Two things from the evening news

• Novartis AG reportedly has completed production of a vaccine against the Influenza A(H1N1) virus. It will be available by September and at least 30 countries already sent in their request for the supply of the vaccine to their countries. Philippines will wait for the recommendation of the World Health Organization (WHO) before proceeding with our own request. I hope that by the time we made up our mind that we need the vaccines, there will be some more left for us.

• Smartmatic (www.smartmatic.com) won the bidding on the automated polls for the 2010 Philippine national elections. According to the Commission on Elections (Comelec), the company has the lowest bid in the P11.2 billion automated contract. Smartmatic’s final bid was P7,191,484,739.48 which is about 4 billion pesos lower than the pegged budget. I hope this will really be effective come 2010 polls. No more ballots stolen perhaps? Hacking now?