Tag: coronavirus

Learn English with the News – Vaccine sceptics might make trials a headache

The fight for or against vaccines has been raging in the UK, and scientists are worried that skepticism could affect the results of specific trials. Watch the video and then do the accompanying English language exercises.

The news is a consistent source of entertainment, knowledge and discovery that never ceases to exist and always comes out with more and more material each day. Because it plays such a vital part in our lives and is so important to keep up with, it is without a doubt a piece of your everyday routine that can’t go ignored. 

Whether it is to understand the ramifications of recent legislation passed, to hear about recent events and grasp the potential consequences to your country, or simply hear about what is happening in other countries in order to compare them to what’s happening in yours, the news is certainly a staple in our lives and the most consistent way to get information.

This is why Scrambled Eggs has decided to unite two of your biggest worlds: learning English and keeping up with what is happening in the world. We hope our challenging daily exercises, composed of listening, vocabulary and comprehension exercises in English, will satisfy both of those above worlds in a satisfactory and also entertaining way.

So enough about introductions, let’s get to today’s Learn English with the News topic:

Adapted from this article.

Now that you’ve had a listen, let’s put your knowledge to the test with some of our vocabulary and comprehension exercises:

Vaccine sceptics might make trials a headache | Definition Match

Put the following words to the correct definitions.

Vaccine sceptics might make trials a headache | Fill In The Blank

Fill the empty spaces with the proper words.

Vaccine sceptics might make trials a headache | True or False

Indicate which sentences are true and which ones are false.

 

And that’s it for today’s English lesson, where you can improve your English with the news and current events. Do you have any comments or special requests for us for the next edition of Learn English with the News? Be sure to leave any feedback you have in the comments section below, as we would love to help you on your quest to learn the English language!

For other Learn English with the News segments, be sure to check out the rest of our posts:

https://scrambledeggsinglese.it/tag/learn-english-with-the-news/

Full Text

“It will soon be critical for the NHS to start vaccinating people against flu, to prevent hospitals
being swamped with flu and Covid-19 patients this winter. Large-scale trials of Covid-19
vaccines, already under way in some places, are likely to start in Bradford in the autumn. It's
therefore worrying, says Dr John Wright of the city's Royal Infirmary, that anti-vax conspiracy
theories seem to have flourished in this pandemic.
The numbers of hospital patients continue to slowly decline in the UK, almost down to single
figures this week. There is great relief in Bradford hospital, tempered by the inevitability of a
further spike of infection. You may know of the warning from Game of Thrones – winter is
coming – and never before has that phrase been so ominous. The prediction of a second wave
of Covid-19 in January, with the added layer of an influenza epidemic, is John Wright’s worst
fear. He and his team will be working hard to make sure they vaccinate as many people for flu
as they can in the autumn.
The race for an effective Covid-19 vaccine continues at pace. Over 130 candidate vaccines have
now been developed and more than 30 are in clinical trials, with some showing promising early
signs.
The Bradford Institute of Health Research is one of just five national centres for patient
recruitment to clinical trials, and the staff have lots of expertise with testing new drugs.
However, vaccine trials are a completely different ball game. Rather than trialling new drugs on
a small number of patients with specific diseases they will be testing new vaccines on hundreds
and thousands of healthy volunteers. They have been exploring how they could use sports
centres or community halls to recruit these volunteers, and how they can scale up their
research teams to cope with the numbers.
They had been preparing for two different vaccine trials, only for the companies to pull them
from the UK at the last minute and move them to the Americas. The pandemic fires have been
dampened in Europe, but in the US and Latin America they continue to rage, and if you are
going to test a new vaccine you need countries where the virus is still accelerating.
But despite these two false starts, there will be further trials of other candidate vaccines.
It’s therefore important to win the support of the public so that they sign up to these new trials,
and to do that there is a need to counter some of the growing false news stories that the public
are hearing on community grapevines, which are leading people to believe that the vaccines are
harmful.”

Learn English with the News – Super-rich call for higher taxes on wealthy to pay for Covid-19 recovery

With Coronavirus creating massive unemployment and economic uncertainty for the future, some of the world’s richest people are asking governments to increase taxes on the 1% to help those in need.

The news is a consistent source of entertainment, knowledge and discovery that never ceases to exist and always comes out with more and more material each day. Because it plays such a vital part in our lives and is so important to keep up with, it is without a doubt a piece of your everyday routine that can’t go ignored. Whether it is to understand the ramifications of recent legislation passed, to hear about recent events and grasp the potential consequences to your country, or simply hear about what is happening in other countries in order to compare them to what’s happening in yours, the news is certainly a staple in our lives and the most consistent way to get information. This is why Scrambled Eggs has decided to unite two of your biggest worlds: learning English and keeping up with what is happening in the world. We hope our challenging daily exercises, composed of listening, vocabulary and comprehension exercises in English, will satisfy both of those above worlds in a satisfactory and also entertaining way.

So enough about introductions, let’s get to today’s Learn English with the News topic:

Adapted from this article.

Now that you’ve had a listen, let’s put your knowledge to the test with some of our vocabulary and comprehension exercises:

 

Super-rich call for higher taxes on wealthy to pay for Covid-19 recovery | Definition Match

Put the following words to the correct definitions.

