Day: February 8, 2022

The Competition Commission of Pakistan (CCP) and the Pakistan Institute of Corporate Governance (PICG) on Tuesday signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on cooperation, collaboration, and capacity development for strengthening corporate governance and competition compliance in Pakistan.

The MoU was signed by the CCP Chairperson Ms. Rahat Kaunain Hassan and PICG Chief Executive Officer Ahsan Jamil in a ceremony at the CCP’s head office in Islamabad. The ceremony was also attended by Chairperson PICG Board of Directors Dr. Shamshad Akhtar, CCP members Shaista Bano, Bushra Naz Malik, Mujtaba Ahmad Lodhi, and other senior officers.

Addressing the occasion, the CCP Chairperson welcomed the support of PICG in joining hands with the CCP through the signing of the MoU. She stated that corporate governance and competition principles are intertwined. There is a commonality of objective in that both regulate human behavior and promote fair play, she added.

She further stated that the collaboration aims to promote good governance, ensure corrective behavior and sustainable compliance through advocacy measures and training for the corporate sector. In the face of the increasing complexity of corporate arrangements, this would help create awareness of the internal and external drivers of collusion or anti-competitive practices. It would also enable the corporations towards better strategic planning, she added.

Dr. Shamshad Akhtar, in her remarks, said that the PICG board has envisioned bringing a new dynamism in the PICG to improve corporate governance in Pakistan. She welcomed the signing of MoU between PICG and CCP, saying that the prevailing conditions in public and private sectors require more such partnerships. “I am delighted to have the opportunity to work with the Competition Commission of Pakistan. This MoU will greatly help to reinforce the respective mandates of CCP and PICG,” she said.

Ahsan Jamil in his remarks said that the importance of free and fair competition for productivity, exports growth and global competitiveness cannot be overstated. Similarly, good corporate governance is beneficial for businesses as it reduces cost, ensures fair play and protects businesses from undesirable outcomes. PICG is looking forward to working with CCP in promoting good corporate governance and competition law compliance. He mentioned several initiatives that PICG is taking to improve corporate governance in Pakistan.

The MoU will not only allow both parties to exchange information on pertinent issues, but also work together in undertaking advocacy, research, and training initiatives to promote public awareness of the Competition Act and the Listed Companies (Corporate Governance) Regulations, 2019.

The collaboration aims to improve awareness of the competition law landscape and a commitment to compliance within organizations. Furthermore, both parties will hold collaborative sessions on competition law, promoting compliance and organizational governance, and assist each other in matters of mutual interest for better implementation of their respective mandates.

Source: Pro Pakistani

Business optimism has declined across the board in Pakistan, with the trading sector registering the biggest decline in optimism.

This was the conclusion of Dun and Bradstreet Pakistan’s ninth edition of the “Business Optimism Index” (BOI) report for the fourth quarter of 2021 (4Q2021). The BOI declined after increasing consecutively for the previous three quarters, indicating a decline in optimism among the business community regarding the performance of their business in 1Q2022.

The BOI registered 143.9 points in 4Q2021 compared to 154.2 points in 3Q2021, indicating a decline of 6.7 percent decline quarter-on-quarter (QoQ). However, the BOI has improved by 7.9 percent compared to the same period last year.

The report said that the decline in optimism was driven by the overall downtrend in the macroeconomic indicators.

“High inflation rate of 12.3 percent in December 2021, the widening of the current account deficit by 57.9 percent, increased policy rates from 7.25 percent to 9.75 percent, depleting foreign exchange reserves from $25.6 billion to $24 billion, and depreciation of the Pakistani Rupee against the US Dollar by 4.5 percent during Q4 2021, may have affected the business community and impacted their business outlook,” the report noted.

The sector-wise comparison showed that the trading sector BOI exhibited the highest decline of 18.7 percent QoQ, the BOI declined from 160.9 in 3Q2021 to 130.9 in 4Q2021. However, the index increased by 5.3 percent year-on-year (YoY). The report attributed the decline to COVID-19 related supply chain disruptions in anticipation of the spread of the Omicron variant in 1Q2022.

The manufacturing sector index decreased by 3.5 percent QoQ, the BOI declined from 147.0 in 3Q2021 to 141.8 in 4Q2021. However, the index increased by 8.0 percent YoY. Similarly, the services sector index decreased by 4.4 percent QoQ, the BOI declined from 157.1 in 3Q2021 to 150.2 in 4Q2021. However, the index increased by 5.3 percent YoY.

The index-wise comparison showed that large business BOI declined from 162.5 in 3Q2021 to 146.2 in 4Q2021. The report attributed the decline to the outbreak of the Omicron variant, and an increase in inflation and policy rates, which is likely to affect the overall consumer demand in the next quarter.

The small and medium enterprises (SMEs) index decreased marginally to 140.5 in 4Q2021 from 141.9 in 3Q2021. The report noted that over 40 percent of SMEs and large companies cite the increase in inflation and interest rates as the key challenge to business growth.

