UPS cuts shifts at major sorting hub in Baltimore, Maryland

Nick Barrickman

A UPS driver unloads packages from a truck and arranges them for delivery. [AP Photo/Mark Lennihan]

On Wednesday, United Parcel Service workers at the Arbutus, Maryland hub outside of Baltimore were notified that the company was cutting its entire daytime sort shift as of March 29. According to local press, this would mean the loss of about 118 jobs. The cuts were announced the same day that UPS stated it was laying off over 12,000 non-union corporate employees nationally.

The announcement is part of an ongoing jobs bloodbath which is being unleashed on workers in multiple industries, as corporations introduce forms of automation and technology to reduce the workforce along with the federal government policy of keeping interest rates high in order to attack wages. 

According to WBAL, “Employee headcount at UPS had grown with the surge in business to about 540,000. It trimmed that headcount back to about 495,000 by the end of last year.” As a result, “the overall U.S. small package market, excluding Amazon, will grow by less than 1% in 2024.”

Additionally, the publication cites numerous company officials’ statements about wages and compensation. “The company also is dealing with a 12.1% increase in union wage rates, driving its efforts to cut other costs,” it said. WBAL cites UPS CEO Carole Tomé, who in an investors call blamed “the macro environment…as well as higher costs associated with the new contract.” 

“There is still work here,” said a worker at the Arbutus hub to the World Socialist Web Site. “[UPS] just wants to send it to new facilities.” Another worker explained that the night sorting shift had been laid off beforehand, leading to 15 jobs being eliminated. 

The cuts are being introduced throughout the company’s network. In Portland, Oregon, over 200 positions will be eliminated at the Swan Island facility in April. In Forest Hill, Texas, Teamsters officials at Local 767 notified their members through social media that “layoffs in the package car classification lasting more than 10 days” were being planned.

“They’re either going to move our jobs down to Burtonsville [Maryland] or they’re going to cut the work altogether and do something else,” said one worker at the Baltimore facility, referring to a larger hub closer to Washington, D.C. Other jobs are being shifted to the EZR “super hub” in the suburbs of Harrisburg, Pennsylvania, “part of a $1.4 billion investment by UPS into Pennsylvania,” according to PennLive.

“A lot of work has been going from Baltimore up to Pennsylvania… This building has been here since like the 1950s or the 1960s I believe. This building has never had any upgrades,” a Baltimore worker said. “It’s like they’re just letting the building go down the drain.”

A few workers will be able to follow their jobs to the new locations. As with part-time workers, the majority of full-timers will lose their jobs.

The corporation’s executives have sought to explain the reductions as part of a normal “flexing down” as demand falls. However, UPS is increasingly relying on automation as a way to cut back on paid labor. UPS’s chief financial officer Brian Newman told local press that these cuts were “a change in the way we work” and that “as volume returns to the system, we don’t expect these jobs to come back. It’s changing the effective way that we operate.”

According to a worker at the Baltimore-Arbutus facility, the part-time workforce, which previously numbered in the “thousands,” had been completely laid off. “Part-timers are already gone,” he said. Another worker called the firings “technically illegal” because part-timers were being fired on the spot and not being given their mandated 14-day notices.

The attack on the part-time workers is especially cynical given the Teamster union officials’ efforts to sell the previous contract, which passed under murky circumstances last summer. The contract was forced down UPS workers’ throats after they were kept on the job after their previous contract expired and they had voted to go on strike.

A Teamsters press release from August declares the contract “historic,” adding that it raises “wages for full and part-time workers, [creates] more full-time jobs,” and won “important workplace protections.” In fact, no sooner was the contract supposedly ratified that the management, with the union’s collusion, began laying off thousands of its workers, replacing them through the introduction of automation and technology.

“The union works for UPS,” said a driver at the hub. “They got us all this money supposedly but then they cut all of our hours, so did we really get more money?”

Over the weekend, Teamster members associated with Local 355 in Baltimore attended a series of informational meetings in which local union representatives sought to deny previous knowledge of the reductions. “People are pissed,” said one worker who attended. He recalled workers complaining that they hadn’t received work in several months because of low volume.

Other than holding meetings, the Teamsters have done little to fight the layoffs. “UPS is going to do what UPS is going to do. The union is going to do what it is going to do.” said one worker.

The global resurgence of measles and the abdication of prioritizing public health

Benjamin Mateus

The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an alert on January 25, 2024, to clinicians that between December 1, 2023, and January 23, 2024, the public health agency was notified of 23 confirmed cases of measles across the states of Georgia, Missouri, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania, of which seven were imported by international travelers and two outbreaks that included more than five cases each. These cases involved mostly age-eligible children and adolescents who were not vaccinated.

A dose of the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine [AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File]

The alert is being issued amid a world-wide resurgence of the disease during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic and the demise of public health infrastructures with the prioritization of profits over lives. Globally, over 61 million doses of measles-containing vaccines were postponed or missed from 2020 to 2022.

Low-income countries, where the risk of death from measles is highest are also the countries that have seen their vaccination rates plummet meaning the disease’s resurgence is not just a result of vaccine hesitancy and opposition among a reactionary petty bourgeois layer, but a starvation of critical resources to these destitute regions.

