From The Alpha and the Omega - Chapter Eight
by Jim A. Cornwell, Copyright © 1995, all rights reserved "Global Environment 2019 JANUARY-MARCH"
    This file is attached to http://www.mazzaroth.com/ChapterEight/2014-2017.htm from “Astronomical Events To Appear Between 2014 Through 2017 A.D.” - Chapter Eight by Jim A. Cornwell, Copyright © 1995, all rights reserved.
This link will take you to Global Environment 2019 April-June

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Global Environment 2019 JANUARY-MARCH
2019 World Disaster and Environmental Issues

• Environmental Changes and Pollution and Extinction 2019:
  • Ecology affected (Fish, Frogs, Trees, Deforestation, Rivers, Oceans and Coral reefs), Industrial waste products released (Mercury, Cyanide, Dioxins, Cadmium, Pesticides, Atrazine (weed killer), antibiotics, steroids, hormones, bacteria, sulfur dioxide, arsenic, irradiation [Cobalt 60], DDT, Ammonium perfluorooctanoate (PFOA) or C-8)
• Environmental Changes and the Global Warming Controversy 2019:
  • "Greenhouse Effect", Ice Age Reversal, Climatic Changes, Ozone Layer.
  • This file is to bring to light how many global wild fires, earthquakes, severe rainstorms and flooding, diseases, mudslides, volcano eruptions, structure collapses, cyclones, typhoons, chemical leaks, high winds, hurricanes, tornados and solar-lunar-planet-asteroids-comets movements that have occurred in the year 2018.
    
  • And as will be seen in the changes being made from the Obama-era policies verses the Trump changes.
    
• Environmental Changes and Biotechnology, Genetically Designed Crops, etc., 2019:
• Environmental Changes and World-Wide Diseases 2018:
  • Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome (AIDS), Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV), Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STDs), Mad Cow Disease, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), West Nile Virus, Tuberculosis, and other that might come along.

• January 2019
  • 12/31/2018 As temperatures fall, air quality worsens in Indian capital
    FILE PHOTO: A man rides his bicycle in front of the India Gate shrouded
    in smog in New Delhi, India, December 26, 2018. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi     NEW DELHI (Reuters) – Pollution levels spiked last week in New Delhi, India’s teeming capital of more than 20 million people, climbing to nearly 12 times the recommended level and exacerbating a public health crisis.
        Senior government officials said the main reasons for the surge in the amount of toxic smog trapped over New Delhi were unusually cold air, including fog, and slow wind speeds.
        Click here for an interactive Reuters graphic https://tmsnrt.rs/2GORiU9 on the link between Delhi’s pollution and falling temperatures and wind speeds.
        The World Health Organization said this year India was home to the world’s 14 most polluted cities.    New Delhi was ranked the sixth most polluted.
        In the city on Sunday, levels of PM 2.5, the amount of tiny particulate matter under 2.5 micrograms found in every cubic meter of air, were at 415, well above “hazardous” levels, as defined by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. The agency says any level above 35 can be unhealthy.
        Pollution levels were exacerbated because of fumes from vehicles, pollutants from coal-fired power plants and industries, as well as smoke from fires being burned to keep people warm.
        In October and November, crop residue burning in the neighboring states of Haryana and Punjab also contributed to air pollution.
        In India, air pollution claimed 1.24 million lives in 2017, or 12.5 percent of total deaths, according to a study published in Lancet Planetary Health this month.
    (Reporting by Mayank Bhardwaj, editing by Raju Gopalakrishnan)
  • 1/1/2019 Indonesia landslides kill at least two, leave dozens missing
    Rescue workers search for victims near a collapsed house following landslides at Cisolok district
    in Sukabumi, West Java province, Indonesia, January 1, 2019. Antara Foto/M Agung Rajasa/via REUTERS     JAKARTA (Reuters) – Landslides on Indonesia’s heavily populated island of Java killed at least two people and left 41 missing, an official at the country’s disaster agency said on Tuesday.
        The landslides, which struck a village in West Java on Monday, also injured 2 people and buried thirty homes, Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman for Indonesia’s disaster agency said in a statement.
        “Rugged rocky roads and the rainy weather is making it difficult for our team to conduct evacuation operations,” Nugroho said, adding that heavy equipment was needed to help search for survivors.
    (Reporting by Fanny Potkin; Editing by Neil Fullick)
  • 1/2/2019 Landslides kill at least 15 in Indonesia after year of disasters
    Search and rescue teams gather for a briefing during a search effort to find victims from the landslide in
    Sukabumi, West Java Province, Indonesia January 1, 2019 in this picture obtained from social media. SEKOLAH RELAWAN/via REUTERS     JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesian rescue teams were searching for victims of a series of landslides that killed at least 15 people on New Year’s Day, officials said, after a year of natural disasters killed thousands.
        At least 20 people were missing after landslides during heavy rain buried 30 houses in Sukabumi regency, West Java.
        “Loose soil is a danger to rescue teams that are working in the field,” said disaster mitigation agency spokesman Sutopo Purwo Nugroho.
        Heavy rain had forced rescuers to suspend the search on Tuesday.
        Indonesia is a disaster-prone archipelago that in 2018 suffered its deadliest year in over a decade in a series of earthquakes and tsunamis in different regions killed more than 3,000 people.
