ROCKY ROAD AHEAD FOR NEW FDA CHIEF CALIFF

Final Senate approval by a historically narrow 50-46 vote came only after the White House and Califf's supporters lobbied hard to gain sufficient support, a success that is very different from Califf's 89-4 approval back in 2016. Pressure to help control the high cost of prescription drugs will continue to drive FDA support for developing complex generic drugs and biosimilars. There is pressure to clarify rules governing e-cigarettes;a need to address serious health problems arising from contaminated food and seafood, including significant volumes of imported products;and the safety of cosmetic products, dietary supplements, sunscreens, and other non-prescription products raise additional complex issues.

Leader of the Pack?

AstraZeneca has potentially taken poll position in the race to develop a novel coronavirus vaccine, but will AZD1222 be ready in 2020? "The interim Phase I/II data for our coronavirus vaccine shows that the vaccine did not lead to any unexpected reactions and had a similar safety profile to previous vaccines of this type," said Professor Andrew Pollard, chief investigator of the Oxford Vaccine Trial at Oxford University and co-author of the trial, in a press release (1). [...]AstraZeneca and the European Commission recently concluded an agreement for the supply of up to 400 million doses (3), which adds to a prior arrangement the company had formed with the Inclusive Vaccines Alliance (4).

The Elephant (or Donkey) in the Room

With the United States presidential election merely days away (set to take place on 3 Nov. 2020), the world's gaze has shifted to the race for the White House and whether there will be a Republican or Democrat taking office. [...]if this circumstance were to change, there would be potential consequences for European pharma companies that have a presence in or deal with the US. If the Democrats win the presidency and have control over Congress, it is expected that foreign and generic-drug manufacturers would benefit as a result of lower market entrance barriers.

Developments in American politics 9

This textbook provides students of US Politics with an informed scholarly analysis of recent developments in the American political environment, using historical background to contextualize contemporary issues. As the ninth edition, this book reviews a time of political controversy in the United States, touching on topics such as gender, economic policy, gun control, immigration, the media, healthcare, the COVID-19 pandemic, and the widespread social protests against police brutality. The book looks both backwards to Trump's presidency and forward to Biden's. Ultimately, the editors and contributors evaluate the significance of these events on the future of American politics, providing a perspective that is at once broad and meticulous. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022. All rights reserved.

A Brief Statistical and Geostatistical Survey of the Relationship between COVID-19 and By-Mail Balloting in the 2020 North Carolina General Election

Adding to the already polarizing 2020 general election was the COVID-19 pandemic. One way in which this pandemic greatly affected the election was through an increased participation in by-mail, or mail-in, ballots. The state of North Carolina experienced a 316 percent increase in by-mail votes between 2016 and 2020, when approximately 977,186 votes were cast by mail. It is no surprise that this increase was due to the COVID-19 pandemic;however, these by-mail voting patterns are spatial in nature and vary across the state. This research measures to what degree COVID-19 rates affected by-mail voting rates. Using geographic information systems data developed from robust tabular files provided by the North Carolina State Board of Elections, by-mail votes were calculated and mapped at ZIP code scale and compared to COVID-19 rates measured at different dates. By-mail rates taken from final absentee tallies for the highest and lowest COVID-19 ZIP codes saw no significant differences across multiple dates (30 September 2020 and 31 October 2020) when COVID-19 data were collected. COVID-19 hot spots (high COVID-19 rates surrounded by other high COVID-19 rates) were extracted using geostatistical techniques and compared to COVID-19 cold spots (low COVID-19 rates surrounded by other low COVID-19 rates). It was found the lowest by-mail rates actually occurred in these COVID-19 hot spots across both dates, as well a metric that expressed percentage change in COVID-19 rates in the month before the 2020 election.Alternate :COVID-19使得已经两极分化的2020年美国大选, 变得更加雪上加霜。COVID-19影响选举的一种方式是邮寄选票的增加。2016年至2020年, 北卡罗来纳州的邮寄选票增加了316%, 共约977,186张。毫无疑问, COVID-19导致了邮寄选票的增加。然而, 邮寄选票在本质上是空间性的, 并且在北卡罗来纳州的各个地方具有差异性。本研究计算了COVID-19发病率对邮寄选票比例的影响程度。利用北卡罗来纳州选举委员会提供的准确的表格文件, 本文制作了地理信息系统数据, 在邮政编码尺度上对邮寄选票进行计算和制图, 并将这些邮寄选票与不同时间的COVID-19发病率进行了比较。在拥有最高和最低COVID-19发病率的邮政编码和不同时间（2020年9月30日和2020年10月31日）, 从缺失人数统计中得到的邮寄选票比例没有显著差异。利用地学统计方法提取COVID-19热点（COVID-19高发病率在空间上被其它高发病率所包围）, 并与COVID-19冷点（COVID-19低发病率在空间上被其它低发病率所包围）进行比较。结果发现, 在这两个时间内, 最低邮寄选票比例出现在COVID-19热点地区。本文还制定了一个指标, 可以表示2020年大选前一个月的COVID-19发病率百分比的变化。