Countries with the highest measles outbreak based on provisional data provided to the World Health Organization (WHO) as of early December 2023 reported include Yemen with 23,000 cases, 14,000 in India, almost 13,000 in Kazakhstan, 11,000 in Ethiopia, and over 7,000 in Russia. Of the 22 million children who missed their first measles vaccine in 2022, more than half lived in just ten countries—Angola, Brazil, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia, Madagascar, Nigeria, Pakistan, and Philippines.

Given the highly integrated nature of global commerce and the ending of all emergency measures associated with the COVID pandemic, an outbreak of measles in any part of the world threatens every other region of the globe.

Global cases of measles increased by 18 percent in 2022 over 2021 to 9 million infections and deaths from the disease were up 43 percent with 136,000 recorded fatalities, mostly among children from the above impoverished countries. In 2023, the number of cases jumped 64 percent compared to previous years. Death estimates have yet to be provided.  

Kate O’Brien, WHO Director for Immunization, Vaccines and Biologicals, said in November 2023 on the global measles threat, “The lack of recovery in measles vaccine coverage in low-income countries following the pandemic is an alarm bell for action. Measles is called the inequity virus for good reason. It is the disease that will find and attack those who aren’t protected. Children everywhere have the right to be protected by the lifesaving measles vaccine, no matter where they live.”

However, for western countries too, the public health crisis with these previously “eliminated” pathogens is becoming a rapidly growing concern.

WHO for the European region warned that urgent measures were needed to prevent the further spread of measles across Europe which has risen by an alarming 45-fold, with some 42,200 people infected in 2023, up from only 941 in the whole of 2022.

Most recently, the UK has been experiencing a sudden and exponentially rising number of measles infections that threatens to spread across the country. Since October 1, 2023, there were 347 laboratory-confirmed measles cases in England with 127 of these just in January 2024. Seventy-five percent of these cases have been in the West Midlands and two-thirds of the infected were in children under the age of 10.

Consultant epidemiologist Dr. Vanessa Saliba of the UK Health Security Agency (UKHSA) warned, “The ongoing measles outbreak in the West Midlands remains a concern. MMR vaccine coverage has been falling for the last decade with one out of 10 children starting school in England not protected and so there is a real risk that this outbreak could spread to other towns and cities.”

On January 30, the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) published an epidemiological alert urging countries in the Americas to intensify vaccination activities, conduct surveillance and prepare health systems for possible measles outbreaks. Only a quarter of the 40 countries in the region have given at least one of two doses of the MMR (Measles, Mumps and Rubella) vaccine to at least 95 percent of the population. Only seven countries in the Americas have a “very-high” level of coverage with the second dose meaning the entire region stands poised for an epidemic of measles.

At least two doses of the measles vaccines (first at 12 months and the second at age four through six) are required to interrupt transmission of the disease and achieve the theoretical herd immunity set by the WHO at 95 percent. Primary vaccine failure with the first dose at 12 months of age or older occurs in 5 percent of people which would mean 100 percent compliance would be necessary with only a single dose. However, 95 percent of first dose failures will seroconvert or respond to a second dose which is why the two-dose series is critical.

In the US, although vaccination rates with two doses stood at around 93 percent for the 2021-2022 school year (down from 95 percent in previous years), there was considerable variation by state with Wisconsin, Kentucky, Georgia, New Hampshire, Ohio, Colorado, and Idaho having rates under 90 percent. Alaska has the lowest rate with only 78 percent vaccinated against measles.

A CBS News investigation revealed that at least 8,500 schools had measles vaccination rates under 95 percent among kindergartners. Penn State University biologist and infectious disease researcher Matt Ferrari told CBS News on the findings, “I think it’s concerning to me as a human being. It also has a population-level consequence. The more individuals that are around who are unvaccinated, the more potential there is for disease to spread and to establish transmission that will give rise to outbreaks that will stick around for a long time.”

A respiratory/airborne virus, measles is highly communicable with estimates that 90 percent of non-immune people exposed to an infected individual will contract the disease. Mathematical modeling estimates that the number of secondary infections can be as high as 12 to 18. The takeaway point here is that a high vaccination rate (greater than 95 percent) is required to ensure herd immunity prevents onward transmission to vulnerable people.

A person contracting the virus is considered contagious four days before a rash starts through four days after, a period that can encompass ten to 14 days. The prodromal phase is considered the most contagious phase due to symptoms of intense coughing that occurs. For those exposed and not immunized, a quarantine period from five days to 21 days.

The US CDC, in their alert on the latest outbreak urged healthcare providers and health systems to be vigilant for patients presenting with rash and high fevers, head colds that include runny noses and red eyes and coughs, especially with travel abroad to areas where there is ongoing measles outbreak. However, given the lackadaisical attitude so prevalent in health systems following the lifting of all COVID restrictions, measles cases could quickly ignite, especially in pediatric hospitals and emergency departments. The other unknown is how previous COVID infections will impact children not vaccinated against measles given the dysregulation it is known to cause in the immune system.