    (Reporting by Bernadette Christina Munthe; Writing by Kanupriya Kapoor; Editing by Nick Macfie)
  • 1/2/2019 Death toll from Philippine landslides, floods climbs to 85
    Rescue workers carry a body bag containing remains of victims following a landslide at
    Cisolok district in Sukabumi, West Java province, Indonesia, January 1, 2019 in this photo taken by Antara Foto.
    Picture taken January 1, 2019. Antara Foto/Nurul Ramadhan/ via REUTERS     MANILA (Reuters) – The death toll from landslides and devastating floods in the central Philippines triggered by a tropical depression climbed to 85, officials said on Wednesday, and 20 people were missing as rescuers slowly reached cut-off communities.
        The casualties, including young children, were mostly killed when their homes collapsed in landslides after days of heavy rain in several provinces in the central Philippines, said Ricardo Jalad, executive director of the national disaster agency.
        “If we don’t recover the missing or we recover them dead, that is 105 deaths, which we hope not,” Jalad said.
        The tropical depression, which weakened into a low pressure system before leaving the Philippines on Sunday, brought heavy rain that triggered landslides and flooding in the Bicol and eastern Visayas regions.
        Officials put three provinces under a “state of calamity” to give them access to emergency funds.
        Bicol, with a population of 5.8 million, was the hardest hit, with 68 killed in intense rains and landslides.    Damage to agriculture in Bicol, which produces rice and corn, was estimated at 342 million pesos ($6.5 million).
        Rescuers, including the police and military, used heavy-lifting equipment to clear roads leading to landslide sites and entered flooded communities using rubber boats.
        “The sun is already out, with occasional light rains.    We hope floods will subside,” Ronna Monzon, a member of the operations personnel at the disaster agency in Bicol, told Reuters.
        About 20 tropical cyclones hit the Philippines every year, with destroyed crops and infrastructure taking a toll on human lives and weighing down one of the fastest growing economies in Asia.
    (Reporting by Neil Jerome Morales and Karen Lema; Editing by Paul Tait)
  • 1/3/2018 Dead and gone forever: Species we lost in ’18 by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY     They had been on our planet for millions of years, but 2018 was the year several species officially vanished.
        Three bird species went extinct this year, scientists said, two of which are songbirds from northeastern Brazil: the Cryptic Treehunter (Cichlocolaptes mazarbarnetti) and Alagoas Foliagegleaner (Philydor novaesi), according to a report from the conservation group BirdLife International.    The other extinct bird is Hawaii’s Po’ouli (Melamprosops phaeosoma), which has not been seen in the wild since 2004.
        An additional species of bird – the Spix’s macaw, made famous in the 2011 animated movie “Rio” – was declared extinct in the wild; only a few dozen captive Spix’s macaws are alive.
        Beyond birds, the vaquita (a dolphin- like porpoise) and the northern white rhino are near the end.    In the USA, only 40 red wolves remain in the wild, according to a report last year by the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service.
        Earth “is now in the midst of its sixth mass extinction of plants and animals – the sixth wave of extinctions in the past half-billion years,” the Center for Biological Diversity said.    “We’re currently experiencing the worst spate of species die-offs since the loss of the dinosaurs.”
    In the USA, the red wolf is on the edge of extinction. GERRY BROOME/AP
  • 1/3/2019 African swine fever hits huge, foreign-invested Chinese farm
    Pig's feet are placed for sale at a market in Beijing, China December 26, 2018. Picture taken December 26, 2018. REUTERS/Jason Lee     BEIJING (Reuters) – China reported an outbreak of deadly African swine fever on a huge pig farm part-owned by a Danish investment fund, showing the spread of the virus to modern industrial farms expected to have the best levels of disease prevention.
        The outbreak occurred on a farm in Suihua city with 73,000 pigs in northeastern Heilongjiang province, owned by the Heilongjiang Asia-Europe Animal Husbandry Co Ltd, a company established in 2016.
        The farm’s herd included 15,000 breeding pigs, according to its website, and it was aiming to produce 385,000 pigs for slaughter a year.    Some 4,686 pigs had been infected and 3,766 animals died, the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs said late on Wednesday.    All animals on infected farms must be culled under current rules.
        The farm is the largest yet to be hit by the disease, which has infected almost 100 farms across China since August 2018, spreading faster than in any other country to date.
        More than 200,000 pigs on infected farms have been culled, according to a Reuters tally of official figures, while hundreds of thousands more in the vicinity have also been put down.
        China has the world’s largest hog herd and the rapid spread of African swine fever has roiled the country’s trade in pork, the nation’s most popular meat, disrupting supplies and pushing up prices in some areas.
        Neither Heilongjiang Asia-Europe Animal Husbandry nor its majority owner, state-owned Zhejiang Rural Development Group Co. Ltd, responded to calls for comment.
        Steffen Schiottz-Christensen, vice president for North Asia at Denmark state fund IFU, confirmed the outbreak but declined to comment further as he had yet to be fully briefed.
        IFU, which provides risk capital and advice for investment in developing countries, invested 28.4 million DKK ($4.32 million) in the farm in 2017, according to its website, although its shareholding has since been diluted, Schiottz-Christensen said.
