NEED TO CATCH up? TheJournal.ie brings you a round-up of today’s news.

IRELAND

Balloons are released to commemorate teenager Josh Dunne Source: Leah Farrell/RollingNews.ie

• The family of 16-year-old stabbing victim Josh Dunne paid tribute to him as a “caring, amazing boy” who was “a dreamer and a do-er”.
• Health officials confirmed 49 more deaths and 1,466 new cases of Covid-19 in Ireland.
• Members of NPHET said that plans to adopt a Zero Covid strategy would be a “false promise” and highly risky.
• Leo Varadkar said that Ireland will extend mandatory hotel quarantine more widely in the coming weeks and would give consideration to a dual-testing model employed in Iceland.
• The HSE announced that it will start testing close contacts of confirmed cases of Covid-19 again from tomorrow.
• A man was hospitalised after being stabbed in Dublin’s north inner city. Another man was arrested following an unrelated stabbing in Baldoyle.
• The Office of the Director of Corporate Enforcement sought to appoint five more people to aid in the examination of documents seized from the FAI over which claims of legal privilege have been made.
• The winner of last night’s €8.5 million Lotto jackpot made contact with the National Lottery.
• The Central Bank fined an insurance broker over €40,000 after finding that customers were overcharged and given unclear communication on fees.

INTERNATIONAL 

A man walks along the Noland Trail in Newport, Wales Source: AP/PA Images

#UNITE THE UNION: Boris Johnson visited Scotland to promote the Union despite questions over whether the trip was essential during the Covid-19 pandemic.

#ASTRAZENECA: Germany’s vaccine commission has said it is recommending the use of AstraZeneca’s Covid-19 vaccine for under-65-year-olds only due to insufficient data on its effectiveness on older people.

#WUHAN: A team of World Health Organization experts left quarantine in China to begin a heavily scrutinised probe into the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic.

PARTING SHOT

If you’ve been on social media/a news website/the Internet over the past two or three days, you’ll probably have seen some mention of Reddit, Gamestop and hedge fund billionaires.

The story involves not uncomplicated aspects of the stock market, and can be hard to get your teeth into if you don’t really know how trading works.

Step forward Ireland AM’s Brianna Parkins, who has managed to distil the whole thing into a few simple clips involving cans, Drumstick squashie sweets and a cameo from the Lady on the Rock.

Part one is here (click into the tweet to see the rest):

Explaining how Reddit users made shite out of a hedge fund part one pic.twitter.com/VH5MaPkwAS

— Brianna Parkins (@parkinsbrea) January 28, 2021