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SWEDEN

Swedish wine tasters crowned world’s best at French contest

Wine tasters from Sweden toasted victory on Saturday after winning the fifth edition of an international blind tasting contest, leaving last year's top contenders China and France in the dust, organisers said.

Published: 14 October 2017 16:55 CEST
Swedish wine tasters crowned world's best at French contest
StockImage/Depositphotos

Held in Burgundy in France's famed Cote d'Or wine-growing region, the contest saw 24 teams from around the world vying against each other to identify a range of wines by country of origin, grape varieties, appellations and vintages.

They had to identify six white wines and six reds from around the world.

The Chinese, who won last year's contest in a triumph that organisers said hit the world of wine with a “thunderbolt, came in ninth.

And the French team, which came second last year, finished 11th.

“The French tasters are excellent but they are more used to tasting (French) wines,” admitted Denis Savarot, managing editor of La Revue du vin de France, the monthly wine magazine which organises the contest.

The Zimbabwean tasters, who took part for the first time this year, came in 23rd.

Next year's contest will take place in Languedoc in France's deep south.

NORWAY

Norway to send 200,000 AstraZeneca doses to Sweden and Iceland

Norway, which has suspended the use of AstraZeneca's Covid vaccine until further notice, will send 216,000 doses to Sweden and Iceland at their request, the Norwegian health ministry said Thursday.

Published: 22 April 2021 14:29 CEST
Norway to send 200,000 AstraZeneca doses to Sweden and Iceland
Empty vials of the AstraZeneca vaccine. (Photo by GABRIEL BOUYS / AFP)

“I’m happy that the vaccines we have in stock can be put to use even if the AstraZeneca vaccine has been paused in Norway,” Health Minister Bent Høie said in a statement.

The 216,000 doses, which are currently stored in Norwegian fridges, have to be used before their expiry dates in June and July.

Sweden will receive 200,000 shots and Iceland 16,000 under the expectation they will return the favour at some point. 

“If we do resume the use of the AstraZeneca vaccine, we will get the doses back as soon as we ask,” Høie said.

Like neighbouring Denmark, Norway suspended the use of the AstraZeneca jab on March 11 in order to examine rare but potentially severe side effects, including blood clots.

Among the 134,000 AstraZeneca shots administered in Norway before the suspension, five cases of severe thrombosis, including three fatal ones, had been registered among relatively young people in otherwise good health. One other person died of a brain haemorrhage.

On April 15, Norway’s government ignored a recommendation from the Institute of Public Health to drop the AstraZeneca jab for good, saying it wanted more time to decide.

READ MORE: Norway delays final decision on withdrawal of AstraZeneca vaccine 

The government has therefore set up a committee of Norwegian and international experts tasked with studying all of the risks linked to the AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson vaccines, which is also suspected of causing blood clots.

Both are both based on adenovirus vector technology. Denmark is the only European country to have dropped the AstraZeneca
vaccine from its vaccination campaign, and said on Tuesday it would “lend” 55,000 doses to the neighbouring German state of Schleswig-Holstein.

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