        “The African swine fever situation is only getting worse.    Small farms, big farms, slaughterhouses, feed – the whole production chain basically all got hit,” said Yao Guiling, an analyst with consultancy China-America Commodity Data Analytics.
        Beijing has banned feeding kitchen waste to pigs, and restricted transport of live pigs and products from infected areas.
        But the virus has now reached 23 provinces and municipalities across China.    The disease is deadly to pigs but does not affect humans.
        “The policies are good, but the increasing outbreaks show that there might be some problem with execution at the local government level,” said Yao.
        China’s agriculture ministry also said on Wednesday that slaughterhouses will need to test their pork products for African swine fever before selling them to the market.
        Slaughterhouses must slaughter pigs from different origins separately, and can only sell the products if blood from the same batch of pigs tests negative for the virus.
        If the virus is detected, slaughterhouses must cull all pigs to be slaughtered and suspend operations for at least 48 hours, according to the regulation, which will go into effect from Feb. 1.
    (For a graphic on ‘Swine fever in China’ click https://tmsnrt.rs/2QMhmzL)
    (Reporting by Hallie Gu and Dominique Patton; editing by David Evans and Richard Pullin)
  • 1/4/2018 One dead in Thailand as tropical storm uproots trees, blows off roofs by Patpicha Tanakasempipat and Panarat Thepgumpanat
    A red flag, warning of dangerous conditions, is seen at a beach as tropical storm Pabuk approaches
    the southern province of Nakhon Si Thammarat, Thailand, January 4, 2019. REUTERS/Krittapas Chaipimon     BANGKOK (Reuters) – Thailand’s first tropical storm in three decades killed one person on Friday as it arrived on the south coast, knocking down trees and blowing off roofs in its path, but was losing speed, officials said, while warning against the risk of flash floods.
        Accompanying winds churned up high waves and gusts in the Gulf of Thailand as tropical storm Pabuk made landfall in the Pak Phanang district of Nakhon Si Thammarat province, where trees crashed down on houses to cause widespread damage.
        Disaster mitigation officials said the person killed was among the crew of a fishing boat that capsized in strong winds near the coast of nearby Pattani province.    Another of the crew was missing, but four others were safe.
        Weather officials warned of torrential downpours and strong winds in 15 provinces in the Thai south, home to one of the world’s largest natural rubber plantations and several islands thronged by tourists.
        But by Friday afternoon, the storm was slowing, and was heading for the province of Surat Thani, the Thai Meteorological Department said in a statement.
        “It is expected to downgrade to be a tropical depression,” it added.    “People should beware of the severe conditions that cause forest runoffs and flash floods.”
        The conditions are expected to persist into Saturday.    With airports and ferry services shut, people were advised to stay indoors until the storm passed.
        The National Disaster Warning Center also sounded alarms around tourist beach destinations, such as Koh Samui and Koh Phangan, urging people to leave high-risk areas for higher ground.
        During the past few days, 6,176 people have been evacuated to shelters from Nakhon Si Thammarat as well as the provinces of Pattani, Songkhla and Yala, the Department of Disaster Prevention and Mitigation has said.
        The Nakhon Si Thammarat airport said it had closed, and low-cost Nok Airlines Pcl said it had canceled all eight flights to and from the province.
        The Surat Thani airport will also close from Friday afternoon to Saturday, cancelling flights by Nok Airlines, Lion Air, and Thai Smile, a subsidiary of national carrier Thai Airways.
        Earlier, Bangkok Airways Pcl said it had canceled all flights to and from the holiday destination of Koh Samui, where ferry services have also been suspended.
        National energy company PTT Exploration and Production Pcl said it had suspended operations at Bongkot and Erawan, two of the country’s biggest gas fields in the Gulf of Thailand.
    (Reporting by Patpicha Tanakasempipat and Panarat Thepgumpanat; Editing by Kay Johnson and Clarence Fernandez)
  • 1/5/2019 One dead, two missing after blizzards hit Greece
    A man rides his bike during snowfall at the seaside promenade of
    Thessaloniki, Greece, January 4, 2019. REUTERS/Alexandros Avramidis     ATHENS (Reuters) – An elderly woman was found dead and two men were missing after blizzards hit parts of Greece, police officials said on Saturday.
        Temperatures in central and northern Greece have remained below zero for almost a week, during which time heavy snow has disrupted transport services and forced flights to be diverted in the north of the country.
        The body of the 66-year-old woman was recovered from a car found overturned near a stream in Keratea, a region 45 kilometers southeast of Athens. Two men who had been in the car were unaccounted for.
        “Her husband and one more man, who were in the same car, have been reported missing since Thursday when bad weather conditions prevailed in the area,” a police official said on condition of anonymity.
        The Greek civil protection service has urged municipal authorities to be on the alert ahead of a further spell of cold weather expected to hit Greece on Monday.
    (Reported by Lefteris Papadimas; Editing by David Holmes)
  • 1/6/2018 The big melt: Antarctic sea ice shrinks to record low for January by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        The amount of sea ice around Antarctica has melted to a record low for January, scientists say.
        As of Jan. 1, there was 2.11 million square miles of sea ice around the continent, the smallest January area since records began in 1978, according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
        Sea ice is frozen ocean water that melts each summer, then refreezes each winter.    Antarctic sea ice is typically smallest in late February or early March, near the end of the Southern Hemisphere’s summer.