Studying dimensions of representation: introducing the Belgian RepResent panel (2019–2021)

This research note presents the RepResent Belgian Panel (RBP). The RBP is a voter panel survey consisting of four waves fielded to a sample of voters in Belgium around the May 2019 federal, regional, and European elections in Belgium. It provides unique data on about 250 variables for a quota sample of the same respondents, pre-2019 elections (N = 7351), post-2019 elections (N = 3909), one year after the elections (N = 1996), and 2 years after the elections (N = 1119). The RBP panel dataset was designed to analyse voters' political attitudes and behaviours, notably on different dimensions of democratic representation, and with a specific focus on democratic resentment (e.g. citizens' attitudes towards democracy such as distrust and alienation, but also behaviours such as abstention, protest, or voting for anti-establishment parties). Its longitudinal structure allows to explore the political dynamics at play in Belgium throughout the lengthy government formation process. Finally, the last two waves of the RBP were fielded during the Covid-19 pandemic, allowing to explore public opinion before and during this global crisis. The RBP should be of interest to scholars of public opinion and electoral studies. © 2023, The Author(s).

Economic policy uncertainty, governance institutions and economic performance in Africa: are there regional differences?

In recent years, the global economy has witnessed several uncertainty-inducing events. However, empirical evidence in Africa on the effects of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on economic activities remains scanty. Besides, the moderating effect of governance institutions on the uncertainty-economic performance relationship in Africa and the likelihood of regional differences in the response of economic activities to EPU on the continent are yet to be investigated. To address these gaps, we applied system GMM and quantile regressions on a panel of forty-seven African countries from 2010 to 2019. We find that while global EPU and EPUs from China, USA and Canada exert considerable influence on economic performance in Africa, the effects of domestic EPU and EPUs from Europe, UK, Japan, and Russia were negligible, suggesting that African economies are resilient to these sources of uncertainty shocks. We also find that governance institutions in Africa are not significantly moderating the uncertainty-economic performance relationship. However, our results highlighted regional differences in the response of economic activities to uncertainty, such that when compared to East and West Africa, economic performance in Central, North and Southern Africa is generally more resilient to global EPU and EPUs from China, USA, Europe and UK. We highlighted the policy implications of these findings.

Tackling Covid-19, the Singapore Way

The Singapore government's strategy of managing the COVID-19 crisis in its first year was built upon its experience of handling the SARS crisis in 2003. The strategy showcased extensive capacities to test, trace, isolate, treat, and limit the importation of cases. Implementation was impressive at first, delivering results that were internationally admired. An emphasis on building social responsibility through transparent communication and the use of technology has also overall been successful. To keep the economy afloat and ready to thrive in postpandemic times, the government allocated approximately $100 billion in a budget that was business- and employer-centric, consistent with neoliberal globalization. Where the government failed was in its handling of the disease outbreaks in migrant worker dormitories, which it seemed not to have anticipated even though there had been warnings from civil society activists. Opportunistically, the PAP called for early parliamentary elections, arguing that a PAP government with a strong mandate was what successful management of this "crisis of a generation” required. Since Singaporeans are often thought to be risk-averse, there was an expectation of a landslide victory for the PAP with voters taking a "flight to safety” and supporting the only government they had ever known in this dominant-party system. Instead, the PAP lost significant vote share and 10 seats including two multi-member "group representation constituencies” were lost to the opposition. If these results reflected what voters thought of the government's performance in managing the COVID-19 crisis, they may well point more specifically to public dissatisfaction with immigration policy and the dormitories fiasco. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd. 2022.

