Silo Pharma, Inc. (Nasdaq: SILO) (“Silo” or the “Company”), a developmental stage biopharmaceutical company focused on developing novel formulations and drug delivery systems for traditional therapeutics and psychedelic treatments, today announced that the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) issued a Notice of Allowance for patent application 17/954,864 for “Pharmacological Prophylactics Against Stress-Induced Affective Disorders in Females.” Following receipt of the Notice of Allowance, Silo filed the final issue paperwork, paid the issue fees, and expects formal issuance of the patent in the next 90 days
Wednesday, January 8, 2025
Transcarent To Acquire Accolade
Combined company creates industry leading platform with more than 1,400 employer and payer clients, with shared focus on consumer empowerment
Transcarent’s Generative AI WayFinding and care experiences combined with Accolade’s Advocacy, Expert Medical Opinion, and Primary Care will deliver on the promise of ‘One Place for Health and Care’
Accolade shareholders to receive $7.03 per share in cash
The Race Is On Between West And East For Control In Syria
by Simon Watkins via OilPrice.com,
The removal of Bashar al-Assad has reignited Western and Eastern plans to control Syria’s oil and gas resources.
Syria's strategic position plays a pivotal role in Russian and Chinese plans, including Russia's "Shia Crescent" strategy and China's Belt and Road Initiative.
The U.S., Turkey, and other players are positioning themselves to rebuild Syria’s energy infrastructure.
Following the surprise removal on 8 December of President Bashar al-Assad after 53 years of his family’s rule in Syria, long-dormant plans in the U.S. are being dusted off about what will happen next there and who will control it. The plans were drawn up in anticipation that Bashar al-Assad would fall soon after July 2011, a senior energy security source who worked closely with the administration of then-U.S. President Barack Obama exclusively told OilPrice.com.
“At that point [when defectors from the Syrian army formed the Free Syrian Army and began an armed conflict across the country], Washington was certain that he [al-Assad] would fall in a matter of weeks, so they expedited the existing planning for that contingency, as did Russia and Iran, and the European Union too,” he said. “The plans for each included options to support its [Syria’s] production of oil and gas as this was a key source of its revenues,” he said.
“These were to run in parallel with, and support, whichever group finally came out on top after he [al-Assad] was removed from the picture,” he added.
At the time of the outbreak of hostilities in 2011, Syria had been producing around 400,000 barrels per day (bpd) of crude oil from proved reserves of 2.5 billion barrels. For a long period before that – prior to the recovery rate dropping off due to a lack of enhanced oil recovery techniques being employed at the major fields -- it had been producing nearly 600,000 bpd. Europe imported at least US$3 billion worth of oil per year from Syria up to the beginning of 2011, and many European refineries were configured to process the heavy, sour ‘Souedie’ crude oil that makes up much of Syria’s output, with the remainder being the sweet and lighter ‘Syrian Light’ grade.
Most of this – some 150,000-bpd combined – went to Germany, Italy, and France, from one of Syria’s three Mediterranean export terminals: Banias, Tartus, and Latakia. As an adjunct to this, a multitude of international oil companies were operating in Syria’s energy sector, including the UK’s Shell, Petrofac and Gulfsands Petroleum, France’s then-Total, the China National Petroleum Corporation, India’s Oil and Natural Gas Corp, Canada’s Suncor Energy, and Russia’s Tatneft and Stroytransgaz. Syria’s gas sector was at least as vibrant as its oil one, with proved reserves of 8.5 trillion cubic feet (tcf) of natural gas, and around 316 billion cubic feet per day (bcf/d) of dry natural gas produced.
After the fighting began in earnest in 2011, the first of the three major options to support the Syrian energy and financial infrastructure for whichever group took over was from the U.S.
This involved moving gas from Qatar through Saudi Arabia and Jordan, then through Syria whereupon it could be moved into Turkey and sold on in the rest of Europe, if resources allowed. The European option involved United Nations peace-keeping monitors in Syria, bringing in hydrocarbons industry experts from the UN Security Council member states, and letting the Qatar-Syria-Turkey, and Iran-Iraq-Syria-Turkey, pipelines develop organically over time. The Russian option focused on resuscitating the Iran-Iraq-Syria pipeline, moving Iranian, and later Iraqi and Syrian gas into Europe.
However, as al-Assad survived the initial phases of the uprising – crucially supported by the Russian military -- he went with the Russian energy and financial option focusing long term on the Iran-Iraq-Syria pipeline plans shorter-term on the build-out of Syria’s oil and gas infrastructure.
