USA: Why the CDC’s guidelines on isolation, boosters, and masks are so confusing - by Dylan Scott

The fierce backlash to the CDC’s recent decision to shorten the recommended isolation period for people who test positive for Covid-19 was the latest in a series of communications blunders so severe that they have now become a meme.

Communication is an essential part of any public health response. But US health agencies have struggled with it since the very beginning of the pandemic, when government officials initially advised against wearing masks in early 2020 before reversing themselves to recommend nearly

It appeared the initial guidance may have been issued in order to preserve enough masks for health care workers. Government officials were warning at the time that hospitals’ supplies could be depleted at a critical moment if there was a run on masks. It was the first of the pandemic’s “noble lies,” The Week’s Ryan Cooper wrote in a blistering essay on the paternalistic treatment of the US public that has undermined the country’s Covid-19 response.

America’s public health institutions have failed to communicate effectively with the US public throughout the pandemic for two reasons: either they have been left trying to defend poor policies, or the messaging has taken the place of creating any kind of coherent policy at all

Read more at: Why the CDC’s guidelines on isolation, boosters, and masks are so confusing - Vox

EU-September EU Travel Restrictions: Covid-19 Vaccination, Testing And Quarantine Rules By Country- by Alex Ledsom

The last hurrahs of summer are bringing more travel complications, as countries are increasingly deluged with rising daily infection rates of Covid-19 and specifically, the tricky Delta variant:

The U.S. has been removed from the EU’s safe list for non-essential travel because its daily infection rate is far higher than the 75 daily cases per 100,000 people needed over a 14-day period to stay on this list–Israel was also removed.

It was a move seen by some to be valid, not only because of rising rates in the U.S. but also because the EU is neck and neck with the U.S. on vaccination rates and because of the continued lack of reciprocity from the U.S. in rescinding the travel ban which has been place since March 2020–airlines now fear a November opening.

Read more at: September EU Travel Restrictions: Covid-19 Vaccination, Testing And Quarantine Rules By Country

International Travel: Vaccinated Travelers Face Chaos and Confusion - by Stephen Hiltner

More than 105 million people in the United States are fully vaccinated. Greece, Iceland and Croatia, among a growing list of countries, are now open to American tourists. Airlines are resuming overseas flights. And perhaps the biggest development of all: Come summer, fully vaccinated Americans will once again be welcome across Europe.

But the optimism may be premature. At the moment, the broader reality is more chaotic, and more sobering.<

Read more at: https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/05/travel/covid-vaccinated-travel-reality.html

EU watchdog flags new rules for handling failing insurers

Regulators are looking at how they would deal with a failing insurer by applying lessons from banks during the financial crisis, the European Union's insurance watchdog said on Tuesday.August 8.

Global regulators are putting in place rules to make sure they could handle the failure of a big bank without disrupting markets as seen when Lehman Brothers went bust in 2008.

Gabriel Bernardino, chairman of the European Insurance and Occupational Pensions Authority (EIOPA), said insurance regulators were now looking at what rules were needed to dealing with a failing insurer.

Read more: EU watchdog flags new rules for handling failing insurers | Reuters