The exporter’s index also declined marginally from 155.0 in 3Q2021 to 154.0 in 4Q2021. The USA, UK, and UAE were identified as top export destinations for businesses.

‘Inflation and high-interest rates’ replaced ‘business disruptions due to COVID-19’ as the top challenges in Q42021 after the latter being at the top for the six previous quarters, the report noted. The rising cost of utilities, less demand for products & services, business regulations, the availability of skilled labor, higher completion, exchange rate fluctuation, government taxes, and high cost of finance are among the other challenges.

Source: Pro Pakistani

An international collaboration led by researchers in Canada and Brazil is applying innovative funding and testing methods to determine whether existing medications can provide cheaper and more effective treatments for COVID-19 and is encouraged by its initial results.

Calling it the “TOGETHER Trial,” researchers predominantly in Brazil and Canada refer to their method as “adaptive platform clinical trial,” which permits several potential treatments to be tested simultaneously, reducing costs and the number of people who need to be tested.

The researchers have also speeded up the search for effective COVID treatments by relying on financing and support from private foundations, universities and the private sector, rather than the time-consuming process of seeking government funding.

One such trial conducted in Brazil beginning in June 2020 found fluvoxamine, a common anti-depressant, helped reduce hospitalization and death of COVID-19 patients by 32%.

Ed Mills, a clinical epidemiologist who teaches at Ontario’s McMaster University, is helping to coordinate the project from offices in Vancouver, Canada. He explained the “adaptive platform” model in which more than one drug is tested at the same time.

“Typically, in a clinical trial, you expect to see a drug versus placebo,” Mills told VOA. “Well, in our circumstance, we’re doing five drugs versus placebo, six drugs versus placebo.”

While uncovering promising data on fluvoxamine, discovering what does not work has been equally important. Mills said the group’s trials showed that hydroxychloroquine, lopinavir, metformin, doxazosin and ivermectin do not help prevent hospitalization from COVID-19.

Two of those drugs, hydroxychloroquine and ivermectin, gained notoriety in the United States as some COVID-19 patients have insisted on taking them despite warnings by U.S. health officials that the drugs are ineffective at best for treating a coronavirus infection.

Amid a global wave of infections driven by the omicron variant, the project is recruiting about 100 participants a day, with trials now underway in South Africa, Pakistan and Brazil. About 5,000 people have participated to date in the trials, which currently involve about 2,500 people.

Mills said the researchers are studying several other existing drugs, and combinations of those drugs, to gauge their effectiveness.

“One would be a drug called peginterferon lambda, which is a single subcutaneous injection, single-dose drug to treat COVID. I’m extremely optimistic about that. We’re also now evaluating combination strategies,” he said.

“So, we know that fluvoxamine works. We also know that budesonide works — an inhaled steroid. What would happen if you put them together? So, I think that’s going to be a really great, cheap intervention that can be applied,” he said. Both drugs are widely available and — in some countries — economical.

Mills said he expects further results within the next few weeks.

Dr. Brian Conway, the medical director of the Vancouver Infectious Diseases Centre, sees the work being conducted by the TOGETHER Trial as a model for some future medical research.

New medications require rigorous and time-consuming clinical trials before they can be approved for use, he noted. But progress can be quicker “if a medicine’s been around for a while, it’s been licensed, it’s available for sale, and you’re trying to decide if there’s a new indication for it.”

Conway, who is not involved with the TOGETHER Trial, was also impressed with the researchers’ methodology.

“I think that going forward, they’re quick. They are rigorous. They generate the kind of information that we need to help guide clinical practice,” he said. “These adaptive platforms are, to my mind, a very appropriate way of figuring out if they work against something for which they have not yet been tested or approved.”

Conway also sees the program as a good way to counter unsubstantiated rumors about unproven medications.

“And it avoids us from getting into a situation where someone says, ‘I gave this treatment to eight or 10 people and it saved their lives. So you should do this, too,’” he said.

“That’s not how we should do science. That’s not how we should practice medicine, especially in the era of COVID,” he said. “And it helps us be rigorous, responsive, and as helpful to our patients as we can be.”

Among the takeaways from the studies, according to Mills, is that the “Global South” — developing countries in the Southern Hemisphere — has a lot to teach the so-called “Global North,” or more developed nations.

“Although we are the ones that tend to come up with the rules on epidemiology, they’re the ones that apply those rules on epidemiology and have practical experience,” he said.

“If you think about a country like Rwanda, for example, where I’ve spent a long time, they deal with Ebola monitoring all the time, they deal with malaria, deal with HIV all the time. They’re very, very experienced at infectious diseases,” Mills said.

This is not the first time Vancouver has played a role in advancing epidemiology. MRNA vaccines developed by Pfizer and Moderna rely on lipid nanoparticles to enter human cells. That technology was first researched at the University of British Columbia in the late 1970s.

Source: Voice of America

A man was killed and two others injured in a grenade attack at Bus Adda in Dera Murad Jamali today (Tuesday).

The injured were shifted to nearby hospital for treatment.

Source: Radio Pakistan