In 2017 this was formalised in a memorandum of understanding that encompassed 40 energy projects, plus the full reconstruction and rehabilitation of the Aleppo thermal plant, the installation of the Deir Ezzor power plant, and the expansion of capacity of the Mharda and Tishreen plants, with a view to re-energising Syria’s power grid and restoring the main control centre for the grid back to Damascus.
Consequently, it was little surprise that early on after al-Assad fled to Moscow a month ago, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov confirmed that his country had been in direct contact with the radical Islamist group, Hayat Tahrir al-Sham (HTS), about the future of its energy projects, and of its key military bases across Syria as well. These comprise the naval base at Tartus – Russia’s only Mediterranean port, its Khmeimim air force base near Latakia, and its huge listening station nearby. Aside from these prized assets, there are three other reasons why Syria remains so crucial to Russia’s core geopolitical strategy in the Middle East and globally, as fully analysed in my latest book on the new global oil market order.
First, it is the biggest country on the western side of the Shia Crescent of Power that Russia had been meticulously developing for years as a counterpoint to the U.S.’s own sphere of influence centred then on Saudi Arabia (for hydrocarbons supplies) and Israel (for military and intelligence assets).
Second, it offers a long Mediterranean coastline from which Russia can send oil and gas products – or anything else it wanted – from itself or from its allies (notably Iran) for export into major oil and gas hubs in Turkey, Greece and Italy or into Africa.
And third, it highlighted to other countries in the Middle East and beyond Russia’s willingness and ability to act decisively on the side of the autocratic dynasties across the region.
Aside from denying Russia all these direct benefits (and doing the same for China indirectly) – which has enormous value in itself -- the U.S. and its allies also understand the key role that Syria was to play logistically for Russia’s plans to expedite Iran’s long-desired ‘Land Bridge’ and for China’s broader ambitions for its ‘Belt and Road Initiative’ (BRI).
The Land Bridge – running from Iran across Iraq, and into Syria -- was close to being operational by the time al-Assad was removed and would have provided and Russia to exponentially increase weapons delivery into southern Lebanon and the Golan Heights area of Syria. This would have dramatically increased the ability of Iran and its proxies to launch attacks on Israel as part of a broader rolling plan to further destabilise the Middle East. China would also have benefited from the same advantages inherent in a Syrian presence as Russia, particularly as the two countries include the dual-use of airports and seaports by both its civilians and its militaries as part of their standard cooperation agreements across the Middle East, most notably for Iran, Iraq and al-Assad’s Syria.
Additionally complementary to Russia’s previous plans for Syria was the recent announcement of the China-backed US$17 billion Strategic Development Road (SDR) which will create a major transport corridor from Basra in Iraq to southern Turkey (close to the Syrian border), and link in with China’s BRI. The planned linkages between the SDR and China’s BRI would allow Beijing to further build up its own ‘security’ presence across the region and also open the way for synergies with plans for the Land Bridge.
That said, shortly after Russia established contact with the HTS rebel group after al-Assad was removed last month, NATO member Turkey sent its own delegation to Damascus to discuss supplying Syria with electricity and rebuilding its oil and gas sector. Turkish Energy Minister Alparslan Bayraktar said his country is studying how to use Syria’s oil and natural gas resources for reconstruction. Given the country’s huge geopolitical importance, it is not surprising that several formerly impeccable senior security and energy sources in Washington, London, and Brussels exclusively told OilPrice.com just after al-Assad’s removal that the sudden – and otherwise inexplicable – success of the Syrian rebels led by HTS was in no small part connected to a massive surge in U.S. and U.K. support for them in the run-up to the coup.
“The U.S. wanted to put Moscow’s and Tehran’s leadership on notice that Washington can easily redraw and restructure borders and regimes in not just the Middle East but also in Eastern Europe, if it wants to,” a senior security source in the European Union (E.U.) told OilPrice.com.
“As he’s [al-Assad] gone now, I can’t see either Washington sitting back and allowing anyone to benefit from this other than the U.S., and if the reconstruction is done in a gradual and inclusive [with Syria’s principal former rebel groups], the outcome may be better than seen elsewhere in the region,” he concluded.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/race-between-west-and-east-control-syria
Tuesday, January 7, 2025
Merck Gets China Nod on HPV Shot for Men Amid Sales Slump
China’s drug regulator approved Merck & Co.’s blockbuster HPV vaccine for use by men, opening a new untapped market for the US drug giant after a rush among women to get the shot lost steam.