Once infected by measles, the disease must take its course. Early use of the vaccine after exposure (within 72 hours) or immune globulin (usually reserved for infants less than 12 months of age, pregnant women, or immune compromised people or unable to get the vaccine) that contain antibodies against measles given within six days of exposure may help prevent the disease or minimize severity. There are no antivirals currently on the market.

Mortality from measles is predominately a byproduct of superimposed bacterial infections with rates of complications climbing if the fever does not abate in a day or two. Case fatality rate is somewhere between one to three per 1,000 in a best-case scenario with access to proper healthcare. In the real-world figures mentioned above, that rate reached 1.5 percent comparable to rates seen from one hundred years ago.

A 2004 report published in the Journal of Infectious Disease reviewing the clinical significance of measles and the impact of vaccinations, noted, “Without the vaccine, five million children would die each year from measles, assuming an estimated case-fatality rate of two to three percent.” Between 1855 and 2005, measles killed nearly 200 million people worldwide.

Given the virus that causes measles has only but one host, humans, and a readily available, highly effective and safe vaccine at hand, the reemergence of measles on the world stage rather than its complete eradication is a result of the irrational character of the capitalist system. In particular, the response to the COVID pandemic is not simply a policy of forever COVID, but an abdication of making public health a priority in pursuit of ever greater profits, no matter the impact on the broader population.

Banks starting to take a hit from commercial property downturn

Nick Beams

They have taken some time to work their way through, but it appears the interest rate hikes by the US Federal Reserve and other major central banks over almost two years are starting to hit commercial property, and the banks that have made loans to this sector.

New York Community Bancorp Inc. on Wednesday reported a loss of $252 million in its fourth quarter [AP Photo/Richard Drew]

This week, three banks on three different continents revealed significant losses and problems due to their exposure to commercial property.

On Wednesday, shares of New York Community Bancorp (NYBC) fell 38 percent, followed by a further 11 percent decline the next day, after it revealed it had made provision for losses running into tens of millions of dollars on commercial property loans.

On Thursday, shares in the Tokyo-based Aozora Bank fell more than 20 percent, the largest amount allowed under stock market rules. This came after it announced its expected profit for the year ending in March had been transformed into a loss because overseas real estate loans had gone sour.

In Switzerland the private bank Julius Baer revealed it had taken a $700 million hit from the failure last year of the Austrian property group Signa.

In a sign of the worsening situation in the US commercial property market, Deutsche Bank said it was increasing the loss provisions for American commercial loans from the fourth quarter of 2023 to $123 million, a rise of nearly five-fold from 2022.

The banks have their own individual characteristics and peculiarities, such as the competency of their managements.

But their common feature is that the transition, from virtually near zero interest rates for more than a decade after the financial crisis of 2008 to the rate hikes that started in 2022, has hit their bottom line. That means there are more problems building up in the sector, particularly for middle-sized banks.

The case of NYCB is a graphic expression of the fragilities of the stock market. NYCB was one of the beneficiaries of the collapse of Signature Bank last year after taking it over at the height of the crisis in March last year when regional banks experienced deposit runs.

Its stock price soared, only to come crashing down after it revealed it had taken $185 million in losses on just two property loans and had set aside more than $500 million to cover potential losses.

Reporting on the NYCB losses, the Financial Times pointed to the dilemma that confronts many medium-sized banks with regard to the commercial property sector.

“Most banks want to reduce their exposure to this $5.8 trillion market. A record amount of loans are maturing and need refinancing this year and the next. Yet they need the high-yield loans to finance the generous deposit rates required to attract savers.”

The deposit issue emerged in the crisis last March when depositors started shifting their money to larger banks, fearing the problems which had engulfed the three that failed—Silicon Valley Bank, Republic Bank and Signature Bank—were not confined to them.

Data from NYCB showed that it paid average rate of 3.62 percent on its interest-bearing deposits in the fourth quarter compared to 1.93 percent a year ago. By comparison, the interest rate paid by the banking giant JPMorgan was 2.78 percent.

The sharp turn in the position of Aozora exemplified the effect of the deepening problems of the US commercial real estate market.

Although they accounted for only 6.6 percent it total loans, the potential losses transformed an expected profit of 24 billion yen ($164 million) into a probable loss of the same magnitude. Its stock price, which had been around a five-year high, then plunged setting off mandatory trading restrictions after the fall went beyond 20 percent.

In an indication of the depth of the downturn, Aozora reported that of the $1.89 billion worth of loans on its books, some $719 million were non-performing, that is more than 90 days overdue dates for payments.

The highest concentration of non-performing loans was in Chicago where the bank said “a considerable amount of time is required to recover supply and demand balances in urban areas,” noting that “the volume of property sales remains very low.”

The slump in commercial real estate and the problems it brings for banks has been the subject of some commentary.

Bank of America analysts wrote that the higher losses were a “a reminder of going credit normalisation that we are likely to witness across the industry.”

This is, to say the least, something of an understatement. The crisis in real estate is not some “normal” conjunctural downturn. It is another expression of the deep crisis which exploded to the surface in 2008 and which created a financial system which now requires massive state support to keep functioning whenever it runs into problems. This was seen in the freeze of the Treasury market in March 2020 and in the banking crisis of 2023.