        “Antarctic sea ice extent is astonishingly low this year, not just near the Ross Ice Shelf, but around most of the continent,” Cecilia Bitz, a polar scientist at the University of Washington, told Grist on Thursday.
        Specifically, the area of sea ice around Antarctica on Jan. 1 was 11,600 square miles below the previous record low for that date, set in 2017.    It was 726,000 square miles below average – an area roughly twice the size of Texas.
        With six to eight weeks remaining in the melt season, the ice center said it remains to be seen whether the Antarctic sea ice will set an all-time low.
        “Antarctic sea ice extent is astonishingly low this year, not just near the Ross Ice Shelf, but around most of the continent.” Cecilia Bitz, University of Washington polar scientist.
        Sea ice loss – especially in the Arctic and less so in the Antarctic – is one of the clearest signals of global warming, the National Climate Assessment reported last year.
        Besides human-caused warming of the Earth’s atmosphere and oceans, factors affecting the ice include Antarctica’s geography, the region’s winds, and air and ocean temperatures.
        “Although it is too soon for us to isolate what caused the rapid December decline and recent record low extents, it is likely that unusual atmospheric conditions and high sea surface temperatures – important factors in the 2016-2017 record lows – are playing a role,” according to a statement from the National Snow and Ice Data Center.
        Even though sea ice occurs primarily in the polar regions, it influences our global climate and weather patterns around the world, the center added.
  • 1/6/2019 Rain clears smog in Indian capital yet air quality ‘very poor’ by Neha Dasgupta
    FILE PHOTO: A man rides his bicycle in front of the India Gate shrouded
    in smog in New Delhi, India, December 26, 2018. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi/File Photo     NEW DELHI (Reuters) – A rainy spell early on Sunday brought better air to residents of New Delhi, giving them a brief respite from thick grey smog that has shrouded the Indian capital for the last two months, although air quality continued to be “very poor.”
        A measure of tiny, hazardous breathable particles known as PM 2.5 reached an average of 182 by 12 p.m., the Central Pollution Control Board said, its lowest since Nov. 4.
        But pollution was still five times more than a U.S. government recommended level of 35 to stand at “unhealthy” levels, according to the U.S. embassy.
        “Change in weather conditions by rain or higher wind speed helps dissipate peak pollution, but we continue to need strong emergency actions such as shutting power plants,” said Anumita Roychowdhury of the Centre for Science and Environment think-tank.
        The federal government air quality index rated Delhi’s air quality “very poor” on Sunday and had a similar forecast for Monday, urging people with respiratory and cardiac problems to avoid polluted areas and limit outdoor movement.
        A sharp drop in temperatures and wind speed over the last two weeks, combined with vehicle and industrial emissions, dust from building sites and smoke from garbage burning has stoked pollution over much of north India.
        Levels of PM 2.5, or particles smaller than 2.5 microns in diameter, hit their highest last year at 450 on Dec. 23.
        Despite the pollution, there is little sign Delhi’s 20 million residents are taking steps to protect themselves.    Activists say the apparent lack of concern gives politicians the cover they need for not tackling the issue adequately.
    (Reporting by Neha Dasgupta; Editing by Clarence Fernandez)
  • 1/7/2019 Air quality worsens in China’s Henan province, improves elsewhere by David Stanway
    FILE PHOTO - A view of sunset is seen in smog in Zhengzhou, Henan province, China
    January 2, 2017. Picture taken January 2, 2017. REUTERS/Stringer     SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Air pollution in China’s heavy-industrial province of Henan worsened in December even as other regions improved, official data showed, with its cities hit by unfavorable weather and a struggle to find cleaner sources of economic growth.
        China is restricting industrial output, traffic and coal consumption in the smog-prone north for a second year in a bid to cut pollution during the winter heating period, when thousands of mainly coal-burning boilers are switched on.
        But nine cities in Henan, home to around 95 million people, still recorded a rise in small, lung-damaging emissions known as PM2.5 to an average of 82 micrograms per cubic meter in the last month of 2018, up 12 percent from a year earlier.
        Emissions in the cities – which include several big steel, aluminum and coal producing districts – had already soared by 107 percent from a year earlier in November, according to a Reuters analysis of official data.
        As many as 79 cities throughout the north and east have drawn up plans to control smog this winter, with many committed to cutting PM2.5 emissions by 3 percent from last year.
        For these cities, average PM2.5 levels fell 18 percent in December from a year earlier to 66 micrograms per cubic meter, according to Reuters calculations, although still nearly double China’s national standard of 35 micrograms.
        But the local increases in Henan and elsewhere show how much cities are at the mercy of the weather, with conditions such as high humidity and low wind exacerbating smog.
        “My analysis indicates that (the rises in Henan) are accounted for by the weather,” said Lauri Myllyvirta, energy analyst with Greenpeace.
        Henan’s smog concentrations have worsened since the end of last year, with the local government saying on Saturday that 12 provincial cities have issued “red alerts” for the coming week.
        Some 28 cities in the major pollution control zone around China’s capital Beijing are also struggling to meet winter air quality targets, with average PM2.5 in the last two months of 2018 up 17 percent compared with a year earlier.