China’s National Medical Products Administration cleared Merck’s Gardasil for use to prevent human papillomavirus, also known as HPV, to prevent anal cancer and genital warts among men, according to the company’s official Wechat account
Amazon Plans to Invest at Least $11 Billion on Cloud, AI Infrastructure in Georgia
Amazon plans to spend at least $11 billion to expand its cloud and artificial intelligence infrastructure in Georgia, as global tech companies boost their data-center footprints amid a boom in demand for AI computing.
Amazon Web Services, the U.S. tech giant's cloud-computing arm, said Tuesday the investment aims to meet the increased demand for advanced cloud infrastructure and compute power, driven by generative AI.
"AWS's investments will support the future of AI from data centers in Georgia," it said.
These include technical roles like data center engineers, network specialists, engineering operations managers and security specialists. It will also support thousands of local construction jobs and positions in the data center supply chain, AWS said.
Amazon has invested $18.5 billion in the southeastern state since 2010, according to the company.
Many top technology companies have been ramping up spending on the expensive chips, data centers and real estate needed to meet the anticipated demand for computing power from AI.
AWS is Amazon's most profitable unit and its third-quarter results showed the segment's net sales grew 11% from a year earlier to $15.33 billion. Amazon's capex jumped more than 80% to $22.62 billion during the quarter, its biggest-ever quarterly spend.
AWS separately on Tuesday announced the launch of its infrastructure cloud region in Thailand, developing data centers based on an earlier announced $5 billion investment in the country.
""We continue to see rapid cloud adoption across Asia Pacific," said Prasad Kalyanaraman, vice president of Infrastructure Services at AWS. "This new AWS Region in Thailand will help customers across all industries deploy advanced applications."
Biden Mulls Prisoner Swap With Taliban Involving 'Last Afghan In Guantanamo'
Less than two weeks to go in his lame-duck presidency before Trump takes office, and President Biden is pursuing the controversial move of emptying out Gitmo further. On Monday the Pentagon confirmed it released 11 Yemeni detainees with suspected ties to al Qaeda from the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba, after which they are set to begin new lives in Oman, as we detailed earlier. This has shrunk the population of the facility to 15 men.
None of the detainees have ever been charged with a crime, despite having been in the high-secure military facility for a couple decades or more. The Biden administration has long sought to move forward Obama's stated goal of seeking to permanently shutdown the notorious facility where torture has been alleged and documented.
On Tuesday another major potential released has been revealed: the White House is now negotiating with the Taliban which could end in the release of a high-profile prisoner long alleged to have been a close Osama bin Laden associate. Muhammad Rahim al Afghani has long been deemed "the Last Afghan in Guantanamo".
The Wall Street Journal reports that the Democratic administration "has been discussing a deal with the Taliban since at least July, told the group on Nov. 14 that the U.S. would release Muhammad Rahim al Afghani, who the U.S. government alleges was a senior al Qaeda aide, if the Afghan rulers released George Glezmann, Ryan Corbett and Mahmoud Habibi, American citizens seized in Afghanistan in 2022."
Rahim, if the swap goes through, could be freed alongside two others prisoners the Taliban is seeking in exchange for Americans Glezmann and Corbett. However, things are already complicated as the Taliban denies that it is holding Habibi.
The potential deal has apparently been in the works for several weeks at this point, given national security adviser Jake Sullivan briefed House Foreign Affairs Committee members in a classified session on Dec.17. The WSJ has cited him as saying that no decision has yet been made.
If Biden goes through with it, he'll be hammered by Trump and Republicans, and it will also revive criticisms of the botched Afghan withdrawal which ended in the deaths of many American troops as well as Afghan civilians:
The Taliban’s offer poses a dilemma for Biden. He has prided himself on securing the release of American hostages around the world, bringing home more than 70 people over the past four years. But handing over Rahim, long seen by the U.S. government as a high-profile prisoner, and potentially other Afghan prisoners held in U.S. custody might spark criticism.
NEWS
— Yashar Ali 🐘 (@yashar) September 2, 2024
Frustrated With White House, Family of Detained American Reaches Out to Taliban
The family of George Glezmann, feeling like it is running out of options, has informed the White House it would negotiate directly with the Taliban to try to secure the American hostage’s… pic.twitter.com/hw5NZikQeY
But at the same time, Gitmo seems to belong to another era—the 'Global War on Terror/GWOT' Bush era of CIA black sites, extraordinary rendition, and the ability of military prosecutors to lock people up for decades without so much as a formal charge.
Ironically the terror situation globally is arguably far worse than it was when Rahim and other AQ operatives were initially apprehended on central Asian battlefields and locked up, thanks to Washington itself.
