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  • Reuters

    China's drugmakers can't sell mRNA shots but haven't quit yet

    China's vaccine developers stuck with unused mRNA COVID shots and idle manufacturing plants are pursuing new targets for the novel messenger RNA technology, but they face a tough path, crimped by a lack of revenue. Three Chinese companies - Walvax Biotechnology , CSPC Pharmaceutical Group and Stemirna Therapeutics - came up with mRNA vaccines that won limited emergency approvals in Asia. However, Walvax and CSPC are not currently manufacturing three of their China market shots, a China health official told Reuters.

  • Reuters

    Nigeria government halves central bank borrowing - finance minister

    Nigeria has halved federal borrowing from the central bank, according to Finance Minister Wale Edun, as Africa's biggest economy works to curb monetary financing and shift to markets to plug revenue shortfalls. President Bola Tinubu, who inherited an economy struggling with record debt, high unemployment, subsidies and large central bank financing, has promised to make the bank autonomous and more focused on its core mandate. Central bank overdrafts to the federal government, so-called "ways and means," were popular with the previous administration, peaking at $53 billion in 2023 and fuelling inflation and budget deficits.

  • Reuters

    GRAPHIC-Slow growth, high debt - troubled UK economy awaits election winners

    Britain's national election, expected later this year, will take place against a backdrop of persistently slow economic growth, high public debt and little room to increase spending for whoever wins power unless they raise taxes. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak promises voters that a recovery from a cost-of-living crisis is underway while the opposition Labour Party, which is far ahead in opinion polls, accuses his ruling Conservatives of overseeing 14 years of economic failure. Below is a summary of some of the challenges facing the world's sixth-biggest economy which appears to be emerging from a shallow recession but is still feeling the aftershocks of Brexit, the COVID pandemic and the energy price surge of 2022.