In commercial real estate, loans and property development projects have relied on the provision of ultra cheap money. So the maintenance of an interest rate above 5 percent for a period of time—once considered entirely normal—threatens major financial problems of which what has surfaced so far are a foretaste.

According to a Wall Street Journal report, some $2.2 trillion worth of US property loans are set to come due by 2027. Some banks are already giving short extensions to loans that were due in the past two years.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum last month, Anne Walsh, the chief investment officer with Guggenheim Partners Investment Management, said: “The commercial real-estate pain in the office sector is just starting.”

She likened the situation to a “rolling recession” for banks that could drag on for some time.

The risk, as noted in the Global Financial Stability report of the International Monetary Fund issued last October, is that it could development into something more.

Warning of the possibility of a significant fall in commercial property prices, the IMF said such a situation had the potential to create “a vicious cycle of tighter funding conditions, falling CRE prices, and bank losses, with broader implications for macrofinancial stability.”

It updated its assessment last month in a blog post which described the fall in commercial property prices as “striking” and that they had “plummeted more in the present monetary policy tightening cycle than in previous episodes.”

Alleged WikiLeaks whistleblower hit with 40-year sentence: A warning of what’s in store for Assange if extradition is not defeated

Oscar Grenfell

Joshua Adam Schulte [Photo: Joshua Schulte/LinkedIn]

In a brutal act of state vengeance, alleged WikiLeaks whistleblower Joshua Schulte was sentenced to 40 years’ imprisonment on Thursday over Espionage Act and other “national security” offenses. The 35-year-old was convicted in 2022 of transmitting documents to WikiLeaks, exposing the Central Intelligence Agency’s hacking and global spying operations.

The Schulte case marks a deepening of a protracted war on whistleblowers and journalism. The computer expert has effectively been tried, convicted and sentenced as a terrorist. His term of imprisonment is comparable to that meted out to individuals convicted of the most heinous crimes.

Aside from motives of retribution, Schulte is being made an example. His sentencing is a message that anyone exposing the crimes of the military and intelligence agencies, amid the US-Israeli genocide in Gaza, preparations for broader wars and a crackdown on democratic rights, will be treated as they would in Saudi Arabia or another US-backed dictatorship. 

In the first instance, the sentence is a signal of what the American government intends to do to WikiLeaks publisher Julian Assange, who faces the imminent threat of extradition from Britain to the US.

The sentence is all the more striking, given the flimsy character of the case against Schulte, who maintains his innocence. There was sufficient doubt over his guilt for a jury to be unable to reach agreement on the Espionage Act and national security charges in a first trial of Schulte in 2020, resulting in a mistrial. 

Schulte has stated that he was fitted-up, because the government was desperate to find a scapegoat for the CIA data breach. As a disgruntled and idiosyncratic former CIA employee, he was identified as a suspect almost immediately after WikiLeaks began publishing the material in March 2017. 

Shortly thereafter he was indicted on charges of possession of child pornography. Whatever their veracity, those charges were clearly aimed at ensnaring Schulte in the legal system, as the government sought to build a case. It took more than a year for the Department of Justice to cobble together an indictment against Schulte over the CIA leak. 

The timeline strongly suggests that the FBI and the government decided upon Schulte’s guilt and worked backwards from there. WikiLeaks stated that the material it published on CIA hacking tools had been circulating among numerous former government employees and contractors.

The limited coverage of Schulte’s sentencing in the mainstream press has uncritically cited the statements of US officials, describing the leak as the digital equivalent of Pearl Harbor, an unprecedented blow to “national security” and the like. Very little has been written about the content of the leaks.

Dubbed by WikiLeaks “Vault 7,” the material pointed to a global CIA operation involving cyber-hacking and dirty tricks on an unprecedented scale. Among the revelations, “Vault 7” showed that:

• The CIA was the world’s biggest purveyor of malware. It developed viruses and hacking tools directed at virtually all operating systems.
• The CIA had developed programs enabling it to hack smart televisions and other household devices for spying purposes.
• By hacking directly into smartphones, the CIA could overcome encrypted messaging apps.
• The agency was seeking to develop capabilities to remotely take control of the computer systems that run newer model cars. The only conceivable purpose would be to do physical harm.
• The CIA had developed capabilities to create digital “evidence” to attribute its own malicious hacking operations to adversaries, useful in “black propaganda” campaigns blaming other countries for supposed cyberattacks.

In other words, everything the US government has accused other states such as Russia and China of doing in relation to cyber-hacking, the CIA has done far more extensively and successfully. 

A WikiLeaks announcement of the Vault 7 publication explained, “In a statement to WikiLeaks the source details policy questions that they say urgently need to be debated in public, including whether the CIA’s hacking capabilities exceed its mandated powers and the problem of public oversight of the agency. The source wishes to initiate a public debate about the security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons.”

The response was apoplectic. A month after the initial release, in April 2017, then CIA Director Mike Pompeo delivered a speech in which he denounced Assange and WikiLeaks staff as “demons” and “enemies” and declared that they would be treated as a “non-state hostile intelligence agency,” without First Amendment or other democratic rights.

