NHS prepare for autumn Covid vaccine programme
In autumn 2025 and spring 2026, residents in a care home for older adults; all adults aged 75 years and over; and people aged six months to 64 years in a clinical risk group will be eligible for a single dose of Covid-19 vaccine.
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Business Standard
31 minutes ago
- Business Standard
Household debt up, but India still lags emerging-market economies: RBI
Although household debt in India is rising, driven by increased borrowing from the financial sector, it remains lower than in other emerging-market economies (EMEs), the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) said in its Financial Stability Report. It added that non-housing retail loans, largely taken for consumption, accounted for 55 per cent of total household debt. As of December 2024, India's household debt-to-gross domestic product ratio stood at 41.9 per cent. '...Non-housing retail loans, which are mostly used for consumption purposes, formed 54.9 per cent of total household debt as of March 2025 and 25.7 per cent of disposable income as of March 2024. Moreover, the share of these loans has been growing consistently over the years, and their growth has outpaced that of both housing loans and agriculture and business loans,' the RBI said in its report. Housing loans, by contrast, made up 29 per cent of household debt, and their growth has remained steady. However, disaggregated data show that incremental growth has mainly been driven by existing borrowers availing themselves of additional loans. Their share rose to more than a third of the housing loans sanctioned in March 2025. '...The share of borrower accounts with loan-to-value ratios greater than 70 per cent is also rising, and delinquency levels are higher for lower-rated and more leveraged borrowers. However, these have declined considerably from their levels during Covid-19,' the RBI said. According to the central bank, per capita debt among individual borrowers rose from ₹3.9 lakh in March 2023 to ₹4.8 lakh in March 2025, primarily led by higher-rated borrowers. 'The share of better-rated customers (prime and above) among total borrowers is growing, both in terms of the outstanding amount and the number of borrowers. This is important from a debt serviceability and financial stability perspective, as it indicates that household balance sheets at an aggregate level are resilient,' the RBI said.
Time of India
an hour ago
- Time of India
Luka Doncic and Anamaria Goltes relationship timeline: From teenage sweethearts to parents of a daughter
Image credit: Anamaria Goltes/Instagram In an era where glitz, stardom, and millions in the bank often reshape relationship dynamics for NBA stars, Luka Doncic and fiancee Anamaria Goltes stand out as an example of old-school love. Together since their teenage years in 2016, they've grown alongside each other in both life and career and are now parents to a daughter. While Luka Doncic is currently part of the Los Angeles Lakers, Anamaria has carved out her own identity as a successful social media influencer and a doting mom to their daughter, Gabriela. Luka Doncic and Anamaria Goltes: A timeline of their love story Luka Doncic wasn't yet an NBA star when he met Anamaria Goltes, and she fell in love with his young and playful energy, as she once revealed to Cosmopolitan SI. From meeting each other at the age of 12 on the seaside in Croatia to relocating from Slovenia to Dallas during Doncic's time with the Dallas Mavericks, they have come a long way — and their love story has stood the test of time and circumstances. During a question-and-answer session on her Instagram Stories, Anamaria shared, 'We still have the same group of friends we had at that time. You keep the real ones, am I right?" — hinting at how both of them have remained grounded and true to who they were when they first met. Anamaria studied economics and business at the University of Ljubljana in Slovenia, managing her coursework online while staying by Doncic's side in Dallas, even adjusting to the time difference as she juggled both responsibilities. A successful model in the past, Anamaria is now thriving as a social media influencer with 262K followers. While Doncic remains busy with his NBA commitments, she often spends time with their three dogs — and they all dress up in Doncic's jerseys to show their support. Image credit: Anamaria Goltes/Instagram The Covid-19 pandemic brought them even closer, becoming a blessing in disguise for their busy lives. In a Q&A session on Instagram during that time, she said, 'I love that I get to spend some time with Luka, Hugo, and Gia in the quarantine. We don't get to spend that many days together because we are always working on our individual things. So being able to spend time together feels very good." Image credit: Anamaria Goltes/Instagram Image credit: Anamaria Goltes/Instagram Also Read: Luka Doncic becomes the Los Angeles Lakers' priority as LeBron James opts in and hears silence in return Doncic proposed to Goltes on 7-7-2023, a date that holds special meaning for him, as he wears jersey number 77. The couple welcomed their daughter later that year and named her Gabriela. Just as they were settling into life with their toddler, Doncic was unexpectedly traded to the Los Angeles Lakers, requiring a move to LA. Here's hoping they continue to grow together in their new city. Game On Season 1 continues with Mirabai Chanu's inspiring story. Watch Episode 2 here.