Living in a Democracy as a Fallen People: A REVIEW ESSAY

Rather, it would be more correct to say that Donald Trump found a ready audience for nationalism and postliberal thinking in the United States and rode a seemingly unlikely wave into the White House by semi-miraculously navigating the twists and turns of the Electoral College. COVID-19, of course, has proved to be a breeding ground of predominantly right-wing conspiracy theories, including regarding vaccines even though they were the result of a Trump-led program. [...]he made an argument that Vice President Mike Pence would be able to refuse to certify the election results. Tocqueville approached democracy as a young aristocrat from a family that had suffered in the French Revolution.

Electoral Democracy and Working-Age Mortality.

Policy Points The erosion of electoral democracy in the United States in recent decades may have contributed to the high and rising working-age mortality rates, which predate the COVID-19 pandemic. Eroding electoral democracy in a US state was associated with higher working-age mortality from homicide, suicide, and especially from drug poisoning and infectious disease. State and federal efforts to strengthen electoral democracy, such as banning partisan gerrymandering, improving voter enfranchisement, and reforming campaign finance laws, could potentially avert thousands of deaths each year among working-age adults. CONTEXT: Working-age mortality rates are high and rising in the United States, an alarming fact that predates the COVID-19 pandemic. Although several reasons for the high and rising rates have been hypothesized, the potential role of democratic erosion has been overlooked. This study examined the association between electoral democracy and working-age mortality and assessed how economic, behavioral, and social factors may have contributed to it. METHODS: We used the State Democracy Index (SDI), an annual summary of each state's electoral democracy from 2000 to 2018. We merged the SDI with annual age-adjusted mortality rates for adults 25-64 years in each state. Models estimated the association between the SDI and working-age mortality (from all causes and six specific causes) within states, adjusting for political party control, safety net generosity, union coverage, immigrant population, and stable characteristics of states. We assessed whether economic (income, unemployment), behavioral (alcohol consumption, sleep), and social (marriage, violent crime, incarceration) factors accounted for the association. FINDINGS: Increasing electoral democracy in a state from a moderate level (defined as the third quintile of the SDI distribution) to a high level (defined as the fifth quintile) was associated with an estimated 3.2% and 2.7% lower mortality rate among working-age men and women, respectively, over the next year. Increasing electoral democracy in all states from the third to the fifth quintile of the SDI distribution may have resulted in 20,408 fewer working-age deaths in 2019. The democracy-mortality association mainly reflected social factors and, to a lesser extent, health behaviors. Increasing electoral democracy in a state was mostly strongly associated with lower mortality from drug poisoning and infectious diseases, followed by reductions in homicide and suicide. CONCLUSIONS: Erosion of electoral democracy is a threat to population health. This study adds to growing evidence that electoral democracy and population health are inextricably linked.

The influence of the environmental factor on the transformation of the main political parties in Germany

This article is devoted to the influence of the ever-increasing importance of measures to protect the environment and combat climate change in the political course of the European Union and Germany on the transformation of the main German national political parties (the Christian Democratic Union of Germany and the Christian Social Union in Bavaria, the Social Democratic Party, the Alliance 90/The Greens, the Free Democratic Party, the Alternative for Germany and the Left). According to the opinion polls in Germany, the environmental issues (the protection of the environment, the fight against climate change, and the energy turnaround) before the 2021 Bundestag elections were causing citizens' concern even more than the coronavirus pandemic. A similar environmental trend was observed before the 2019 European elections when climate change also came to the fore. As a result, the significant growth of the Alliance 90/The Greens in 2019 triggered the other German parties to think of the substantial environmental transformation of their political courses. The reason for it was the need both to preserve the current political influence in parliaments and to expand it further. This article aims to characterize the environmental evolution of the discourses, priorities, and influences of the main parties in Germany. For this aim, the author used the programmes and manifestos of the parties, opinion polls, statistics of election results, speeches of party leaders, etc. Based on the result of the research, the author concludes a significant shift in priorities and deepening of the environmental agenda of all the mentioned parties with an emphasis on climate change. It is also possible to trace that the competition on the proposed climate change targets reaches populist trends in some cases (e.g., in the cases of the Alternative for Germany and the Left). However, the opinion polls and other statistics show that the popularity of parties depends not only on the most important political topics such as the protection of the environment and the fight against climate change (i.e., the environmental factor) but also on other factors, where the reputation of party leaders, as well as historically formed traditional preferences of citizens, are crucial. In particular, it was reflected in the downgrade of the Alliance 90/The Greens, which reached the highest popularity in the 2021 spring. The party achieved record results in the Bundestag elections in September of 2021, but it could not claim the victory.