        The zone includes the country’s top steel producing province of Hebei, where average emissions rose 11 percent in the last two months of 2018.
        Hebei has promised to cut PM2.5 by 5 percent this year compared to 2018, the official Hebei Daily reported on Monday, citing the local environmental bureau.
        It vowed to cut another 14 million tonnes of steel smelting capacity and 9 million tonnes of coal production, after shutting 12.3 million tonnes and 13 million tonnes respectively in 2018.,br>     The province said last week it had cut PM2.5 by 12.5 percent to an average of 56 micrograms over the whole of 2018, beating its target.
    (Reporting by David Stanway; editing by Richard Pullin)
  • 1/9/2019 ‘Camp Fire’ ranked most expensive disaster in 2018 by OAN Newsroom
        California’s ‘Camp Fire’ has topped the list as 2018’s costliest natural disaster.    On Tuesday, the German reinsurance company Munich RE reported the blaze cost up to $16.5 billion in pure damages.
        It beat out several other catastrophes, including Hurricane Michael which caused $16 billion in damages in the gulf coast and Hurricane Florence which cost $14 billion.
        “We’re going to help them with funding — it’s going to take a lot of funding, I will tell you that,” stated President Trump while visiting Paradise, California.
        The ‘Camp Fire’ burned through 154,000 acres for more than two weeks, destroying thousands of homes and claiming more than 80 lives.
    Ashes and debris are all that remain where houses once stood in Paradise, Calif.,
    on Nov. 15, 2018, after a wildfire destroyed the town. (AP Photo/Noah Berger)     Experts say these disastrous fires can continue in places like California due to the state’s dry weather and forest management.
        On a global scale, last year’s natural disasters cost more than $160 billion in damages and only half were insured.
  • 1/9/2019 N.Y. health officials battle worst measles outbreak in decades by OAN Newsroom
        Health officials in New York are battling the worst measles outbreak in decades as the highly contagious disease spreads nationwide.
        At least 160 people have been infected by the virus, with the worst affected areas surrounding orthodox Jewish communities in Brooklyn and Rockland County.
    In this file photo, a pediatrician holds a dose of the
    measles-mumps-rubella (MMR) vaccine at his practice in Northridge, Calif. (Damian Dovarganes / AP)     While measles can only be prevented by vaccinations, health officials are saying more than 80-percent have not been vaccinated in those areas.
        Meanwhile, 25 other states have reported outbreaks with alarming numbers rising in Oregon and Washington.
        The Big Apple has given over 11,000 vaccinations to children so far, but are still struggling to contain the virus’ rapid spread.
    [I had measles when I was young and lived through it, and I assumed they thought they eradicated with vaccines.].
    
  • 1/10/2019 China’s Henan underperforms on smog after winter surge
    FILE PHOTO: People walk in the smog towards a railway station on a
    polluted day in Zhengzhou, Henan province, China January 9, 2017. REUTERS/Stringer     SHANGHAI (Reuters) – The heavy industrial Chinese province of Henan met its target to cut air pollution in 2018 but underperformed the country as a whole after a surge in smog over winter, underscoring the challenges facing coal-dependent regions as the economy slows.
        Henan, a major coal and metal producer in central China, is under heavy pressure to curb pollution and restructure its industrial economy as Beijing’s five-year “war on pollution” expands to more regions.
        It promised late last year that it would work to slash coal consumption by 15 percent by 2020, but many of its mining-dependent cities are struggling to find alternative sources of growth.
        Over the course of 2018, concentrations of lung-damaging small particle pollution known as PM2.5 fell 1.6 percent from a year earlier to 61 micrograms per cubic meter.    That beat its target of 63 micrograms, but is still well above China’s national standard of 35 micrograms.
        “The province’s air quality has continuously improved,” said Jiao Fei, the vice-head of the provincial environmental protection office, according to a transcript of a press conference posted by the Ministry of Ecology and Environment on Thursday.
        Still, A Reuters analysis of official pollution data showed that PM2.5 in nine industrial cities in Henan rose by an average of 12 percent in December, hitting 82 micrograms.    It hit nearly 100 micrograms in November, more than double a year earlier.
        Jiao blamed poor weather over the last two months of the year, saying that “diffusion conditions” in Henan were significantly worse than normal, leading to longer smog outbreaks.
        “Heavy pollution weather conditions in Henan were much more severe than in Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei and other provinces,” he said.
        According to MEE data published this week, PM2.5 levels in 338 cities across China fell 9.3 percent compared to last year to an average of 39 micrograms.    A total of 262 cities failed to meet the national standard of 35 micrograms over the year.
    (Reporting by David Stanway; editing by Richard Pullin)
  • 1/10/2019 Greenland’s residents grapple with global warming by Maria Caspani
    Seal hunter Henrik Josvasson pulls a common loon into his boat while seal hunting near
    the town of Tasiilaq, Greenland, June 16, 2018. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson     (Reuters) – Nestled between icy peaks and lapped in frozen ocean waters, the tiny town of Tasiilaq in southeastern Greenland is home to some 2,000 people.
