savoring the treasures of a difficult year

Photograph: Mehdi Fedouach/AFP/Getty ImagesMillions of people in Japan will not receive Pfizer’s coronavirus vaccine as planned due to a shortage of specialist syringes an oversight that could frustrate the country’s inoculation programme.Standard syringes in use in Japan are unable to extract the sixth and final dose from each vial manufactured by the US drugmaker, according to the health minister, Norihisa Tamura.Related: Japan faces Olympian task with slow start to Covid vaccinationsJapan has secured 144m shots of the Pfizer vaccine enough for 72 million people on the assumption that each vial contained six doses.Each recipient requires two jabs, three weeks apart, to increase the level of protection, according to Pfizer.But a shortage of low “dead space” syringes which have narrow plungers that can push out any leftover vaccine means vaccinators in Japan will have to use mainly standard syringes that are capable of extracting only five doses per vial, or enough for 60 million people.”The syringes used in Japan can only draw five doses,” Tamura said, according to the Kyodo news agency. “We will use all the syringes we have that can draw six doses, but it will, of course, not be enough as more shots are administered.”The government is requesting medical equipment manufacturers to increase production of the specialist syringes.A vial of the Pfizer BioNTech vaccine against Covid 19. Photograph: Franois Mori/APJapan is not alone in encountering the problem.

“Their commitment to UNBC and their contributions have been outstanding,” Payne said. “This had nothing to do with their performances.” The layoffs will save UNBC about $800,000. Exactly how much UNBC is in the red was not immediately available but Payne indicated it’s in the range of $2 4 million.

Twenty years ago, the hot thang in indie pop was the Elephant 6 Collective, a family of bands that played a particularly psychedelic and Beach Boys influenced brand of pop rock. The headliners were Neutral Milk Hotel, the Apples in Stereo, and the Olivia Tremor Control, and one of the affiliated groups was the Minders, a Beatles lovin’ combo out of Denver. A great secret of the Elephant 6 Collective is that the Minders’ 1998 album Hooray for Tuesday is every bit as good as anything else any other E6 band released.

Ramsey County spokesman John Siqveland said in a statement Tuesday that the county board and sheriff had participated in voluntary mediation with the officers starting in July in an attempt to resolve their claims, but they were unable to reach a settlement. He had no comment on the lawsuit, citing the active litigation. A message left with the sheriff’s office was not returned..