A 2021 Yahoo News investigation would later reveal what this meant in practice. Based on the comments of more than 30 US officials, it confirmed that in 2017 Pompeo, the CIA and other figures in the Trump administration, including the president, had discussed illegally kidnapping Assange from Ecuador’s London Embassy, where he was a political refugee, or assassinating him. This was not idle chatter. The company that provided security to the embassy and controlled Assange’s physical environment, UC Global, was secretly working for the CIA.

It was only with the failure or abandonment of those extrajudicial plans that the US government indicted Assange. He faces Espionage Act charges and 175 years imprisonment if extradited. While those charges are over separate 2010 and 2011 WikiLeaks publications exposing US war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan and global conspiracies by the State Department, Assange and WikiLeaks have stated that the main impetus for his stepped-up persecution was Vault 7 and the ferocious CIA response.

At the sentencing hearing Thursday, prosecutors argued that Schulte should be imprisoned for life. “There is a need for incapacitation,” one reportedly said. They called for his sentence to be extended based on “terrorism enhancement” provisions.

Schulte has already served more than five years in barbaric conditions. He has been under Special Administrative Measures, a form of detention involving almost total isolation and sensory deprivation. 

According to Inner City Press, one of the few publications to have extensively covered the case, the alleged whistleblower told the sentencing hearing: “The US Federal government tortures me with 24/7 white noise and solitary confinement. The window is blacked out. When I am offered access to the law library, I have to urinate and defecate on the floor. I am left there for 9 hours.” 

Schulte added: “I have been locked in my torture cage with rodent excrement. Ice accumulates near the window. I wash my clothes in my toilet. I’m forced to eat with my bare hands like an animal. They look down on you like you are not human.”

These conditions, akin to a medieval dungeon, are what awaits Assange if he is extradited. The WikiLeaks founder is perilously close to being dispatched to his persecutors. On February 20-21, he will appear in court, where an application to appeal the extradition order will be heard. If unsuccessful, Assange’s avenues within the British legal system are exhausted.

The Schulte case again underscores the criminal, gangster-like pursuit of Assange. The courageous journalist is being hounded as a criminal for exposing the illegal activities of the American government and its allies. This began under the Obama-Biden administration, was escalated by Trump, and the current Biden presidency is seeking to complete Assange’s destruction. 

That underscores the commitment of the entire political establishment, whatever their tactical divisions, to ever-greater authoritarianism as they pursue a program of global war and confront growing social and political opposition domestically.

The bipartisan character of the assault on Assange, not only in the US, but in Britain and his home country Australia, demonstrates the futility of any perspective of securing his freedom through appeals to the powers that be. That perspective has been tried and has failed.

Massachusetts Institute Of Technology (MIT) FREE Online Courses 2024

APPLICATION DEADLINE:

Ongoing

Tell Me About Award:

In 2024, MIT continues to spearhead global education with MIT Free Online Courses, encompassing over 2,500 courses spanning disciplines such as computer science, engineering, literature, and philosophy. This initiative, embedded in MIT’s commitment to knowledge dissemination, offers learners worldwide a unique opportunity to enhance their skills and knowledge.

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) stands as a beacon of academic excellence and innovation globally. Renowned for its groundbreaking research and contributions to science and technology, MIT has extended its impact through the OpenCourseWare (OCW) program, offering a diverse array of free online courses. This initiative, accessible to anyone with an internet connection, provides a gateway to high-quality educational resources, including lecture videos, problem sets, and course materials.

MIT’s Transformative Impact: As a world-class research university, MIT has played a pivotal role in shaping the contemporary world through cutting-edge technology and scientific advancements. The MIT Free Online Courses 2024 echo this commitment by providing learners with a platform to develop and refine their skills, fostering personal and professional growth. Leveraging the expertise of MIT’s esteemed faculty, these courses contribute to creating a brighter future for all.

Diverse Learning Opportunities: MIT’s free online courses cover a broad spectrum of disciplines, ranging from science and technology to finance and business. In this highly competitive world, learners can upskill and expand their expertise at their own pace. While the courses are free, participants have the option to obtain a verified certificate upon completion. Regardless of age or academic background, individuals can register for these courses, each with its own duration, ensuring a tailored learning experience.

MIT Free Online Courses 2024 Details:

• Host Institute: Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
• Access Mode: Online
• Offered Programs: Online Courses
• Deadline: Open

Course Offerings:

• Aeronautics and Astronautics
• Anthropology
• Architecture
• Biological Engineering
• Biology
• Chemical Engineering
• Chemistry
• Comparative Media Studies/Writing
• Earth, Atmospheric & Planetary Sciences
• Economics
• Electrical Engineering & Computer Science
• Global Languages
• History
• Humanities
• Linguistics & Philosophy
• Literature
• Management
• Materials Science and Engineering
• Mathematics
• Mechanical Engineering
• Music and Theater Arts
• Nuclear Sciences & Engineering
• Physics
• Political Science
• Urban Studies and Planning
• Office of Digital Learning
• MIT Energy Initiative

TYPE:

Courses

Who Can Apply?

• Open to all individuals globally
• No gender, academic background, or age restrictions
• Internet access required for course registration

HOW MANY AWARDS?

Not specified

What Is The Benefit Of Award?