        Colorful wooden houses dot the sub-Arctic landscape battered by one of the harshest climates on the planet. But global warming is reshaping the world’s largest island, causing the ice sheet to melt at a faster rate than previously thought, according to recent research.     As scientists study the threats posed by a warming climate, some of the immediate effects of climate change have been a double-edged sword for some in and around Tasiilaq.
        Julius Nielsen, 40, who lives about 45 km (28 miles) from Tasiilaq, has been hunting and fishing in the area most of his life.
        “There’s no snow, it’s too hot and the water is not freezing,” said Nielsen.    A thin, frail ice sheet – or lack of ice – pose a big problem for locals like Nielsen who are not able to go hunting with their sled dogs, or have to take alternate routes.
        Continued global warming will accelerate thawing of the ice sheet and contribute to rising sea levels worldwide, scientists have found.
        A United Nations report released in October urged nations to limit the increase in global temperatures to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels in order to minimize global sea level rise, reduce flooding and the overall impact of climate change on the world’s ecosystems.    This would require global net carbon dioxide emissions to fall by about 45 percent by 2030 from 2010 levels.
        Nielsen said that, over the last 10 years, it has become increasingly hard to reach usual hunting grounds with sled dogs due to unpredictable weather, thinning ice or no ice at all.
        “Every year we see the glaciers, the landscape, the ice sheet melting and melting,” he said.    “What we know from our ancestors is almost gone and we cannot take it back.    We have to find new tools.”
        Lars Anker Moeller used to be able to take tourists out on his signature five-day sled dog ride every year when he started working at tour operator Arctic-Dream over a decade ago.
        Now, Moeller often has to take his clients on alternate routes because of the lack of ice.
        But there is a silver lining.
        Ice retreating earlier in the year is freeing access to areas that were previously locked away for longer, and it has allowed Moeller to kick off boat tours for tourists much earlier in the summer season, said the 45-year-old Dane.
        “Instead of having three months, we can go (on boats) four months or five months,” Moeller.
        In addition, fish such as mackerel, usually not found in the icy seawater of Greenland, are now abundant – a boon for the local fishing industry, Moeller and Nielsen said.
        Moeller also cited another temporary advantage climate change has brought to his tourism business: People want to see the ice cap before it is too late.
        “Go and see the glaciers before they disappear.    That’s the thing you hear again and again,” Moeller said.
        A first-of-its-kind survey conducted in December by the University of Copenhagen, the University of Greenland and Kraks Fond Institute for Urban Economic Research sought to paint a picture of how Greenlandic residents view climate change.
        The study found that over four in 10 residents believe climate change will harm them, while just one in 10 think they will benefit from it.
        “Our results indicate that climate change is personally relevant to most people living here and something which the majority of residents are already experiencing now,” Kelton Minor, one of the survey’s authors, told Reuters in a phone interview from Nuuk.
        For many in Greenland, it is a daily reality.
        “About eight in 10 residents say that they have directly experienced climate change, over 60 percent think that it’s extremely important or very important to them personally… and slightly less than half the population think that climate change will harm them,” Minor said.
        Despite the new challenges brought by the changing climate, Greenland’s residents are known for their resilience.
        “The beauty is that Greenlanders have always been good at adapting, so they will survive anyway, whatever will happen,” Moeller said.
        For photo essay, please click on: https://reut.rs/2rPa9nn
    (Reporting by Maria Caspani; Editing by Diane Craft)
  • 1/11/2019 China could lift life expectancy by nearly three years if it meets WHO smog standards: study
    FILE PHOTO - A chimney is seen in front of residential buildings during a polluted day
    in Harbin, Heilongjiang Province, China, January 21, 2016. REUTERS/Stringer/File Photo     BEIJING/SHANGHAI (Reuters) – China could raise average life expectancy by 2.9 years if it improves air quality to levels recommended by the World Health Organisation (WHO), according a new study from a U.S. research group.
        China has vowed to determine the precise impact of air and water pollution on health as part of its efforts to raise average life expectancy to 79 years by 2030 from 76.3 years in 2015.
        According to the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago (EPIC), big air quality improvements made in the last five years have already been enough to push up average lifespans.
        “China is winning its war against pollution … (The country) is due to see dramatic improvements in the overall health of its people, including longer lifespans, if these improvements are sustained,” EPIC director Michael Greenstone said at an event in Beijing on Thursday.
        According to the EPIC’s findings, air quality improvements made in the smog-prone northern city of Tianjin over the last five years are already expected to have raised the average lifespan of its 13 million residents by 1.2 years.
        China cut average concentrations of hazardous particles known as PM2.5 to an average of 39 micrograms per cubic meter last year, down 9.3 percent from 2017 after a campaign to curb coal use and improve industry and vehicle standards.
        However, average emission levels remain significantly higher than China’s own 35-microgram standard, as well as the 10-microgram limit recommended by the WHO. In northern industrial regions, average concentrations are much higher.
        In a study cited by state-owned news agency Xinhua on Friday, a group of top Chinese health experts identified air and water pollution as one of the major health risks in China for the next 20 years, alongside obesity, depression and Alzheimer’s disease.
        Chinese Premier Li Keqiang declared “war” on pollution in 2014 amid fears that the damage done to the country’s environment as a result of more than 30 years of untrammelled economic growth would lead to social unrest.
