U.S. President Biden Says Not Considering New Vaccine Mandates
Top news today NANTUCKET, Mass (Reuters) – U.S. President Joe Biden said on Friday his administration was not considering new vaccine mandates following the discovery of a new COVID-19 variant in South Africa, which led to travel bans from that country and seven other nations.
“We don’t know a lot about the variant except that is of great concern,”top news today Biden told reporters. “I decided that we are going to be cautious.”
(Reporting Nandita Bose; Writing by Lucia Mutikani; top news today Editing by Mark Porter)
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. President Joe Biden on Friday called on nations expected to meet at the World Trade Organization next week to agree to waive intellectual property protections for COVID-19 vaccines in the wake of the identification of a new coronavirus variant in South Africa.
However, the meeting he was referring to was later postponed after the new variant led to travel restrictions that would have prevented many participants from reaching Geneva.
“The news about this new variant should make clearer than ever why this pandemic will not end until we have global vaccinations,” Biden said in a statement.
“This news today reiterates the importance of moving on this (waiving intellectual property protections) quickly.”
The Biden administration faces fresh criticism over a failure to get vaccines to poorer countries while supplying free booster shots to Americans, after the new variant named Omicron was identified.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Latvia and Sweden next week to attend Transatlantic and European security meetings and hold bilateral talks, the State Department said on Friday.
The trip, which will take place between Nov. 29 and Dec. 2, comes at a time of rising tension between Russia and the Western military alliance following a build-up of Russian forces near the border with Ukraine.
(Reporting by Nandita Bose, writing by Lucia Mutikani and Heather Timmons, editing by Chris Reese)
While in Riga, Blinken will attend a meeting of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation and hold bilateral talks with NATO counterparts. In the Swedish capital Stockholm, ministers from members of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) will discuss concerns about the Europe-Eurasia region’s security environment, the State Department said.
U.S., NATO and Ukrainian officials have raised the alarm in recent weeks over what they say are unusual Russian troop movements closer to Ukraine, suggesting that Moscow may be poised to launch a new attack on its neighbour, accusations Russia has rejected as fear-mongering.
Russia’s intentions remain unclear, and East-West tensions are running high with Ukraine, Russia and NATO all conducting military drills and Moscow accusing Washington of rehearsing a nuclear attack on Russia earlier this month.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) -U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken will travel to Latvia and Sweden next week to attend Transatlantic and European security meetings and hold bilateral talks, the State Department said on Friday.
The trip, which will take place between Nov. 29 and Dec. 2, comes at a time of rising tension between Russia and the Western military alliance following a build-up of Russian forces near the border with Ukraine.
“The news about this new variant should make clearer than ever why this pandemic will not end until we have global vaccinations,” Biden said in a statement.
“This news today reiterates the importance of moving on this (waiving intellectual property protections) quickly.”
