Facebook under fire for allowing drug, beer ads that target children below 17
Teenagers on Facebook can be targeted by adverts endorsing alcohol, drugs, gambling, smoking and eating disorders, according to a report by a watchdog group. The Tech Transparency Project created six test adverts and submitted them to Facebook, saying it wanted to reach users aged 13 to 17. Facebook approved all...
People will die, but what is the tolerable ‘new normal’ in a post-Covid world?
On April 24, Perth in Western Australia entered a snap three-day lockdown when two people tested positive for SARS-CoV-2 – the first community infections recorded outside hotel quarantine in the state in more than a year. Pubs, gyms and playgrounds shut, remembrance-day services were cancelled and people were confined to...
US support for Covid vaccines patent waivers kicks off fierce resistance
In a historic move, the US government has announced that it supports waiving patent protections for Covid-19 vaccines, a measure aimed at boosting supplies so that people around the world can get the shots. “The extraordinary circumstances of the Covid-19 pandemic call for extraordinary measures,” US trade representative Katherine Tai...
Olympics: Starved of action, Kenyan and South African rugby teams train together
Rugby Africa has embarked on preparation African teams that will represent the continent in the Tokyo Olympic Games by organising a training camp in South Africa. The preparations under #AficaAsOne campaign involve South Africa and Kenya, which have already qualified for the games, while Zimbabwe and Uganda will be using...
How South Africans who lost jobs since onset of Covid struggle to rebuild lives
Some 40 kilometres outside Cape Town, Leebah Bessick wipes sweat from her forehead as she digs a pitchfork into the earth at a neighbourhood community garden. It’s an unseasonably hot day at Blackheath Secondary School and even a shady corner of the garden offers Bessick and fellow gardeners little comfort...
ICC finds ex-Uganda’s LRA commander guilty of 61 crimes against humanity
Former Ugandan rebel leader facing charges of genocide and crimes against humanity the International Criminal Court (ICC), Mr Dominic Ongwen, was today May 6 sentenced to 25 years in prison following trial judgment in which the Trial Chamber IX found him guilty for a total of 61 crimes. Ongwen, who...
Tanzanian president dazzles Kenyans, resets creaky EAC trade and diplomatic ties
Not before has a Tanzanian president caught the attention and dazzled Kenyans as did the newly installed President Samia Suluhu Hassan during her maiden two-day tour, effortlessly pulling off a diplomatic coup that at the end of her visit endeared her to her hosts whose perception of her predecessors was...
Even in darkest realms of life, ‘Black and brown people are fetishes or body parts’
When Johnnie Keyes starred in Behind the Green Door, one of the first mainstream American adult films to feature a Black performer, he was credited merely as “African Stud.” It was 1972 and his co-performer Marilyn Chambers was a white woman, an influential casting decision that earned the film the...
The rich also cry: Couples make a killing as America’s ‘divorce industry’ booms
As Kenya and Africa in general experience a phenomenal rise in dissolution of marriages, divorce in the United States, Europe and other developed countries has transformed into a thriving industry from which couples are making a killing. The latest of such high-profile dissolution was announced on Monday this week when...
China’s Covid vaccines go global: If no option is offered, they’re a good choice
The World Health Organization (WHO) is considering approving two of China’s Covid-19 vaccines for emergency use, potentially opening the door to wide distribution in lower-income nations through the Covid-19 Vaccines Global Access (Covax) initiative. A successful outcome in the coming weeks might boost global confidence in these vaccines, say scientists....
