*New Covid vaccines needed globally within a year, say scientists.*

We must increase the capacity to produce vaccine so that we can get the new version to just about everyone in a few months. Then we won't have to do it yet another time.

*Global treaty needed to protect states from pandemics, say world leaders.*

I agree. We need to bring more areas of life out of narrow national interest, and into the sphere of cooperation.

* As the former chief investment officer of Sustainable Investing at BlackRock, the largest asset manager in the world with $8.7 trillion in assets, I led the charge to incorporate environmental, social and governance (ESG) into our global investments. In fact, our messaging helped mainstream the concept that pursuing social good was also good for the bottom line. Sadly, that's all it is, a hopeful idea. In truth, sustainable investing boils down to little more than marketing hype, PR spin and disingenuous promises from the investment community.*

In the 1990s or 2000s, someone challenged me to look for an ethical investment fund. As it happened, I was acquainted with someone to had started one — an independent company. The fund stated its criteria and it listed its investments.

I think the fund was honest. The main investment was Microsoft.

Microsoft got a high ethical grade, according to the usual criteria — which did not include the question of whether software respected the freedom of its users.

I did not invest in the fund.

Even when New York City refuses to directly defend a cop in a lawsuit, the city does so indirectly through a special fund paid by the city.

A tendency to oversensitivity to "what might someone possibly mistakenly criticize?" is pushing society into increasingly rigid self-censorship.