LONDON (Reuters) – Britain called on Sunday for international action on the issue of medical devices such as oximeters that work better on people with lighter skin, saying the disparities may have cost lives of ethnic minority patients during the COVID-19 pandemic. Health Secretary Sajid Javid said he had commissioned a review of the issue after learning that oximeters, which measure blood oxygen levels and are key to assessing COVID patients, give less accurate readings for patients with darker skin. “This is systemic across the world. This is about a racial bias in some medical instruments. It’s unintentional but it exists and oximeters are a really good example of that,” Javid said during an interview with the BBC. Asked whether people may have died of COVID-19 as a result of the flaw, Javid said: “I think possibly yes. I don’t have the full facts.” He said the reason for the discrepancies was that a lot of medical devices, drugs, procedures and textbooks were put together in white majority countries. “I want to make sure that we do something about it but not just in the UK. This is an international issue so I’m going to work with my counterparts across the world to change this,” said Javid.

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MOSCOW (Sputnik) – The North Korean Foreign Ministry has criticized the United Nations Human Rights Council for arbitrariness and ‘attacks’ only on few chosen countries. The foreign ministry in its statement, published by the state-run Korean Central News Agency (KCNA), has accused the UN of “going wide off its founding objectives” of ensuring fair and equal protection of human rights. It called the council a “three-ring circus where the Western countries target and attack independent developing countries as they please”. “In order to achieve the promotion and protection of genuine human rights as has been aspired by the international society, the first priority should be given to putting an end to the high-handedness and arbitrariness of the U.S. and the Western countries that bring the international human rights arena into disrepute,” the ministry added. Pyongyang also criticized the system of UNHCR special rapporteurs on human rights, stressing that many other countries have voiced similar concerns about their appointment procedure and choice of cases to investigate, as “selection only being made targeting the countries which go against Western values and its human rights standard”.

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BEIJING (AFP) – China has officially downgraded diplomatic ties with Lithuania in protest, the foreign ministry in Beijing said Sunday, after Taiwan established a de facto embassy in Vilnius. “The Chinese government had to lower diplomatic relations between the two countries... to safeguard its sovereignty and the basic norms of international relations,” the ministry said in a statement announcing the downgrade to the charge d’affaires level. “The Lithuanian government must bear all It added that Lithuania had “abandoned the political commitment made upon the establishment of diplomatic relations” with China.
It was a reference to the “One China” policy, under which countries officially recognize Beijing over Taipei. Taiwan announced that it would open the office in July, its first new diplomatic outpost in Europe in 18 years. That prompted a fierce rebuke from China. It withdrew its ambassador from Lithuania and demanded Vilnius do the same, which it eventually did.
China also halted freight trains to Lithuania and stopped issuing food export permits.

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KAYA (Dispatches) – French soldiers in Burkina Faso shot and injured at least four protesters on Saturday amid a three-day standoff in the town of Kaya. The military convoy was stopped by a blockade of civilians who are upset with the activities of the former colonial power which is active in the region aiding the fight against terrorist groups linked to Al-Qaeda and the Daesh. “Today they shot at us with heavy weapons. They first shot in the air and after they shot and wounded people. Is that normal?’’ protester Mahamadi Sawadogo told AP news agency. “You’re in our country, even though you colonized Africans there are things you must not do.’’ French troops are stationed in the wider Sahel region under the pretext of fighting the spread of militant forces there. However, reports emerged that the convoy of some 60 trucks aimed to deliver arms to the militants. The United Nations declared in July last year that the spread of terrorist attacks in West Africa was so fast that the region had to consider bolstering its response beyond current military efforts.

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SANTIAGO, Chile (AP) – Chileans voted for a new president Sunday following a polarizing campaign in which the leading candidates vowed to chart starkly different paths for the region’s most economically advanced country staggered by a recent wave of social unrest. Pre-election polls point to a large number of undecided voters but consistently have favored two of the seven candidates running: former student protest leader Gabriel Boric and his ideological opposite, José Antonio Kast, who has a history of defending Chile’s military dictatorship. But neither is expected to garner enough support to cross the 50% threshold required to avoid a runoff vote next month. Within striking distance of the two frontrunners are center-right candidate Sebastián Sichel and center left former Education Minister Yasna Provoste. Also up for grabs is Chile’s entire 155-seat lower house of congress and about half the senate.