In 2015 the CIA directly helped a coalition of jihadists which make the Gitmo guys look like 'moderates' take Idlib province from Assad. These same NATO/Gulf-backed Idlib terrorists now hold all of Syria in the wake of Assad's overthrow, and the Biden administration has positively celebrated it.
The real scandal...
The U.S. State Dept.’s own numbers: read the full report HERE at STATE.GOV
Yet Fox-style conservatives are now going to boil with rage over Biden "selling out America" by freeing Gitmo prisoners, but all the while the same 'Fox-Cons' will barely bat an eye over the ISIS-style terrorists now controlling Damascus. The mainstay of the Republican party has also been completely silent over America having armed Sunni hardline jihadists from Libya to Syria for more than the past decade, more content to make a national scandal over who gets released from Gitmo - all the while also dutifully ignoring the obvious Saudi state connections to 9/11.
And then there's also the fact that the jihadists of central Asia, including the Taliban itself, were trained and supported by the CIA and allied intelligence services throughout the 1980s as part of the Afghan-Soviet war. The US deep state doesn't like when average Americans actually dig in to history, where they discover that there are few terrorists or foreign dictators that Washington didn't initially create or at least support at some point.
MTA is wasting billions on NYC’s congesting pricing plan
With congestion pricing now underway, the tone-deaf misfits at the MTA are taking a victory lap on just about every news network they can, touting how visionary their regressive tax is while claiming it will lead to better and safer mass transit.
Forgive me for being pessimistic, but if you buy what the MTA is selling, I have a bridge or two to sell you!
These are the same folks who had their most recent Five-Year Capital Plan shot down by two of the biggest spenders in New York’s history — legislative leaders Carl Heastie and Andrea Stewart-Cousins — due to their concerns about how on earth the MTA was planning on paying for over half of its proposed $65 billion plan.
This should come as no surprise, though. MTA Chairman and CEO John “Janno” Lieber and the bigwigs at the agency have been spending like drunken sailors for years — so much so that the MTA has more debt than almost 80% of states in the country.
That’s totally unsustainable and reflective of their obnoxious attitude toward New Yorkers who pay their salaries.
Gross mismanagement
In 2023, state taxpayers had to bail out the MTA due to mismanagement of its finances to the tune of $1 billion — no small feat.
The sad part is that it doesn’t have to be this way. Just look at all the money the MTA has wasted or failed to collect on:
The MTA spent twice as much on Second Avenue subway consultants as it did to tunnel the subway itself.
It then chose to build the subway stations twice as large as needed, adding another $1 billion to the project.
And don’t forget that the MTA costs itself around $700 million a year due to not enforcing its fares.
It then tried fixing this by spending $700,000 on special gates designed to stop fare-beaters, which are easily bypassed.
Then the MTA spent $1 million on studying the “psychology” of fare-beaters.
All that wasted money has real-life consequences, too.
A recent audit by the state comptroller shows the MTA failed to “maintain flood doors to its tunnels,” and a review by the MTA inspector general found that 41% of stations needed immediate or near-future repairs, and 54% of emergency stairwells had “serious defects.”
Only 23% of subway stations are Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA)-compliant, according to public data.
Unsafe system
And this doesn’t even take into account the state of safety on the subways, where the MTA and Gov. Hochul have failed spectacularly on all fronts.
Felony assaults are up 55% since 2019, murder was up more than 300%, and you are twice as likely to be assaulted in the subways in 2024 as you were in 2019.
You know, all that transit crime that Janno Lieber claims is just “in people’s heads.”
Can he be more out of touch?
Lieber was even called out by Willie Geist on “Morning Joe” Tuesday morning, with the MSNBC host stating: “To Congressman Lawler’s point, and it’s not just his point, the MTA has an operating budget of $20 billion. An organization with a budget of $20 billion already should have been able to take care of the subways. They shouldn’t look the way they look at most of these subway stations; they shouldn’t operate the way they operate on most of these trains. You shouldn’t then have to slap a $9 tax on a commuter to pour more money into a system that doesn’t appear to be working for New Yorkers.”
Well said, Willie.
The MTA is spending itself into oblivion, New York state is along for the ride, and commuters and taxpayers are suffering the consequences.
If we’re ever going to get this runaway train under control, we need to fire Hochul and Lieber and elect serious officials committed to spending reform and accountability.
Republican Mike Lawler represents New York’s 17th Congressional District.
https://nypost.com/2025/01/07/opinion/the-mta-is-wasting-billions-on-nycs-congesting-pricing-plan/
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