COVID-19 is going to kill more people in 2021 than it did last year. If you want to see why, look at what’s happening in India. Cases have been surging in the country of 1.37 billion people. Case counts are rising quickly, too. Average infection numbers over the past seven days have run at nearly three times the level two weeks ago, a pace of growth that the US last saw in the early days of the outbreak a year ago. The real numbers may be yet higher. The city of Bhopal used COVID-19 pro

The original Earth Day on April 22 in 1970 drew Americans’ attention to their planet. This year’s is designed to draw the planet’s attention to Americans. President Joe Biden’s climate conference, kicking off Thursday, aims to demonstrate that the US is serious about tackling climate change, and showing it can outcompete China in the process. In doing so, though, Biden is also reaffirming his intent to transform the domestic scene with multitrillion dollar infrastructure

The blooming of yellow forsythias heralds the long awaited arrival of spring. The golden bells are everywhere, on the sides of Seoul’s numerous rocky mountains, by the Han River and along school fences. The golden yellows are soon joined by the creamy white elegance of magnolia blossoms that, at night, look like candle lights floating midair. All too soon, they fade, the large petals falling to the ground one by one. But don’t despair, there are delicate pale pink cherry blossoms

The by-elections for mayors in Seoul and Busan ended in landslide defeats for President Moon Jae-in’s Democratic Party. Winning 57.5 percent of the vote, former Mayor Oh Se-hoon returned to City Hall 10 years after resigning over opposition to free school lunches. In Busan, that Democratic Party candidate won only 34.4 percent of the vote, a huge drop from the 55.2 percent it won in June 2018. Two main currents running against the Democratic Party came together to produce the storm. The f

President Joe Biden‘s bid to retool the US economy has me thinking about the parallels with earlier transformational presidents: FDR and Reagan. One of the most interesting aspects of these previous administrations was that the big changes they implemented actually began under their predecessors of the opposite party. Just as Ronald Reagan expanded on Jimmy Carter’s accomplishments, and Franklin D. Roosevelt got a running start from Herbert Hoover, Biden is benefiting from a change i

For the reshuffle of Cabinet ministers and Blue House staff announced last week, President Moon Jae-in made more reasonable choices than at any other time in his entire tenure. Notable was the appointment of Lee Chul-hee as the senior presidential secretary for political affairs, a post responsible for taking care of the administration’s relations with the opposition. Lee, 56, had given up running for the National Assembly after serving one term on a proportional representation ticket, e

To judge by the headlines, you’d think the most critical immunization issue facing the world is the safety and hesitancy concerns over the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines. That debate is genuinely important. Still, it shouldn’t distract from the biggest challenge the world will face over the coming months: the grossly unequal distribution of vaccines between rich and poor countries. The development and ramp-up of preventive medicine for the coronavirus are a testamen

When we are born, we cannot choose our home and our country. Since these two things determine our destiny, they could be either the best gifts or the worst nightmares to us, depending on the situation. If your parents were destitute, you will know what it is to suffer poverty and will learn not to expect any financial support from them. Likewise, if you were born in a country plagued by war, you may end up being a refugee or a migrant worker wandering foreign lands. Unfortunately, we have no

When President Joe Biden announced he was ending “the forever war” in Afghanistan by pulling out the last 3,500 or so US troops based there by Sept. 11, my mind flashed to Afghans I know for whom that speech could spell prison or death. I thought of Fawzia Koofi, a female member of the Afghan team negotiating with the Taliban, who was shot several months ago in an attempted assassination and fears for her daughters. And Suraya Pakzad, who runs shelters for battered women. And the fe

As the late Swedish economist Assar Lindbeck memorably put it, “In many cases rent control appears to be the most efficient technique presently known to destroy a city -- except for bombing.” And yet that’s never kept economic populists from passing new rent curbs. One of the most radical such attempts, watched by cities all over the world, was enacted last year in Berlin. This week, however, Germany’s constitutional court ruled that the law is null and void. In the shor

US President Joe Biden is very familiar with both Poland and Ukraine. His decades of service as a United States senator and his eight years as vice president under Barack Obama taught him that the two countries are among America’s most devoted friends and allies. Yet he waited until April 2 -- just as Russian troops were once again massing on Ukraine’s eastern border -- to call Ukraine’s president, and he still has not spoken to his Polish counterpart. Biden’s relative s

In politics, as in sport, some miscues can be corrected or overcome. But not all of them, even for the world‘s most iron-fisted rulers. Whether borne of hubris or misreading the situation, slip-ups tend to increase as regimes age and the consequences can be unpredictable. Could this be the moment Vladimir Putin opens himself up to unforced errors of the authority-threatening kind? After more than two decades under his watch, Russia has entered a darker, more repressive phase. A bounce in

A month ago, I read an article about Lee Bong-ju, one of the legendary marathoners in South Korea. He has been suffering from unknown pain since last year. Many doctors examined him to find a cure for his disease but have failed. Although his current situation is hopeless, he is eager to run again once he is fully recovered. After reading the article, I thought of the similarities between Lee Bong-ju, Lance Armstrong, and Ludwig van Beethoven. Lance Armstrong is also an athlete like Lee Bong-j

Munpia, one of the biggest web novel platforms in South Korea, is reportedly in talks with major portals Naver and Kakao to sell a controlling stake. There is no doubt that storytelling matters in the era of digital content and the category of web novels deserves attention, considering its potential as a source for other multimedia content. Munpia, which started as an online community in 2002, now boasts over 100 million page views on the strength of some 400,000 visitors per month. With 47,0

People lucky enough to have the option are looking forward to working from home more after the pandemic, polls suggest -- provided they’re not schooling from home at the same time. And polls also suggest employers are looking forward to offering that flexibility. Momentum is building for a “hybrid” workplace, according to experts, which would most likely allow for two to three days per week at home. Still, as vaccine rollouts gather pace and economies reopen, there doesn&rsquo