        However, with much of the low-hanging fruit already taken and the economy facing a slowdown, China has admitted that the campaign is under pressure.
        “It would be very difficult for China to meet the WHO standards even with strong efforts to reduce industrial emissions and fossil fuel consumption,” Jiang Kejun, research professor at the Energy Research Institute, a government think tank, told Reuters on the sidelines of the Thursday event.
        “Emissions from non-industrial sectors, agriculture for instance, also play a big part in air pollution and are hard to put under control,” he said.
    (This version of the story corrects the acronym for the Energy Policy Institute at the University of Chicago to EPIC, not EPI, in paragraphs 3, 4 and 5)
    (Reporting by Muyu Xu and David Stanway; Editing by Joseph Radford)
  • 1/11/2019 Fund battling AIDS, TB and malaria seeks $14 billion to invigorate fight by Kate Kelland
    FILE PHOTO: A nurse holds a glass containing a cocktail of HIV/AIDS drugs for a
    patient at Mercy Centre in Bangkok February 8, 2007. REUTERS/Adrees Latif     LONDON, Jan 11 (Reuters) – At least $14 billion is needed to accelerate the fight against AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria and quell stubborn epidemics that still kill millions, the head of a global health fund said on Friday.
        Announcing a fundraising target for the next three-year cycle, Peter Sands, director of the Global Fund to Fight AIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria, said the money could help save 16 million lives, halving deaths from the three diseases.
        It would also be used to build stronger health systems in poor countries ill-equipped to handle existing outbreaks and unable to cope with potential new epidemics.
        “New threats mean there is no middle ground,” Sands said in a statement.    “We need to … protect and build on the gains we have made, or we will see those achievements eroded, infections and deaths resurge, and the prospect of ending the epidemics disappear.”
        The Global Fund is a group of governments, civil society and private sector partners which invests around $4 billion a year to fight infectious diseases.    It was launched in 2002 and has since helped slash the number of people dying from AIDS, TB and malaria by around a third.
        Yet the epidemics are still far from beaten.
        In 2017, TB killed 1.6 million people, including 300,000 people with HIV, making it one of the top 10 causes of death worldwide.    Malaria kills almost half a million people each year, most of them babies or young children in sub-Saharan Africa.
        In the AIDS pandemic, almost 37 million people worldwide are infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and around 15 million of them do not get the antiretroviral drugs needed.
        Sands acknowledged in a telephone interview how hard it would be to encourage international donors to pledge funds towards such a high target.    But he added that with the fund’s reach and ability to elicit engagement and investment by governments in nations affected by the epidemics, he was confident it would have a major impact.
        “If we step up the fight now, we will save millions more lives,” he said.
    (Reporting by Kate Kelland; Editing by Andrew Cawthorne)
  • 1/13/2019 Rising sea temperatures set record after record - Study: Oceans heating faster than we thought by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Global warming isn’t only cooking our atmosphere, it’s also heating up the oceans.
        The world’s seas were the warmest on record in 2018, scientists announced last week.    Also, ocean temperatures are rising faster than previously thought, a new paper said.
        Specifically, they’re warming as much as 40 percent faster than an estimate from a United Nations panel just five years ago.
        “If you want to see where global warming is happening, look in our oceans,” paper co-author Zeke Hausfather said in a statement.    “Ocean heating is a very important indicator of climate change, and we have robust evidence that it is warming more rapidly than we thought,” said Hausfather, a climate scientist with Carbon Brief, a British-based website that covers climate science news.
        He also said that while 2018 was the fourth-warmest year on record in the atmosphere, it was the warmest year on record in the oceans, as was 2017 and 2016 before that.    In fact, Hausfather told Reuters, records for ocean warming have been broken almost yearly since 2000.
        Overall, while we’re rightly concerned about what climate change is doing to our atmosphere, ocean heating is critical because an estimated 93 percent of all heat trapped by greenhouse gases settles in the world’s oceans.
        Global warming is caused by humanity’s burning of fossil fuels such as oil, gas and coal, which release greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide and methane into the earth’s atmosphere and oceans.
        “Global warming is here, and has major consequences already.    There is no doubt, none!” the paper’s authors wrote.
        The analysis also shows that trends in ocean heat content match those predicted by top computer models.
        Laure Zanna, an associate professor of climate physics at the University of Oxford who was not involved in the study, told The New York Times that the research was “a very nice summary of what we know of the ocean and how far the new estimates have come together.”
        The unusual warmth in the seas is harming marine life and coral reefs.    It’s also contributing to rising sea levels around the world as ice melts near Antarctica and Greenland.
        The research was published Thursday in a “Perspectives” paper in the peer-reviewed journal Science.
    Ocean temperatures are rising faster than previously thought, with dire implications
    for coral reefs and other marine life. UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY
  • 1/13/2019 On climate change, ‘a race against time’ - New panel chairwoman to put issue in spotlight by Ledyard King, USA TODAY
        WASHINGTON – The warnings about climate change are dire: bigger floods, larger fires, larger storms.
        Most experts agree there’s little to prevent these catastrophes without swift action on climate change.
        Enter Rep. Kathy Castor, the Florida Democrat that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi has chosen to chair the new Select Committee on the Climate Crisis.
