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Health

Moody’s says hospitals, utilities face high hacking risks

Around $22 trillion of global debt rated by Moody’s has a ‘high’ or ‘very high’ exposure to the risk of cyber attack, the ratings agency said in a report on Thursday, with hospitals and utilities seen at the greatest risk. Out of $80 trillion worth of debt across 71 sectors that the rating agency monitors, […]

Medication, Pill, Capsule

Europe’s generic drugmakers may cut output due to high energy bills

Europe’s drugmakers have warned they may stop making some cheap generic medicines because of surging electricity costs and are calling for an overhaul of the way they are priced, the latest industry to seek help as the energy crisis deepens. The generic drug industry lobby group Medicines for Europe, which represents companies including Teva, Novartis’s […]

Burjeel eyes local investors for IPO after IHC buys stake

Abu Dhabi-based hospital operator Burjeel Holdings is seeking local investors for its planned initial public offering, two sources said, scrapping plans to seek foreign investors after Abu Dhabi’s International Holding Company (IHC) took a 15 percent stake this week. Egypt-listed EFG-Hermes and JP Morgan are no longer on the deal, said the sources, declining to […]

Altibbi plans healthcare expansion in North Africa and Pakistan

Altibbi, the largest AI-based digital health provider in the Arab world, is looking to expand into North Africa and Pakistan after “turbocharging” growth in Saudi Arabia and Egypt, its CEO has told AGBI. Jalill Allabadi said the proceeds from Altibbi’s latest funding round of $44 million – the largest ever single financing round for a […]

A Burjeel hospital

Abu Dhabi’s IHC acquires 15% stake in Burjeel Holdings

Abu Dhabi-based International Holding Company (IHC) has purchased a 15 percent stake in healthcare provider Burjeel Holdings. The acquisition aims to diversify IHC’s investment in the healthcare sector locally and regionally, WAM, the UAE state news agency, reported. Founded in 2007, UAE-based Burjeel Holdings is a private healthcare services provider, with a growing presence in […]

Britain to recruit health workers from Nepal to offset shortage

Britain will recruit health professionals from Nepal under its first labour agreement with the Himalayan country, officials said on Monday, helping Britain offset a labour gap while Nepal bids to boost remittances from migrant workers. A joint statement by Nepal government and the British Embassy in Kathmandu said they had signed a preliminary agreement to […]

Bottle, Lotion, Shampoo

Johnson & Johnson to end global sales of talc-based baby powder

Johnson & Johnson will stop selling talc-based baby powder globally in 2023, the drugmaker said, more than two years after it ended US sales of a product that drew thousands of consumer safety lawsuits. “As part of a worldwide portfolio assessment, we have made the commercial decision to transition to an all cornstarch-based baby powder […]

Downtown, City, Urban

Macau turns more casino hotels into Covid medical centres

Macau authorities have added two hotels in popular casino resorts to be used as Covid-19 medical facilities from Friday as they try to ramp up capacity to handle a surge of infections in the world’s biggest gambling hub. The east wing of Grand Lisboa Palace owned by SJM Holdings and the Grand Hyatt hotel owned […]

Injection

Saudi Arabia to invest $3.4bn in vaccine, biomedical drugs sector

Saudi Arabia’s industry and Mineral Resources minister said on Friday the country would invest $3.4 billion in the vaccine and biomedical drugs sector, according to state news agency SPA. The Minister Bandar Alkhorayef, who heads the newly-established vaccines and biopharmaceutical industry committee, said the move is part of the kingdom’s push towards achieving pharmaceutical security […]

Airlines upbeat on recovery but labour shortages may hurt growth

Global airlines battered by COVID-19 seem confident of narrowing their losses but still face challenges such as labour shortages at airports which could restrict post-crisis growth, industry executives at a summit in Doha said. Recent flight delays and cancellations have been widely blamed on a lack of staff as an increasing number of people desert […]

UK should have done better on Covid-19: IATA director general

A top airline industry official on Tuesday said the UK should have responded “a hell of a lot better” to Covid-19 and argued aviation should have been more forceful in challenging government-mandated border closures during the pandemic. Willie Walsh, director general of the International Air Transport Association (IATA), also defended airlines’ handling of a rebound […]

Formula One appoints Shaila-Ann Rao as new interim head

Shaila-Ann Rao, who was previously a special advisor to Mercedes team boss Toto Wolff, took over as interim head of Formula One at the governing FIA on Wednesday in place of departed Peter Bayer. The Paris-based FIA, which voted in Emirati Mohammed Ben Sulayem as president last December to succeed departing Frenchman Jean Todt, thanked […]

Amazon.com says it is being unfairly targeted by US Congress bill

By David Shepardson and Diane Bartz Amazon.com Inc on Wednesday lambasted a bill in Congress barring tech giants from giving preference to their own businesses on their websites, saying it unfairly singles the retailer out while not subjecting rivals to similar regulations. The Senate could vote on the bill as early as this month, media […]

Food, Invertebrate, Animal

Turkey to receive $500m from World Bank for COVID-19 vaccines

The World Bank said on Thursday that its board had approved $500 million in additional financing to support Turkey in its efforts to fight against COVID-19. The funds, which will have a maturity of 10.5 years with a five-year grace period, will be used to ensure access to safe and effective COVID-19 vaccines in Turkey, […]

Covid testing in Taiwan

Taiwan, now trying to ‘live with Covid’, has 80,000 cases a day

Taiwan was billed as a coronavirus success story when its economy boomed in the pandemic, but the island is now battling a record wave of infections as it eases restrictions to start “living with the virus”. For the whole of 2021, Taiwan reported under 15,000 locally transmitted cases. It is now registering around 80,000 cases […]

Egypt’s net foreign assets retreat further into the red

Egypt’s net foreign assets (NFAs) dropped by 169.7 billion Egyptian pounds ($9.17 billion) in March, the sharpest decline since the coronavirus crisis broke out in February 2020, central bank data showed on Sunday. NFAs fell to a negative 221.3 billion pounds at the end of March from a negative 51.69 billion pounds a month earlier. […]

Air travel took a massive hit globally as the pandemic took hold. Picture: Creative Commons

Saudi reveals post-Covid entry policy in tourism push

Government white paper proposes simplifying health-related entry protocols for travellers to the kingdom Saudi Arabia is working to introduce a shared framework by which countries can share information on local and global health crises to prevent disruption in air travel to and from the kingdom. The proposed policy, called Harmonising Air Travel and set out […]

Betting big on drug discovery, UK’s OMass Therapeutics raises $100m

Betting on a fresh formula for the arduous, expensive and failure-prone field of drug discovery, UK-based OMass Therapeutics on Thursday said it has raised $100million in series B funding. Including the latest injection – led by a pack of prominent new investors including the Google Ventures and Sanofi Ventures as well as existing investors such […]