon as a vaccine is declared effective, “we want to be able the next day, frankly, to start these programs,” Messonnier said. “It’s a long road.” 
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