Pandemic, dire economy, unrest upend US Prez race ISRAEL OPENS FACTORY TO MAKE HIGH-SPEC MASKS AS IT PREPARES FOR A POSSIBLE SECOND COVID-19 WAVE

National reflection over racial inequality during campaign by incumbent Trump, challenger Biden

Washington, June 7: Three concurrent crises scarring the United States — a deadly health pandemic, economic despair and widespread social unrest — have reframed this year’s presidential contest and prompted national reflection over racial inequality in America.

Is the country on the cusp of a transformation, or will systemic inequalities exacerbated by the Covid-19 crisis persist, allowing alienation and marginalisation to fester? In weeks, the unprecedented strain has become the focal point of the ferocious White

House campaign between President Donald Trump and Democrat Joe Biden, two politicians approaching the disasters with very different strategies.

It has been several generations since the country has experienced such a sharp and rapid confluence of major emergencies, a national low point that philosopher Cornell West has branded “America’s moment of reckoning”.

Nearly 110,000 Americans have died of Covid-19, and tens of millions are jobless due to pandemic-prompted lockdowns. At the same time, unrest has gripped dozens of US cities where protesters demand justice over the killing by Minneapolis police of unarmed black man George Floyd. Repeated episodes of police brutality caught on camera, even as most demonstrations have been peaceful, have further laid bare the nation’s deep social wounds.

“It’s a pretty bad moment,” said Daniel Gillion, a political science professor at the University of Pennsylvania and author of “The Loud Minority”. The crises, he said, have been “horrific” for African Americans, who traditionally have poorer health care outcomes, have just a fraction of the household wealth of whites, and are more likely to face police brutality. “I can’t think of a (modern-day) period where blacks have experienced such strife, such pain, such hardship,” Gillion said. Among Covid-19 victims, a disproportionate number are people of colour. While Trump on Friday touted a surprise drop in the overall jobless rate from 14.7 percent in April to 13.3 percent in May, black unemployment actually rose, to 16.8 percent.

Jerusalem, June 7: Israel said Sunday it had opened a factory to make millions of high-spec masks as it prepares for a possible “second wave” of Covid-19 cases. After imposing tough measures to tackle the Covid-19 illness, Israel has fared relatively well in the initial months of the pandemic. More than 17,700 infections have been registered among a population of nine million, with nearly 300 deaths.

But as the country has gradually opened up in recent weeks, new outbreaks have occurred and the government has warned Israelis not to become complacent. “We are preparing for a second wave of the virus,” said Defence Minister Benny Gantz, announcing the country’s first production line of N95 masks. N95 masks offer a higher level of protection and are more sturdy than the simple medical masks worn by many Israelis.

Gantz said the local production “removes our dependence on foreign factors and contributes to the Israeli economy during a difficult period”. The new masks are being made in Sderot using machines imported from China.

Daniel Lev Israeli, owner of the Sion Medical Company, making the masks, said his firm will be able to produce around two million a month.