Page 9 - Sonja Smith News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

KAMPALA, Uganda (AP) — Omicron cases have been confirmed in at least nine African...

Burial Homes Under Strain as Deaths Surge in South African Hub Khuleko Siwele, Bloomberg News (Bloomberg) -- South Africa’s commercial hub of Gauteng, which includes Johannesburg and Pretoria, risks running out of coffins as Covid-19-related deaths surge. While a third wave of coronavirus cases in South Africa’s worst-affected province may have peaked, fatalities have risen 57% in the past week, data from National Institute of Communicable Diseases show. Funeral parlors are starting to buckle under the strain, according to Nkosi Nare, chairman of the Inner-City Funeral Directors A...

The number of deaths is also soaring. The 1,711 fatalities nationwide this week exceeded the previous week's tally by 45% and are twice the total of 849 a week earlier. Gauteng funeral director Sonja Smith said: "It's horrific. It's young people - even babies ... people we know." Covid-19 beds in Gauteng's hospitals are expected to run out within days. Hospital staff used phrases like "beyond a catastrophe" when they spoke this week about shortages of nursing staff and equipment. South African Medical Association head Angelique Coetzee said: "Now, when the country is in the midst of the third...

A faith-based program in New Orleans teaches adoptive parents how to understand children from troubled backgrounds.

Berlin promises a billion euros in financial support to descendants of victims, but activists say this is only a first step and call for direct reparations for 1904-1908 massacres