Super-rich call for higher taxes on wealthy to pay for Covid-19 recovery | Fill in the Blank

Fill the empty spaces with the proper words.

Super-rich call for higher taxes on wealthy to pay for Covid-19 recovery | True or False

Indicate which sentences are true and which ones are false.

 

And that’s it for today’s English lesson, where you can improve your English with the news and current events. Do you have any comments or special requests for us for the next edition of Learn English with the News? Be sure to leave any feedback you have in the comments section below, as we would love to help you on your quest to learn the English language!

For other Learn English with the News segments, be sure to check out the rest of our posts:

https://scrambledeggsinglese.it/tag/learn-english-with-the-news/

Full Text:

“A group of 83 of the world’s richest people have called on governments to permanently increase taxes on them and other members of the wealthy elite to help pay for the economic recovery from the Covid-19 crisis. The super-rich members, including Ben and Jerry’s ice cream co-founder Jerry Greenfield and Disney heir Abigail Disney, called on governments to raise taxes on people like them immediately, substantially, and permanently. The group warned that the economic impact of the coronavirus crisis will “last for decades” and could “push half a billion more people into poverty”. Among those adding their names to the letter are Sir Stephen Tindall, the founder of the Warehouse Group and New Zealand’s second richest man with a $475m fortune; the British screenwriter and director Richard Curtis; and the Irish venture capitalist John O’Farrell, who made millions investing in Silicon Valley tech companies. The group released the letter ahead of this weekend’s G20 finance ministers and central bank governors meeting. They called on politicians to “address global inequality and acknowledge that tax increases on the wealthy and greater international tax transparency are essential for a viable long-term solution”. The number of super-rich people continues to grow despite the economic impact of the coronavirus crisis and global lockdowns. Jeff Bezos, the world’s richest person and the founder of Amazon, has seen his fortune swell by $75bn so far this year to a record $189bn. There are more than 500,000 people in the world classed as “ultra-wealthy” with fortunes of more than $30m. That means there are more ultra-wealthy people around the world than the populations of Iceland, Malta or Belize. There have been repeated calls for the super-rich to contribute more following the Covid-19 crisis. Critics have pointed out that while Bezos has donated $100m, it represents less than 0.1% of his estimated fortune.”

Learn English with the News – Reports of price hikes have been registered at bars, restaurants and hairdressers in Italy

Some of Italy’s shops and restaurants have added a “Covid Tax” in order to make more money after months of lockdown. Watch the video and then check out our website for the accompanying exercises.

The news is a consistent source of entertainment, knowledge and discovery that never ceases to exist and always comes out with more and more material each day. Because it plays such a vital part in our lives and is so important to keep up with, it is without a doubt a piece of your everyday routine that can’t go ignored. 

Whether it is to understand the ramifications of recent legislation passed, to hear about recent events and grasp the potential consequences to your country, or simply hear about what is happening in other countries in order to compare them to what’s happening in yours, the news is certainly a staple in our lives and the most consistent way to get information.

This is why Scrambled Eggs has decided to unite two of your biggest worlds: learning English and keeping up with what is happening in the world. We hope our challenging daily exercises, composed of listening, vocabulary and comprehension exercises in English, will satisfy both of those above worlds in a satisfactory and also entertaining way.

So enough about introductions, let’s get to today’s Learn English with the News topic:

Adapted from this article.

Now that you’ve had a listen, let’s put your knowledge to the test with some of our vocabulary and comprehension exercises:

Reports of price hikes have been registered at bars, restaurants and hairdressers in Italy | Definition Match

Put the following words to the correct definitions.

Reports of price hikes have been registered at bars, restaurants and hairdressers in Italy | Fill in the Blank

Fill the empty spaces with the proper words.

Reports of price hikes have been registered at bars, restaurants and hairdressers in Italy | True or False

Indicate which sentences are true and which ones are false.

And that’s it for today’s English lesson, where you can improve your English with the news and current events. Do you have any comments or special requests for us for the next edition of Learn English with the News? Be sure to leave any feedback you have in the comments section below, as we would love to help you on your quest to learn the English language!

For other Learn English with the News segments, be sure to check out the rest of our posts:

https://scrambledeggsinglese.it/tag/learn-english-with-the-news/

Full Text:

“Italy’s consumers are being charged €2 to €4 more than before the coronavirus emergency as bars, restaurants and hairdressers add a ‘covid tax’ to the bill, according to consumer watchdog Codacons. Codacons has received dozens of reports on the increases in the price lists of hairdressers. Based on average costs in large cities, they have calculated how the price of a cut has gone from an average of €20 to €25, a rise of 25 per cent. Codacons also reports increases in the price of coffee at the bar, with cases of an espresso in Rome now costing €1.50 instead of the usual €1 or €1.10. In Milan the espressos are €2, up from €1.30. In Florence they are €1.70, up from the usual average of €1.40. The so-called covid tax has also been slammed by the National Consumer Union whose president Massimiliano Dona describes it as an “incorrect practice.” The hike in prices comes as many businesses struggle to get back to work after being closed for more than two months during the nationwide lockdown to contain the spread of the coronavirus. Businesses are operating amid reduced capacity due to social distancing as well as dealing with extra costs relating to sanification and protective equipment required under Italy’s Phase Two in the covid-19 emergency.”