The Impact of COVID-19, Election Policies, and Partisanship on Voter Participation in the 2020 U.S. Election

The COVID-19 pandemic had the potential to wreak havoc on elections. Democracies initiated varied policies to minimize health risks to voters and election workers. This study assesses the impact of voting policies, personal exposure to COVID, and partisanship on voter behavior in the 2020 U.S. general election. Using a comparative state-politics approach and new data, we demonstrate that exposure to COVID substantially influenced voter turnout, and election policies had a major effect on whether a voter cast a ballot by mail, early in-person, or in-person on Election Day. Unique circumstances, including the emergence of voting policies as a polarizing issue, also spawned a new partisan voting gap that is especially prominent among heavy news consumers. Compared to 2018, many more Democrats than Republicans abandoned Election Day voting in favor of mail voting.

The Pandemic in Belarus in 2020-21: COVID-19 in the Shadow of Politics

The situation with COVID-19 in Belarus has been unique compared to other countries in the region since its very inception in February 2020. When the first case was registered the problem of a purely medical character barged into the realities of the authoritarian regime, leading to a mass decrease in its popularity, and spurring a social solidarity movement with physicians. At the same time, 2020 was the year of the presidential election in Belarus that caused a deep political crisis and made the COVID-19 topic disappear from people's consciousness because both society and representatives of the state machine were concerned not by the virus, but by repressions, prospects of the ruling power, and their own future. For one thing, we ought to note that the figures of those who fell ill, recovered, and died, which are presented by data provided by the Health Ministry should not be trusted. We explain in the "State statistics: Trust issues” section of the chapter. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.

Pandemic Democracy in Manipur: By Elections and Covid-19

This article provides an initial assessment of the many risks posed by the COVID-19 pandemic on the conduct of genuine and transparent elections in Manipur. It begins with explaining why elections are a vital part of democracy and then using the notion of the electoral cycle, constructs a risk matrix that assesses the relative impact and likelihood of risks to the cycle, as well as proposes a number of potential mitigations to these risks. The root cause of the by-elections in Manipur is to be the election of the Rajya Sabha which held on June 19, 2020 by indulging in cross voting in favour of BJP candidate. There is a clear that the rise of Covid-19 cases be increased during the democratic process of by-elections such as, mass rallies, congregation etc. without maintaining SOPs. The number of elections dimensions of the electoral cycle that can be disrupted and the need for solution raises significant questions about the future of democracy itself.Copyright © 2020 Ubiquity Press. All rights reserved.

Republic of Congo: Opposition Alliance

"There are other (parties) which will be coming along", said B Jean-Jacques Serge Yhombi-Opango b , the RDD's vice president and son of the party's founder, who died from Covid-19 in 2020. Three opposition parties in the Republic of Congo have joined forces ahead of the next elections, for which veteran hardline leader B Denis Sassou Nguesso b is a potential candidate. The Alliance for Democratic Change in 2026, unveiled on April 13th, brings together three parties that have grassroots support but no legislative seats. [Extracted from the article] Copyright of Africa Research Bulletin: Political, Social & Cultural Series is the property of John Wiley & Sons, Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Intertwined Geographies of the Pandemic and the U.S. Presidential Election of 2020: COVID-19 Prevalence and Donald Trump