1. High-quality education: Benefit from MIT’s world-renowned expertise in a variety of subjects.
2. Flexibility: Self-paced courses allow for study at your own convenience.
3. Cost-effective: Access quality education without financial barriers.
4. No prerequisites required: Open to all without specific entry requirements.
5. Variety of subjects: Explore a wide range of disciplines matching personal interests and career goals.
6. Global recognition: Gain skills and knowledge recognized globally.

How To Apply:

1. Visit the MIT OpenCourseWare official website.
2. Browse through available courses and select the desired ones.
3. Click on the course link to access materials.
4. Review course requirements, including any prerequisites.
5. Enroll by creating an account on the MIT OCW website.
6. Access course materials and engage in online discussions.
7. Start the course by reviewing the syllabus and materials.

Visit Award Webpage for Details

Lula government rules out universal COVID-19 vaccination, deepening “herd immunity” policy in Brazil

Eduardo Parati & Guilherme Ferreira

Just over a year after Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva took office, the criminal negligence of his Workers Party (PT) government in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic has been thoroughly exposed.

President Lula and Health Minister Nísia Trindade [Photo: Ricardo Stuckert/PR]

Daily data on the pandemic was halted in February of last year, while in May the government welcomed the World Health Organization’s (WHO) decision to end the Public Health Emergency of International Concern for COVID-19 without any scientific basis. The government has failed to implement educational campaigns on the airborne transmission of SARS-CoV-2 and the dangers still posed by COVID-19, and, at the end of last year, the Lula government ruled out COVID-19 vaccination for the entire population, even as the pandemic is still raging.

Pfizer’s bivalent vaccine, covering the original variants and the Omicron BA.1 or BA.4/BA.5 variant, began to be administered in February 2023 to people over 60, those over 12 with comorbidities, and other specific groups. At the end of April, with only 17.6 percent of the eligible population receiving the bivalent vaccine, the Lula government authorized it for the entire population over 18, despite claiming it would “not bring benefits.”

At the end of October, the Lula government announced that the COVID-19 vaccine would be included in the National Immunization Program (PNI) starting this year. However, it will only be applied to children between six months and five years old, older people, and other specific groups. Even if all the people included in the PNI are immunized, this will represent less than a third of the Brazilian population with a new shot of the COVID-19 vaccine in 2024.

Considering what was seen last year, even a reasonable level of immunization of this population is hardly likely. Having abandoned virtually all public health measures that help alert the public to the dangers of COVID-19, while leading the population to believe that the pandemic is over, the Lula government’s COVID-19 vaccination campaign has been a fiasco. In mid-December, vaccination coverage of the bivalent was still barely 17 percent.

Since coming to power, the Lula government has followed the strategy of the world’s ruling elite of scrapping all mitigation measures, such as mask-wearing, and insisting that “we will still live with COVID-19” and that “our great ally is vaccination,” according to Health Minister Nísia Trindade. Contrary to claims that it would “follow the science” in its supposed “reconstruction” of Brazil, the Lula government’s decision to abandon universal COVID-19 vaccination shows that it is continuing and deepening the policy of “herd immunity” in Brazil initiated by fascistic ex-president Jair Bolsonaro (2019-2022), normalizing continuous waves of mass infection, debilitation and death.

Several people concerned about the pandemic have spoken out on X/Twitter, denouncing the Lula government’s “herd immunity” policy. In a lengthy thread from the beginning of November, shortly after the announcement of the inclusion of the COVID-19 vaccine in the PNI, anti-COVID activist Márcio explained the limitations of the Lula government’s vaccination campaign: “In making this decision, the federal government claims to be following what is recommended by the WHO. In fact, this is their recommendation. However, we must understand that the WHO is a multilateral organization that uses equity to make its recommendations to member countries. In other words, this WHO suggestion is the minimum a country could offer its population. Therefore, Brazil could offer the maximum or more than the minimum, vaccinating its entire population.”

He also drew attention to the fact that the Lula government had not acquired the most up-to-date monovalent vaccines against the Omicron XBB.1.5 subvariant, which predominated in Brazil throughout most of last year and is being applied to virtually the entire population in the Northern Hemisphere. In the US, it is fully authorized for everyone 12 years or older, with an emergency use authorization for children six months to 11 years old. 

In response to the Health Ministry’s claim that “For other people, including healthy adults, there is no recommendation for annual vaccination,” Márcio declared in another thread at the beginning of December: “This attitude of the current federal government denies reality. COVID-19 still represents a danger both in the acute phase and in its chronic phase (Long COVID).” Therefore, he added, this claim shows that “Brazil has officially become one of the most denialist countries regarding SARS-CoV-2.”

Indeed, it is a scientific fact that the effectiveness of COVID-19 vaccines decreases both over time and depending on the variant used to manufacture them and the variant against which it will act in case of infection, which is why pharmaceutical companies have been updating these vaccines regularly. Numerous studies have also pointed out the need to have the maximum possible vaccination coverage, with vaccines updated against the newest variants and applied periodically as one of the instruments for effectively combating the pandemic.

