AstraZeneca has paused its vaccine trial after a participant fell ill

The Download

Your daily dose of what's up in emerging technology

09.09.20

Good morning! Today: AstraZeneca has put its vaccine trial on hold after a participant fell ill, how India became the world leader in internet shutdowns, and China says it's launched and landed a mysterious reusable spacecraft. Get your friends to sign up here to get The Download every day.

The news: AstraZeneca has paused its global Phase 3 covid-19 vaccine trial after a UK participant fell seriously ill. It’s unclear if the suspected “serious adverse reaction” was a result of receiving the vaccine or coincidental, but the person affected is expected to recover, according to STAT. We also don’t know how long the trial pause will last. In the meantime, the company will review all safety data collected so far, and researchers running the nine other Phase 3 coronavirus vaccine trials will comb through their data to look for similar cases of adverse reactions.

Don’t panic: It is standard practice for clinical trials to be paused in this scenario. While it’s a setback, it may just be a temporary one. Arguably, it’s reassuring that standard safety practices continue to apply despite the political pressure being exerted on the timeline and outcome of these trials. President Trump is keen to be able to unveil a vaccine before the election on November 3, but has received significant pushback not only from his opponent Joe Biden but also from the pharmaceutical community. The CEOs of all the nine companies with vaccines in late-stage trials signed a pledge yesterday to “stand with science,” make the safety and wellbeing of vaccinated individuals the top priority, and only submit vaccines for approval after demonstrating they are safe and effective in a Phase 3 study. Read the full story.

How India became the world’s leader in internet shutdowns

The Indian government imposed a communications shutdown in Kashmir last August in an attempt to suppress dissent in the volatile region. The shutdown was total—no mobile internet, broadband, landlines, or cable TV. The shutdown lasted until January, making it the longest internet blackout ever seen in the democratic world.

After partly restoring internet connectivity, the government initially banned the use of social media, and several people who violated the ban by masking their location were arrested under anti-terror laws. At the time of writing, connection speeds continue to be heavily throttled.

But as the coronavirus spread, the information blockade itself became a threat to public safety. The day after the valley’s first diagnosis, Amnesty International asked the government to restore access. “The right to health,” it said in a statement, “provides for the right to access healthcare [and] access to health-related information.” The government didn’t oblige.

For years, many Indians bought the government line that internet shutdowns in Kashmir curb violence and save lives. But in 2018, instead of being limited to the volatile valley, they began taking place all over India. According to user-reported figures, there were 134 internet blackouts in more than half a dozen Indian states that year, and a further 106 of them across more than 10 states in 2019. Hundreds of millions of people were affected.

That makes India, a democracy, the world leader in such shutdowns—ahead of China, Iran, and Venezuela. And it has become harder for ordinary Indians to dismiss the people affected as a threat to national security—because it’s happening to them, in their own cities, in their own homes. Read the full story.

—Sonia Faleiro

This story is from the latest issue of MIT Technology Review, all about technonationalism. Read the rest of the magazine and subscribe.

China says it has launched and landed a reusable spacecraft

On September 6, China successfully landed a reusable spacecraft the country had launched into orbit just two days before, according to the state-run Xinhua News Agency. The country has provided very few specific details into what the mission was and the spacecraft that was tested. No images were released.

Spaceplane speculation: China has previously expressed interest in developing reusable spaceflight architecture. That report led many experts to believe China wanted to develop its own version of the US Air Force’s X-37B spaceplane, which is capable of flying in low Earth orbit for several years on end. US space surveillance identified an additional smaller object released into orbit by the Chinese spacecraft before its return to Earth. It’s not yet clear what this object is and what its purpose might be. Read the full story.

—Neel V. Patel

We can still have nice things

A place for comfort, fun and distraction in these weird times. (Got any ideas? Drop me a line or tweet 'em at me.)

+ Kettlewell, a village in rural England, has a scarecrow festival every year. That wasn’t going to change in 2020, thanks to two very dedicated residents who put the whole thing online.
+ Photos taken while driving through heavy rain.
+ NASA has released some dazzling new images.
+ Missing airplane food? Thai Airways has got you covered.
+ Imagine being as cool as this archer.
+ Museums and art galleries are starting to reopen.

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The top ten must-reads

I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology.

1 A coronavirus outbreak tied to a motorcycle rally cost $12 billion
Just one superspreading event led to 19% of all new cases in the US in August. (Axios)

2 Another Facebook employee has resigned in disgust
Discontent is rising in the company over its moderation practices. (WP $)
+ Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook isn’t a “right-wing echo chamber.” (Axios)

3 Voting in person is relatively safe
It’s no more risky than going to the grocery store, which people do every day. (The Atlantic)
+ Trump is betting big on YouTube. (Politico)

4 How two women in the US became targets for Chinese nationalists
Endless online posts accused them of being “traitors” for moving. (The New Yorker $)
+ GitHub has become a refuge from censorship in China (for now.) (Wired $)

5 Robots are cleaning up in the pandemic
In all senses. (WP $)
+ Ford used Spot the robot dog to map its plants. (WSJ $)

6 Amazon is not going to drop the fact it lost a $10 billion Pentagon contract
It says the deal, which went to Microsoft, was “flawed, biased, and politically corrupted.” (Ars Technica)

7 Nigeria is experiencing a quiet bitcoin boom
A young, tech-savvy population, weaker local currencies, and complex bureaucracy are helping push people towards the cryptocurrency. (NBC)
+ There’s little evidence for blockchain, says the Centre for Evidence Based Blockchain. (FT $)

8 How to escape from a volcano eruption 🌋
You don’t need to worry about the lava as much as they make out in the movies. (Wired)

9 London’s bridges are (quite literally) falling down
Sometimes the metaphors just write themselves. (NYT $)

10 Colleagues who met on Zoom are freaking each other out in real life
We’re all the same height on the internet. (Wired UK)

Do you see hype in tech when others see hope? Or vice versa?

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Take a stand

“Anxiety and depression, especially in response to something like this global pandemic—those are not problems with you as an individual.”

—Tamara Browne, a lecturer in health ethics at Deakin University in Australia, warns against pathologizing natural human responses to adversity in an interview with Wired.

Top image credit: Associated Press

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Follow me on Twitter at @charlottejee. Thanks for reading!

—Charlotte