For all, 2020 was beyond extra ordinary. While at the start of 2020 much of the world was transfixed on Donald Trump and the upcoming 2020 presidential election in the United States, a virus began emerging in China. In the early months of 2020, the term's coronavirus or COVID-19, would become too familiar and by March 2020 as the world faced the first major Pandemic since the Spanish Flu outbreak in 1918. In the U.S., the reactions and beliefs about the ferocity of the virus and the mitigation strategies to halt the spread became deeply entangled in the nation's already highly partisan political divides. This chapter will focus on the impacts of COVID-19 on the 2020 presidential election. Specifically, this chapter will provide a temporal and spatial representation of COVID-19 on the 2020 election cycle from the presidential primaries, to the presidential campaigns, the November 3, 2020 election, and ending with the January 20, 2021 inauguration of newly elected President Joe Biden. It was clear, after the election distinct spatial patterns between COVID-19 rates and partisan preference were identifiable. In general, higher rates of COVID-19 correlated with higher support for Donald Trump. Maps and statistical analyses complement the investigation of a uniquely intertwined political geography between the spread of COVID-19 and American electoral politics. © The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2022.

Race, poverty and unemployment as quantitative predictors of voter turnout in St. Louis amidst COVID-19 and a racial justice movement

PurposeThe 2020 election season brought with it a global public health pandemic and a reenergized racial justice movement. Given the social context of the intertwined pandemics of COVID-19 and racialized violence, do the traditional predictors of voter turnout – race, poverty rates and unemployment rates – remain significant?Design/methodology/approachUsing county-level, publicly available data from twelve Midwest states with similar demographic and cultural characteristics, voter turnout in St. Louis City and St. Louis County were predicted using race, poverty rates and unemployment rates.FindingsFindings demonstrate that despite high concentration of poverty rates and above average percentages of Black residents, voter turnout was significantly higher than predicted. Additionally, findings contradict previous studies that found higher unemployment rates resulted in higher voter participation rates.Originality/valueThis study suggests that the threat of COVID-19 and fear of an increase in police violence may have introduced physical risk as a new theoretical component to rational choice theory for the general election in 2020.

NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: Presidential Tweets, the U.S.–U.K. Free Trade Agreement, Humanitarian Intervention, and China's Bilateral Relations

" Words Matter: Presidents Obama and Trump, Twitter, and U.S. Soft Power. Graph [9] concentrate on the issues that soured the initial optimism for a U.S.-U.K. free trade agreement between President Trump and Prime Minister Johnson which did not come to its planned fruition by 2020. EN Social Media Foreign Policy Twitter Soft Power Obama Trump Boris Johnson Humanitarian Intervention President Clinton Bosnia Kosovo China Sri-Lanka Kazakhstan South Korea ASEAN Sub-Saharan Africa Information Technology. NOTE FROM THE EDITOR: Presidential Tweets, the U.S.-U.K. Free Trade Agreement, Humanitarian Intervention, and China's Bilateral Relations. [Extracted from the article] Copyright of World Affairs is the property of Sage Publications Inc. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Teaching controversial issues during a presidential election: Exploring how teachers navigated polarized politics in 2020

American politics today is the culmination of historical, political, social, geographic, and economic events that have significantly impacted this country. Over the last year, America and the world have been tested to political, social, and economic extremes not seen in over a century because of the Coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. Both the 2020 Presidential election and the storming of the Capitol on January 6th, 2021 are just two of the events that challenged teachers and educators across all levels of schooling to change and adapt teaching practices. It has forced citizens to have difficult conversations about democracy, equality, health, and safety. Educators tasked with teaching government and civics are required to teach political parties and the functions of government. However, in this current socially distant and polarized political climate, doing so was tremendously difficult. For some high school students and teachers, teaching secondary government is only a nine-week crash course into the functions of the government and rights outlined to students. Nine weeks to teach the functions of government, Constitution, rights of citizens, powers of the president, courts, and how federalism and states interact. Furthermore, only a small minority of students who take government courses do so during a presidential election cycle. This reality underscores the importance of understanding how teachers help students navigate such an important function of government. In this polarized political climate post-2016, it is of interest to study how teachers have prepared to teach the election and document their experience navigating campaign issues. This study hopes to shed light on the educational strategies and expectations of secondary government and civics teachers teaching controversial political topics surrounding the 2020 election. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)