TEL AVIV, ISRAEL —
When it comes to fighting the coronavirus, Israel is discovering the limits of vaccines.
The country famous for its high-tech prowess and spirit of innovation is home to the world’s speediest vaccination drive, fueled from the top by national pride and a deep longing to start “getting back to life,” as Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu put it.
But experts say reopening the country will still take months, complicated by coronavirus mutations that have spread from Britain and South Africa, a refusal among some sectors to adhere to safety rules and wobbles in the pace of vaccinations of people under 60.
While the government is expected to begin easing a third nationwide lockdown in the coming days, there are likely to be further, partial closings as the threat ebbs and flows.
“This is going to be a balancing act,” said Eyal Leshem, director of the Center for Travel Medicine and Tropical Diseases at Sheba Medical Center.
In an impressive feat, more than a third of Israel’s 9.3 million people have received at least one shot in mere weeks, and over 1.9 million have gotten both doses, perhaps putting the country on track to inoculate nearly its entire adult population by the end of March.
Alongside the praise for its speed, Israel has come under global criticism for excluding Palestinians in the Israeli-occupied West Bank and the blockaded Gaza Strip. The situation has drawn attention to the global disparity in access to vaccines between rich and poor countries.
Rights groups say Israel has the obligation as an occupying power to vaccinate Palestinians. Israel denies having such a responsibility, and says its priority is its own citizens. Nevertheless, Israel this week for the first time transferred 5,000 doses of the Moderna vaccine to the Palestinian Authority to inoculate medical workers.
In Israel, for the first time, researchers are starting to see the effects of the vaccinations, giving other nations a very early glimpse of what might lie ahead for them.
Netanyahu on Thursday said that among people over 60, the first group vaccinated, serious cases of hospitalizations have dropped 26% and confirmed infections have fallen 45% over the past 16 days.
“This is a direct result of the vaccinations,” he said. “The vaccines work.”
But other key indicators, including deaths and new infections, remain high, in part because of the fast-spreading mutations and the month-long lag time before the vaccine shows its full benefits.
Israel has been reporting some 7,000 new infections a day, one of the highest rates in the developed world. Nearly 5,000 people have died, more than a quarter of them in January alone.
Israel has certain advantages that suggest its success at vaccinations may not be easily duplicated elsewhere. It is small, with 9.3 million people. It has a centralized and digitized system of health care, delivered through just four HMOs. And its leader, Netanyahu, has made the vaccination drive a centerpiece of his bid for reelection in March, personally negotiating deals with the CEOs of Pfizer and Moderna.
Still, experts around the world are watching eagerly.
“Israel’s aggressive inoculation program demonstrates that it is indeed possible for a country to get vaccines into people’s arms quickly and efficiently,” said Jonathan Crane, a bioethicist at Emory University in Atlanta. In an email, he praised the centralized effort, compared with the “piecemeal” way vaccines in countries like the U.S. are being delivered by various jurisdictions.
Even with these early signs of success, it’s increasingly clear that there will be no pandemic day-after, a celebratory moment when people are cleared to flood back to work, hold large family gatherings or resume the social lives they once knew.
Reopening will depend on many factors, including efforts to halt the spread of the highly contagious variants and whether the public takes the proper precautions. Many Israelis were horrified this week by scenes of big ultra-Orthodox funerals for two revered rabbis, with most mourners mask-free.
Some parts of the population, including the Arab and ultra-Orthodox sectors and younger adults, have shown an apparent reluctance to get vaccinated, which could also hinder the effort to achieve “herd immunity” and stop the virus.
“All of Europe is waiting for the vaccines, and here people don’t want to get vaccinated?” Sara Baruch said after receiving her second dose on Wednesday in Tel Aviv. “It’s strange.”
She said it is a “big mistake” if the trend continues: “We won’t be able to go on a holiday and to go back to normal life we had before.”
The vaccination campaign has become a feature of pop culture and a point of national pride. Israelis proudly post photos on social media showing themselves getting vaccinated, and one HMO serves cappuccinos afterward so people can be monitored for side effects before they leave.
Experts have recommended a gradual reopening of the country, though political leaders will make the final decision. Closings and reopenings, experts say, will be a cost-benefit analysis that will change according to the course of the outbreak and the state of the economy.
Dr. Nadav Davidovitch, a member of a government advisory panel, said young children along with vaccinated high school students over 16 should be allowed to return to school in the first stage, and only teachers who have been inoculated should be in class. Street shops and restaurants might open for takeout only, followed in later stages by malls and cultural events opened only to people who have been vaccinated.
He said steps should be staggered every two weeks, with a constant eye on infection rates, testing and more vaccinations. Indoor and outdoor public gatherings should continue to be limited for a while, he said. Social distancing and masks will be required for the foreseeable future.
“It will be very gradual in the coming months,” said Davidovitch, director of the school of public health at Israel’s Ben-Gurion University. “Vaccinations are very important, but they are not going to solve all the problems.”
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Associated Press writers Josef Federman, Isaac Scharf and Ilan Ben Zion contributed.
