A very important holiday announcement
The splainer team will be taking their annual holiday, starting Friday, December 24. We will be back and raring to go on January 3. We know you will miss getting your daily splainer during this week, but as a founder, I strongly believe in a work culture that encourages mental wellness and work-life balance. We wish you all a joyous and restful holiday with your friends and fam, as well:)
PS: To make up for our absence, we are working on a big holiday advisory for Thursday—which we hope will give you lots of fun things to do… other than reading the news lol!
The Omicron variant: A holiday advisory
Here’s some important research to note if you’re making plans over Christmas:
- An Imperial College study found “no evidence” that Omicron causes less severe disease than Delta—“judged by either the proportion of people testing positive who report symptoms, or by the proportion of cases seeking hospital care after infection."
- The same study found that previous infections offered only 19% protection against reinfection.
- But it offered this caveat: “hospitalisation data remains very limited at this time.” In other words, researchers didn’t have enough such cases to reach any conclusions—since these are early days.
- Also important: This New York Times report which collates early data on vaccine efficacy—which concludes that only mRNA boosters show some success in fending off Omicron. Most other vaccines like Covishield, Sputnik etc “offer almost no defense against becoming infected.”
- An important caveat: “Most evidence so far is based on laboratory experiments, which do not capture the full range of the body’s immune response, and not from tracking the effect on real-world populations. The results are striking, however.”
- A silver lining: They still protect against severe disease.
Moral of this story: Please be careful out there, people!
In related news: The glitziest global summit Davos has postponed its annual meeting for the second consecutive year thanks to Omicron. It may now be held in the summer. (Wall Street Journal via Mint)
Meanwhile in Delhi: The capital is experiencing the worst dengue outbreak since 2016. The total number of cases have crossed 9,400—and 17 people have died. Point to note: Delhi currently has only 540 Covid cases. (NDTV)
Chile swings to the left
Left-leaning Gabriel Boric will become the youngest president of Chile—after winning a highly polarised election that pitched him against far-right politician José Antonio Kast. Why this matters: This is a vote for Boric’s unabashedly left agenda—which includes “expanding social rights and reforming Chile's pension and healthcare systems, as well as reducing the work week from 45 to 40 hours, and boosting green investment.” And many observers believe that his win is part of a broader regional trend. Los Angeles Times and BBC News have more details. PS: Weirdly enough, someone targeted his face with a laser pen during his victory speech.
Not doing well on the democracy front: Hong Kong, where only 30.2% of residents turned out to vote in the latest legislative election—down from the 58% turnout in the previous one five years ago. Point to note: None of the city's major pro-democracy parties fielded any candidates. This marks a steep decline in citizen engagement ever since Beijing introduced “improvements to the electoral system.” (CNN)
An uproar over J&K assembly seats
The government has always held that there can be no elections in Jammu & Kashmir until it completes the delimitation exercise—i.e. redrawing boundaries to decide how many assembly constituencies each will have. A new proposal plans to create seven new seats—and give six to Jammu and just one to Kashmir. So the total seats for each will be 43 and 47, respectively. The government says this lopsided distribution is justified by the population numbers in the 2011 census. Critics say this is dirty politics—pitching one community against another. For example: Caravan journalist Hartosh Singh Bal points to population data to argue that 51 seats out of 90 should be allotted to Kashmir—12 more than Jammu. NDTV and The Telegraph have more details.
Aishwarya Rai in tax trouble?
The Enforcement Directorate summoned the actor and grilled her for five hours. The reason: She is suspected of stashing cash in offshore accounts. This is because her name popped up in the Panama Papers investigation—where a global consortium of media outlets published names of very rich folks holding vast amounts of money in tax havens. If you need more background, check out The Guardian’s explainer on the Panama Papers. (NDTV)
Human brain cells vs AI: The Pong edition
Researchers taught a collection of human brain cells—grown in a petri dish—how to play the video game. And they found that these ‘mini brains’ learn the game faster than AI: “The [amazing] aspect is how quickly it learns, in five minutes, in real time.” Now, here are two added bits of info from the scientists designed to make you flinch.
First: “We often refer to them [the mini brains] as living in the Matrix. When they are in the game, they believe they are the paddle.” Far scarier: The researchers hope to use their findings to develop sophisticated technology using “live biological neurons integrated with traditional silicon computing.” Yikes! You can watch the “cyborg” brains in action below: (Futurism)
TikTok is betting big on food
The company is launching a takeout biz called TikTok Kitchen—which will serve dishes based on recipes that have gone viral. The menu will include baked feta pasta, corn ribs, a smash burger, and pasta chips—and will change based on what is trending. An interesting question to ponder: Who will be compensated for these viral recipes:
“First, the claim that TikTok will pay recipe creators is nice but has plenty of holes. Viral recipes often have more than one video that popularized them, and those videos aren’t necessarily from the original recipe’s creator. Take baked feta pasta: It first went viral on Instagram in a post from a Finnish blogger, but made the jump to TikTok when @feelgoodfoodie and @grilledcheesesocial clocked the trend and posted their versions of the dish. So who actually gets the credit, and the cash?”
Spiderman is a box office sensation
The latest installment, ‘Spider-Man: No Way Home’, grossed $260 million in the US—and made $121.5 million on its first day. And it made $340.8 million from more than 60 overseas markets. Sony had hoped for $130-150 million at best. The movie broke all pandemic box office records—and is now the second best opening of all time, behind ‘Avengers: Endgame’. (NBC News)
North Korea bans laughing
All citizens are not allowed to laugh for 11 days marking the death anniversary of Kim Jong-il—father of current dictator du jour Kim Jong-un. A person can’t even go grocery shopping on the exact date:
“During the mourning period, we must not drink alcohol, laugh or engage in leisure activities…Even if your family member dies during the mourning period, you are not allowed to cry out loud and the body must be taken out after it’s over. People cannot even celebrate their own birthdays if they fall within the mourning period.”
The kicker: The police are tasked with the responsibility of making sure everyone looks sufficiently “upset.” Why do we need fiction at all? (Telegraph UK)
Four things to see
One: Custom officials in Mumbai found smuggled gold in the most unexpected place: A flask full of coffee carried by Kenyan women traveling from Sharjah: “The gold in the form of bars, wires and powder was concealed in coffee powder bottles, linings of inner-wear, footwear and masala bottles being carried by the women.” (NDTV)
Two: The US Navy unveiled uniforms for pregnant sailors: “[T]he maternity flight suit prototype was designed to help pregnant aircrew fit in their uniforms as they progress in their pregnancy by adding expandable panels to standard flight suits.” And that’s very cool! (Daily Mail)
Three: Newborn baby girls are abandoned all the time in India. But this story has an unexpected twist: The baby—left without any clothing and with the umbilical cord intact in a field—was discovered by stray dogs. And one of them protected the baby along with her puppies. She has since been rescued and is doing well. (Indian Express)
Four: Speaking of dogs, meet Reas—the three-year-old male whippet who is officially the fastest dog in America. He ran a 100-yard dash in just 5.769 seconds. (National Geographic)