The Star
2 hours ago
- The Star
ESG sustainability: societal and global perspectives
The increasing volatility and unpredictability of the global economy arising from Black Swan events, such as the Covid-19 pandemic and the Ukraine war, is prompting corporate managers the world over to initiate measures to enhance their chances of survival. Many are adopting the ESG framework. This strategy focuses on the ESG factors that are essential for the survival of the business enterprise over the long haul. The three measures of ESG sustainability are the following: > Environmental: the ecological criteria for corporate performance as a custodian of nature; > Social: standards by which a company manages its relationships with customers, workers, suppliers and the communities where it operates; and > Governance: factors relating to a company's style of leadership, compensation policy, corporate accountability and shareholder rights. High standards of performance along these three ESG dimensions reflect a firm's concern for its stakeholders and ensures it of a continued flow of economic resources from them. By contrast, poor ESG performance is generally scorned by government regulators and militant stakeholder groups, such as activist investors and consumers who may threaten to withhold resources from the firm, thereby posing a potential threat to its continued existence. In response to pressure from activist stakeholders, many corporations are investing in ESG-compliant projects in order to burnish their public image. Key risks in PH The ESG framework may also be applied to social policies aimed at the sustainability of nations and of the planet. This broader application of the ESG framework is traditionally a function of the state. However, the state has become remiss in performing this function, and business should therefore assume this responsibility. Firms can promote ESG for society by engaging with the various stakeholder activist groups in a collaborative effort to exert pressure on the state to promote environmental (i.e., ecological), social and governance sustainability for society, and consequently, for its component institutions as well. There are currently two major sources of instability in Philippine society that pose a potential threat to its sustainability, one political and the other economic. The recently concluded national elections have a potential impact on the current state of public-sector governance in our country. Many see in the outcome of the elections the resurrection of a political regime that history has shown to have been responsible for the breakdown of most of our social and political institutions. Rightly or wrongly, it was, according to a number of observers, the result of a well-oiled campaign machinery that twisted the truth beyond recognition, and aimed at gullible, impressionable voters. More ominously, it was a political exercise where government agencies that have been captured by pressure groups, profit-seeking social media platforms and self-seeking individuals have been complicit with. By whatever lens one views the current chaotic political scenario, the emerging system of public sector governance is apparently dysfunctional and patently unsustainable. Saving an unsustainable economic system: Can business save capitalism? In the introductory chapter of my recently published book, Strategy in the New Age of Capitalism (UP Press, 2022), I wrote: '... in the last thirty years, capitalistic societies have witnessed a dramatic increase in economic inequality, lack of economic opportunities and worsening living conditions among large segments of societies. Such large-scale economic disenfranchisement in the face of phenomenal growth is unquestionably among the greatest anomalies of capitalism.' The ever-widening gap in the economic fortunes of the few, very rich individuals in society and the great majority of the people suffering in abject poverty is unsustainable. There have been increasing calls from the business community itself for a more inclusive and a more compassionate form of capitalism. On Aug 19, 2019, the influential Business Roundtable (BRT) formally abandoned its long-standing advocacy of shareholder wealth maximisation as the main purpose of business corporations and formally adopted a new 'Statement of Purpose of the Corporation'. With this proclamation, the BRT committed corporate America to creating value for all stakeholders. Over a year later, 26 of the largest business and professional organisations in the Philippines, collectively known as the Philippine Business Groups, signed a 'Covenant for Shared Prosperity', by which they upheld the universal issues of economic and social inequality and non-inclusivity by ensuring '... ethical wealth creation and the sharing of prosperity with all stakeholders.' At its virtual annual meeting held on Jan 26, 2021, leaders of the World Economic Forum made an impassioned appeal for stakeholder capitalism, an approach to business and economic policymaking that looks beyond the interests of shareholders and toward the well-being of society. By all indications, stakeholder capitalism appears to be the new mantra in the corporate world. All the sound and fury about stakeholder—or inclusive—capitalism is cloaked with the empty promise of corporate social responsibility, or CSR, interpreted by most as a form of largess or altruism, and a moral obligation of business to society. In our view, corporate initiatives that pass for 'CSR' have an underlying strategic agenda. The social benefits arising from the commercial activities of business firms are the unintended external effects of their strategic and operational decisions on the material well-being of society, and not, as popularly construed, their intended purpose. To conclude, business organisations and other forms of social institutions can survive only in sustainable physical and social environments. It is therefore in the strategic interest of business to promote sustainable ecological, political, economic and social environments. This article is reproduced with the kind permission from the Philippine Daily Inquirer—a member of A-EPIC. It reflects the personal opinion of the author and not the official stand of the Management Association of the Philippines (MAP). The author is a retired professor of economics and management, and currently a professorial lecturer at the University of the Philippines-Diliman. Feedback at map@ and nspoblador@
