LAST UPDATE | 5 Oct 2021
GOOD MORNING.
Here’s all the news that you need to know as you start your day.
1. This morning, Rónán Duffy writes that nightclub promoters want the government to confirm that the scheduled 22 October reopening will go ahead without capacity restrictions.
Following the pilot event in the Button Factory in Dublin last week, promoters are reporting a huge demand for events in nightclubs, with many already sold out.
With all restrictions set to be lifted in just over two weeks, promoter Buzz O’Neill-Maxwell told TheJournal that there’s “huge panic” amongst promoters that there’ll be restricted numbers, with the government not yet confirming a full capacity reopening.
2. Facebook, Instagram and Whatsapp have been restored after a widespread outage impacted all three of the platforms for several hours yesterday.
Users were eventually able to access Facebook and Instagram from late on Monday evening, while WhatsApp said its services were “back and running at 100%” as of 3.30am last night.
Facebook said a “faulty configuration change” on its routers was believed to be at the centre of the outage.
3. A US study has found that vaccination with two doses of the Pfizer jab stays highly effective against severe Covid, including the Delta variant, for at least six months.
The study looked at records from 3.4 million residents of southern California, about a third of whom were fully vaccinated between December 2020 and August 2021.
After an average period of three to four months, fully vaccinated people were found to be 73% protected against infection and 90% protected against hospitalisation.
4. A man has died and two people were hospitalised following an assault at a house in Dublin yesterday.
The incident happened at a house in the Ashfield Park area of Blanchardstown at around 4pm.
The man, aged in his 40s, was taken to James Connolly Memorial Hospital where he was later pronounced dead. A second man, aged in his 20s, and a woman, aged in her 20s, were both taken to the Mater Hospital to be treated for serious injuries.
5. Free contraception is expected to be given the green light in next week’s Budget.
Health Minister Stephen Donnelly has said that women’s health care is a “big priority” for him, and is understood to have been battling to ensure funding for free contraceptive distribution to women would be made available.
Former Health Minister Simon Harris had planned to deliver it in 2019, but to no avail.
6. Meanwhile, in the United States, the Biden administration reversed a ban on abortion referrals by family planning clinics
Under former president Donald Trump, clinics were barred from referring patients for abortions, with a recent legislation in Texas banning abortions from as early as six weeks into a pregnancy.
The Department of Health and Human Services said its new regulation, known as Title X, will make available more than $250 million a year to clinics to provide birth control and basic healthcare services mainly to low-income women.
7. Back in Ireland, some Tusla staff reported having more time to do face to face work in the aftermath of the HSE cyberattack.
Internal records detail how employees in two regions reported at least one upside from having fewer emails to contend with on a daily basis.
8. Ireland’s first national survey into suicide bereavement is being launched today.
Researchers at the National Suicide Research Foundation, in collaboration with the Suicide Bereavement Charity HUGG, are inviting all adults who have been bereaved or affected by suicide to take part anonymously, in particular men and minority groups.
The research aims to provide a national profile of the impact of suicide bereavement and the needs of the estimated 60,000 people impacted by suicide every year in Ireland.
9. While scattered showers look set to dominate for the next few days, temperatures could reach as high as 20 degrees in some parts of the country later this week.
According to Met Éireann, today will see a mix of sunshine and showers with highest temperatures ranging between 12 and 15 degrees.
Tonight will be mostly dry with some mist and fog in parts, while tomorrow will be cloudy and overcast with persistent rain and drizzle across the west and northwest.
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