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U.K. Prime Minister Boris Johnson won a mandate from the House of Commons to raise taxes to the highest level on record to fund health and social care. The result allows the prime minister to levy a new 1.25% tax on working Britons and their employers, as well as adding an extra 1.25% to dividend tax. The revenue is earmarked to pay for a post-pandemic catchup program in the National Health Service and to overhaul the country’s struggling social care system. It comes just a day after the plans were unveiled in Parliament. (Morales and Ashton, 9/8)

India is better prepared to stop new Covid-19 waves from wreaking havoc on the country, according to Dr. Soumya Swaminathan, chief scientist at the World Health Organization. The South Asian nation suffered a devastating second wave between February and early May, during which daily infection cases and death rates rose at an alarming pace, pushing the health-care system to the brink. Since then, cases have declined and are currently averaging to around 30,000 to 40,000 a day. The pace of vaccination has also climbed sharply. (Choudhury, 9/9)

As COVID-19 patients fill Philippine hospitals to the brim, officials say the virus has hit an orphanage and infected almost 100 children. Quezon City Mayor Joy Belmonte said the outbreak in the orphanage could have been prevented and “the children could have been saved from the life-threatening risks of COVID” had minimum health standards been followed strictly. Of the 122 people infected, 99 are age 18 and younger while the rest are personnel of the Gentlehands Orphanage, the mayor said in a statement Thursday. (9/9)

A Guatemalan businesswoman who is considered to be the inventor of the McDonald's Happy Meal died on September 6 at the age of 87, after spending much of her life with the company. Yolanda Fernández de Cofiño and her husband, José María Cofiño, purchased the first McDonald's franchise in Guatemala in 1974 and she continued to run it until handing the franchise over to her children in 2018. ... When she noticed that portions on the McDonald's menu could be too large for children, Fernández de Cofiño began to offer a meal with smaller portions more suitable for children, calling it the "Ronald Menu." That meal included a hamburger, small fries and a sundae, all in a bag, making it easier for parents to buy their children a meal without spending too much time examining the restaurant's menu. (Roche, 9/8)

France will offer free birth control to all women up to age 25 starting next year, the health minister announced Thursday. The measure will also include free medical visits about contraception, and will start Jan. 1, Health Minister Olivier Veran announced on France-2 television. Birth control was already free for girls up to 18 years old, but is being expanded to all women up to 25. (9/9)