Moreover, despite reducing the possibility of severe cases, the vaccines do not prevent infection and do not offer significant protection against the various effects of Long COVID, a chronic condition that can affect virtually every organ in the body and develops in 10-20 percent of those infected, according to the WHO. Despite all the danger that long COVID poses to the Brazilian population, this “mass debilitating effect” is a subject ignored by the Lula government.

Leading neuroscientist Miguel Nicolelis, who has closely followed the dynamics of the pandemic in Brazil since its beginning, has also spoken out on X/Twitter. Throughout November, he questioned “the justification for not vaccinating the entire population in 2024 with new vaccines developed to combat the new variants derived from Omicron.” He went on to demand a “Strategic Plan from the Ministry of Health to deal with the tsunami of patients with chronic COVID that will hit the doors of the SUS [Unified Health System] in the coming months and years.”

In one of these posts, Nicolelis also charged: “Brazil has abandoned any surveillance ... Basically, we are flying blind.”

If monitoring the virus was one of the many measures entirely neglected by the Bolsonaro government, making it practically impossible to grasp the true extent of the pandemic in Brazil, this has only worsened under the Lula government. Last year, the number of RT-PCR tests carried out was the lowest since the beginning of the pandemic. By September, only 1.76 million tests had been carried out, compared to 9.5 million in 2020, 21 million in 2021, and 5.9 million in 2022.

Without implementing a nationally coordinated system for monitoring the pandemic or even making wastewater data available, the release of COVID-19 data occurs with significant gaps and underreporting every week, combining the data from the Brazilian states. The latest data shows that in the week between January 14 and 20, Brazil recorded 38,246 cases and 196 deaths from COVID-19. Overall, Brazil has recorded 38 million cases and 709,000 deaths since the start of the pandemic, in addition to the millions suffering from Long COVID.

The positivity rate for respiratory infections in Brazil between January 21, 2023, and January 20, 2024 [Photo: Todos pela Saúde]

After a wave between last September and November, the positivity rate monitored by Todos pela Saúde (All for Health), a non-profit organization that analyzes data from seven private laboratories in Brazil, has increased since the beginning of the year, indicating the start of a new wave. According to the organization’s bulletin on Monday, “after persisting in the 20 percent range for three months, positivity for COVID-19 rose again after the holiday season, reaching 27 percent.”

This coincides with the unchecked spread of the highly infectious and immune-resistant JN.1 subvariant. Predominant worldwide, it is driving a new wave in the US and other countries. According to the Fiocruz Epidemiological Institute, the prevalence of JN.1 jumped from 18.3 percent in November to 56.8 percent in December.

The Lula government, a loyal representative of the Brazilian and international capitalist elites, showed in its first year that it has no interest in implementing a scientific response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Lula came to power to deepen the austerity policies implemented during his previous governments (2003-2010) in order to prioritize corporate profits over life. Today, this is being expressed in the “new fiscal regime” approved last year and the “zero deficit target” for the 2024 budget, both of which have been applauded by the international financial markets, even as they threaten the constitutional right to healthcare.

As the New Year’s statement published by the World Socialist Web Site analyzed, eliminating the novel coronavirus, the only scientific response to the COVID-19 pandemic, “remains viable and necessary.” By the end of 2022, China demonstrated that the combination of several long-known public health measures, such as the use of high-quality masks, a strict surveillance and contact-tracing system, and vaccination, can stop the transmission of SARS-CoV-2, save lives, and prevent the debilitating effects of Long COVID. However, China’s elimination strategy has also shown the unfeasibility of “any nationally-based program in the epoch of imperialism.”

Mexican president denounces election meddling after US officials claim he took drug cartel money

Andrea Lobo

Three separate articles released simultaneously on Tuesday report claims that the 2006 campaign of Mexican President Andres Manuel López Obrador, known as AMLO, received millions of dollars from the Sinaloa Cartel.

President Joe Biden meeting with Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador on January 9, 2023, overlooking the balcony at the National Palace in Mexico City [Photo: White House/Adam Schultz]

López Obrador, who lost the 2006 and 2012 elections likely due to fraud before being elected in 2018, denied the allegations on Wednesday. Identifying the reports as a coordinated effort to “slander” him and meddle in the June 2 general elections, he said: “I don’t denounce the journalists; I don’t denounce the outlets. I denounce the United States Government for allowing these immoral practices.” 

The articles by investigative journalists Tim Golden for ProPublica, Anabel Hernández for the German DW, and Steven Dudley for InsightCrime differ only in the details. 

As sources, Golden and Dudley cite unnamed US Drug Enforcement Agency (DEA) and Mexican government officials, while Hernández says she spoke to “a member of AMLO’s team and one of the Sinaloa Cartel.” Hernández, in particular, has a long record of exposures on this issue based on inside sources that have been later confirmed, especially regarding the case of former security chief Genaro García Luna, who was found guilty in New York last February of taking millions from the Sinaloa Cartel. 

The charges and evidence cited, although not shown, are credible given the numerous times López Obrador and members of his party have openly indicated their ties to the Sinaloa Cartel. For instance, last November, AMLO inexplicably visited the tiny town of Badiraguato, the birthplace of drug lords “Chapo” Guzmán and Caro Quintero, as well as of the Sinaloa Cartel, for the sixth time. He had hugged in public and acknowledged being in communication with the recently deceased mother of Guzmán.

