14 NEWS Best columns: Europe
UNITED KINGDOM
“Trendy woke ideals” are replacing “British
values” in our schools, said Calvin Robinson. A
middle school in northern England has renamed
its schoolhouses for modern activists in place of
historical figures. Lord Nelson, Sir Francis Drake,
and Sir Walter Raleigh have been dumped for envi-
ronmental activist Greta Thunberg, girls’ education
activist Malala Yousafzai, and Marcus Rashford,
a Manchester United soccer star and campaigner
against child hunger. The “removal of dead white
men” is, of course, all the rage in the wake of last
year’s Black Lives Matter demonstrations, during
which statues of slave traders and colonialists werepulled down. But to replace heroes such as Lord
Nelson with living young people, who may yet do
something offensive or deplorable, is ridiculous.
Will the school rename its houses again if one of
its new heroes “gets canceled”? In fact, the selec-
tion of Thunberg is already questionable, since her
Friday strikes for the climate have made her “the
global face of school truancy.” What’s worse is
that the whole project was sparked by complaints
from a single student who lectured her principal
on the supposedly shameful legacy of the three
historical figures. It should be the “teacher’s job to
educate young people, not the other way round.”Will our new prime minister reverse Italy’s habit
of ignoring the South? asked Roberto Napole-
tano. Mario Draghi, the former European central
banker who was last month appointed to head a
technocratic government, says he wants to follow
the example of Italy’s post– World War II leaders
and launch a “New Reconstruction” that will
rebuild our pandemic-ravaged economy. If he is
serious, he will have to tear up decades of policies
that have funneled public spending to the wealthy
North at the expense of the needy South. Right
now, spending on social services in the alpine
region of Bolzano, for example, is 650 euros per
capita, while Calabria—the toe of Italy’s boot—gets a paltry 27 euros per capita. Can Prime
Minister Draghi do better? The “litmus test” will
come when we see how his government disburses
the $250 billion in coronavirus relief funds that
Italy has been allocated by the European Union.
The previous government wanted to peg spend-
ing to “fiscal capacities of the territories”—which
would have meant “giving more to the well-off”
regions while denying funding for schools, child
care, and elder care to “the very areas that need
it most.” Building a fair and prosperous Italy will
require deep investments in the South to reverse
past neglect. Anything else will be national “eco-
nomic suicide.”GettyMost Europeans are desperate to get in-
oculated against Covid-19, said Bruno
Ripoche in Ouest-France (France)—but
they won’t settle for just any vaccine.
The two-dose regimen developed by
the Anglo- Swedish pharmaceutical firm
Astra Zeneca and Oxford University has
been widely used in the U.K., where about
1 in 3 people have received at least one
dose of a vaccine, compared with 1 in
20 in the European Union. Yet across the
EU, people are shunning Astra Zeneca and
holding out for other vaccines. In Belgium,
only 4 percent of available Astra Zeneca
doses have been administered; in Germany, 13 percent. Many
think it’s a second-class shot: Clinical trials found Astra Zeneca’s
vaccine to be about 60 percent effective in preventing infections,
while Pfizer’s and Moderna’s were about 95 percent effective.
Astra Zeneca’s PR problems were exacerbated by French President
Emmanuel Macron, who in January—as EU leaders bickered
with the pharma firm over delayed deliveries— falsely claimed
the shot was “ quasi- ineffective” in older adults. That wrongful
impression led France, Germany, and other EU members to rule
it could be given only to those under age 65. New research shows
that Astra Zeneca’s vaccine is in fact plenty protective—four weeks
after one dose, it slashes the risk of being hospitalized by Covid
by 94 percent—and Macron now says he’ll gladly get a jab of the
stuff. But is it too late to change the public’s mind?Astra Zeneca has a terrible image problem in Germany, said
Alex ander Fröhlich in Der Tagesspiegel (Germany). One reason
is our army of conspiracy theorists, who have been exploitingthe case of Timo Sievert, a paramedic
and popular YouTuber. After Sievert,
39, got his Astra Zeneca shot in early
February, the right side of his body was
temporarily paralyzed; he still has trou-
ble with walking and grasping with his
right hand. Doctors think the vaccine
may have triggered “a flare-up of previ-
ously undiagnosed multiple sclerosis.”
Sievert insists, “I would get the shot
again,” and encourages his followers
to get inoculated. But far-right Covid
deniers are telling their own followers
to reject the vaccine.Still, many Germans will happily take any shot on offer, said Til-
man Aretz in N-TV.de (Germany). Why not let them? With more
than 1 million doses of Astra Zeneca sitting on shelves, we need
to “get these shots into arms”—any willing arms. Restricting vac-
cination to priority groups makes sense when there is a shortage
of doses, but with Astra Zeneca, “we have a glut.” Yet Chan-
cellor Angela Merkel, a chemist by training, insists on following
her science advisers and reserving all vaccines for the elderly and
front-line workers. When asked if she would get the Astra Zeneca
shot on live TV to assuage fears, she refused to jump the line, add-
ing, “I am 66 years old and I do not belong to the recommended
group.” She soon will, said Alfonso Bianchi in Europa.Today
.it (Italy). France has approved Astra Zeneca’s use in some over
65s, and other countries are following suit. Plus, new U.K. re-
search suggests the jab is just as effective as Pfizer’s—and possibly
slightly more so—in protecting against symptomatic Covid among
over-80s after one dose. Astra Zeneca’s “revenge is coming.”Cancel culture
comes for
Lord Nelson
Calvin Robinson
The Times
ITALY
Awaiting willing recipients in GermanyWhen will
the South
get its due?
Roberto Napoletano
Il Quotidiano del Sud
European Union: Shunning AstraZeneca’s vaccine