TOKYO (AP) — Japanese technology group SoftBank swung back to profitability in the July-September quarter, boosted by positive results in its Vision Fund investments.
Tokyo-based SoftBank Group Corp. reported Tuesday a fiscal second quarter profit of nearly 1.18 trillion yen ($7.7 billion), compared with a 931 billion yen loss in the year-earlier period.
Quarterly sales edged up about 6% to nearly 1.77 trillion yen ($11.5 billion).
SoftBank credited income from royalties and licensing related to its holdings in Arm, a computer chip-designing company, whose business spans smartphones, data centers, networking equipment, automotive, consumer electronic devices, and AI applications.
The results were also helped by the absence of losses related to SoftBank’s investment in office-space sharing venture WeWork, which hit the previous fiscal year.
WeWork, which filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in 2023, emerged from Chapter 11 in June.
SoftBank has benefitted in recent months from rising share prices in some investment, such as U.S.-based e-commerce company Coupang, Chinese mobility provider DiDi Global and Bytedance, the Chinese developer of TikTok.
SoftBank’s financial results tend to swing wildly, partly because of its sprawling investment portfolio that includes search engine Yahoo, Chinese retailer Alibaba, and artificial intelligence company Nvidia.
SoftBank makes investments in a variety of companies that it groups together in a series of Vision Funds.
The company’s founder, Masayoshi Son, is a pioneer in technology investment in Japan. SoftBank Group does not give earnings forecasts.
Shopify Inc. executives brushed off concerns that incoming U.S. President Donald Trump will be a major detriment to many of the company’s merchants.
“There’s nothing in what we’ve heard from Trump, nor would there have been anything from (Democratic candidate) Kamala (Harris), which we think impacts the overall state of new business formation and entrepreneurship,” Shopify’s chief financial officer Jeff Hoffmeister told analysts on a call Tuesday.
“We still feel really good about all the merchants out there, all the entrepreneurs that want to start new businesses and that’s obviously not going to change with the administration.”
Hoffmeister’s comments come a week after Trump, a Republican businessman, trounced Harris in an election that will soon return him to the Oval Office.
On the campaign trail, he threatened to impose tariffs of 60 per cent on imports from China and roughly 10 per cent to 20 per cent on goods from all other countries.
If the president-elect makes good on the promise, many worry the cost of operating will soar for companies, including customers of Shopify, which sells e-commerce software to small businesses but also brands as big as Kylie Cosmetics and Victoria’s Secret.
These merchants may feel they have no choice but to pass on the increases to customers, perhaps sparking more inflation.
If Trump’s tariffs do come to fruition, Shopify’s president Harley Finkelstein pointed out China is “not a huge area” for Shopify.
However, “we can’t anticipate what every presidential administration is going to do,” he cautioned.
He likened the uncertainty facing the business community to the COVID-19 pandemic where Shopify had to help companies migrate online.
“Our job is no matter what comes the way of our merchants, we provide them with tools and service and support for them to navigate it really well,” he said.
Finkelstein was questioned about the forthcoming U.S. leadership change on a call meant to delve into Shopify’s latest earnings, which sent shares soaring 27 per cent to $158.63 shortly after Tuesday’s market open.
The Ottawa-based company, which keeps its books in U.S. dollars, reported US$828 million in net income for its third quarter, up from US$718 million in the same quarter last year, as its revenue rose 26 per cent.
Revenue for the period ended Sept. 30 totalled US$2.16 billion, up from US$1.71 billion a year earlier.
Subscription solutions revenue reached US$610 million, up from US$486 million in the same quarter last year.
Merchant solutions revenue amounted to US$1.55 billion, up from US$1.23 billion.
Shopify’s net income excluding the impact of equity investments totalled US$344 million for the quarter, up from US$173 million in the same quarter last year.
Daniel Chan, a TD Cowen analyst, said the results show Shopify has a leadership position in the e-commerce world and “a continued ability to gain market share.”
In its outlook for its fourth quarter of 2024, the company said it expects revenue to grow at a mid-to-high-twenties percentage rate on a year-over-year basis.
“Q4 guidance suggests Shopify will finish the year strong, with better-than-expected revenue growth and operating margin,” Chan pointed out in a note to investors.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
TORONTO – RioCan Real Estate Investment Trust says it has cut almost 10 per cent of its staff as it deals with a slowdown in the condo market and overall pushes for greater efficiency.
The company says the cuts, which amount to around 60 employees based on its last annual filing, will mean about $9 million in restructuring charges and should translate to about $8 million in annualized cash savings.
The job cuts come as RioCan and others scale back condo development plans as the market softens, but chief executive Jonathan Gitlin says the reductions were from a companywide efficiency effort.
RioCan says it doesn’t plan to start any new construction of mixed-use properties this year and well into 2025 as it adjusts to the shifting market demand.
The company reported a net income of $96.9 million in the third quarter, up from a loss of $73.5 million last year, as it saw a $159 million boost from a favourable change in the fair value of investment properties.
RioCan reported what it says is a record-breaking 97.8 per cent occupancy rate in the quarter including retail committed occupancy of 98.6 per cent.
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 12, 2024.