But given their timing and sources, the reports are undoubtedly part of an effort by the US state to shift Mexican politics further to the right. They play against AMLO’s handpicked candidate for the presidency, Claudia Sheinbaum, and pressure the Mexican government as a whole to toe the line of US imperialism even more obediently.

Golden, whose article can be read as testimony by DEA officials, directly denounces the restrictions placed by AMLO on the operations of US law enforcement within Mexico and also criticizes Biden’s supposed indulgence toward AMLO.

The articles were also published a day after López Obrador denounced as “demagogic” and unacceptable the threat by Joe Biden to “shut down” the US-Mexico border in exchange for securing funding for the war against Russia in Ukraine and the Israeli genocide in Gaza from the Republicans in Congress. Donald Trump, for his part, has asked for “battle plans” to invade Mexico and fight the cartels if reelected as president.

The reports are based on an investigation carried out in 2010 and 2011 by the US District Court for the Southern District of New York and the DEA. 

Roberto López Nájera, the lawyer of US-born trafficker Edgar Valdéz Villarreal, alias “La Barbie,” became a DEA asset in 2008, allegedly as revenge for the disappearance of his brother. Two years later, Nájera told agents that he had participated in a meeting in January 2006 with two businessmen in Durango, northern Mexico, who requested campaign money for AMLO’s presidential bid, at the time as the candidate of the Party for Democratic Revolution (PRD). The businessmen said AMLO knew about the meeting and approved. 

Nájera was then introduced to Mauricio Soto Caballero, another businessman who was working with Nicolás Mollinedo, AMLO’s driver and campaign logistics chief. In three deliveries, “La Barbie,” who at the time operated under the Sinaloa Cartel, gave the campaign $2 million, on top of hefty donations for rallies in Durango, presumably through Soto Caballero and Mollinedo.

While Golden indicates that it is unclear whether AMLO knew about the donations, Hernández claims that the day of the final campaign rally in 2006, “according to the U.S. government,” AMLO spoke to “La Barbie” on the phone and thanked him for the money. 

Soto would later be tricked by the DEA into becoming an informant and presumably recorded Mollinedo confessing to the donations. The DEA was later going to use Soto in a larger undercover operation to prove the complicity of AMLO’s campaign but the Justice Department shut down the investigation claiming there was not enough evidence to justify it. At the time, the Obama administration was facing the fallout from the “Fast and Furious” undercover operation by DEA, which handed a huge arsenal of weapons to the cartels. 

In May 2012, after his extradition to the US, the lieutenant to “La Barbie” confirmed to agents the donations to AMLO’s campaign. 

Mollinedo denies the donations and left AMLO’s team after the 2012 presidential campaign. Soto Caballero was given a probation period and freed by the US District Court in Southern New York. He then worked for AMLO’s campaign in 2012 and is currently a member of Congress representing AMLO’s Morena party.

Anabel Hernández points out that the case could have been reopened in 2020, when former Mexican Secretary of Defense Gen. Salvador Cienfuegos was arrested in the United States and indicted on drug and money laundering charges based on extensive evidence of his helping a faction of the Beltrán Leyva cartel. However, López Obrador convinced then President Donald Trump to return Cienfuegos and close the case, blocking the possibility for an investigation into the 2016 campaign.

The ties between the cartels and the AMLO administration demonstrate that the ongoing military buildup is aimed not against drug traffickers, but at strengthening the repressive state apparatus against the working class. 

After promises to send the troops to their barracks helped AMLO get elected in 2018, his administration enshrined their deployment domestically in the Constitution, claiming it was necessary to “fight violence.” During his first four and a half years in power, however, there were more than 160,000 homicides, more than any six-year term since records began in 1994—mostly tied to conflicts between criminal bands. 

More broadly, all federal governments in Mexico since the 1990s have been exposed as being in bed with the cartels, which operate as multinational business conglomerates led by billionaires. These relations have become just another instrument of bourgeois rule. The large cartels and gangs have adapted to the traditional means of buying politicians and controlling politics through campaign finance, bribes and business opportunities. The entire ruling class, moreover, rules ultimately through violence and preys on the desperate levels of poverty, labor informality and unemployment that are fundamental for maintaining cheap labor and high profit rates. 

Even to claim that cartels resort to assassination as a means of compulsion more often than other segments of the ruling class can be put into question. For over a century, US imperialism has employed—through surrogates trained and funded by the US or directly by the Pentagon—the most brutal methods of semi-colonial control, including invasions, bloody coups, mass killings and torture across the Americas. 

Today, through its unanimous support for the US-Zionist genocide in Gaza, the entire American ruling class has embraced a level of barbarism that overshadows that of any cartel. 

Despite the massive levels of deaths from criminal bands in Mexico, it has been AMLO’s policies integrating the Mexican economy and society with US-NATO plans for world war with nuclear-armed Russia and China that represent the greatest threat to the safety of workers in Mexico. 

Moreover, as a result of the criminal policy of putting profits over lives and reopening key suppliers to US corporations, AMLO oversaw over 600,000 excess deaths during the first two years of the COVID-19 pandemic.