        A Capitol Hill veteran and clean energy champion with a background as an environmental lawyer, the Tampa Democrat plans to shine a light on the very climate issues many Democratic candidates ran on in November to win back the House.
        Over the next 15 months, the panel will make policy recommendations, push for legislation and cast a spotlight on the growing dangers of man-made global warming that’s spelled out in a chilling a federal report released in November.
        “We are in a race against time,” Castor, 52, told USA TODAY recently.
        The committee already faces obstacles:
    • Republicans, who have consistently downplayed the effects of climate change, say the panel is unfairly partisan (nine Democrats vs. six Republicans).
    • Progressives, who support a comprehensive approach known as the Green New Deal, worry the committee won’t be aggressive enough.
        The panel will only be able to do so much.
        It won’t have the power to subpoena documents or depose witnesses.    It ultimately will have to rely on standing committees to adopt its recommendations.    And any ambitious measures are unlikely to win passage in the Republican-held Senate or be signed by President Donald Trump, who has dismissed global warming as a “hoax” and made environmental deregulation a cornerstone of his economic agenda.
        Castor spoke with USA TODAY about the charge of her committee and the challenges it faces:
        Question: Much of the information on climate change is out there.    So what do you hope to accomplish with this new committee?
        Castor: We’re going to press for dramatic carbon pollution reduction.    We want to win the clean energy future to defend the American way of life and avoid catastrophic and costly weather events that have dire impacts.
    Q: What are some of the issues you want to pursue and how will you work with the standing congressional committee to achieve them?
    A: Right off the bat, we will tackle fuel economy standards, make sure the Commerce Committee and the (Transportation and Infrastructure Committee) are focused on that.    The Financial Services Committee has to do a flood insurance reform bill. We will be involved in that as well.
    Q: You mentioned flood insurance. Representing a coastal district, you know what flooding and storms can do.    Should we rebuild along the shore?
    A: We shouldn’t be insuring at taxpayer expense homes and businesses that have been destroyed repeatedly on the shore.    Folks know full well that they’re in hurricane’s path or flood’s path and they do that on their own.    I’m concerned the (flood) maps are not upto- date, that states and local communities are not acting fast enough to adopt policies to revise maps.
    Q: Is there a concern you may getting in the way of standing committees who are already charged with environmental protection and climate change issues?
    A: No, we’re going to be complementary.    This is a collaborative effort.    It’s just being elevated because the threat to our way of life is at stake.    It’s all hands on deck.
    Q: What’s your response to Republicans who say the panel will be stacked with Democrats and have too much latitude to go after issues beyond its scope?
    Castor: Look, we’ve had so much delay and Republicans have had their heads in the sand here in the Congress.    I’ve just been through a time in the minority on (the) Energy and Commerce (Committee) where they refused to have even one hearing on the climate or hear any legislation dealing with the escalating cost of climate of extreme weather events.    And I do see our jurisdiction as being very broad.    We’re talking about the planet.
    Q: How will the committee go about highlighting the consequences of climate change?
    A: We intend to tell the stories of communities that are taking action despite the inaction from the Congress and the Trump administration.    There are some conservative, rural areas that are going renewable and reducing carbon pollution, and we’re going to shine a light on their good work.    And for bad actors that know better, we intend to make sure they’re famous as well.
    Q: Even if the House passes ambitious measures, their chance of becoming law is slim given the positions of the president and the Senate.    So why try?
    A: We don’t have time to wait.    Whatever we can press to accomplish as soon as possible, we will do that.
        “Whatever we can press to accomplish as soon as possible, we will do that.” Rep. Kathy Castor, D-Fla.
    Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., left, administers the House oath of office to Rep. Kathy Castor, D-Fla.,
    right, during a ceremonial swearing-in on Jan. 3. Castor will chair the new Select Committee on the Climate Crisis. JOSE LUIS MAGANA/AP
  • 1/14/2019 Britain pledges legislation in 2019 to combat deadly air pollution
    FILE PHOTO - A man walks through Greenwich Park as a haze of pollution sits over the London skyline April 3, 2014. REUTERS/Luke MacGregor     LONDON (Reuters) – Britain on Monday pledged to fight air pollution and introduce new legislation this year on air quality to save lives and billions of pounds for the economy.
        The government said Britain would become the first major economy to adopt air quality goals based on World Health Organization recommendations regarding people’s exposure to particulate matter.
        “Air pollution continues to shorten lives, harm our children and reduce quality of life.    We must take strong, urgent action,” environment minister Michael Gove said in a statement.
        The Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs said it aimed to reduce the costs of air pollution to society by 1.7 billion pounds every year by 2020, increasing to 5.3 billion pounds every year from 2030.
        Last year, the government published plans to reduce emissions from cars and planes.    In addition to cars, diesel-only trains will also be phased out by 2040.
        The strategy, which also looks to tackle home, farming and industrial pollutants, commits Britain to halving the number of people who live in areas breaching WHO guidelines on pollution as poor air quality in British cities comes under scrutiny.
        On Friday, Attorney General Geoffrey Cox gave consent for a new inquest to be opened into the death of Ella Kissi-Debrah, a nine-year-old asthma sufferer who died in 2013, after her family argued that the initial inquest ignored the role air pollution might have played in her death.
        A petition to Cox by the family said there was evidence Kissi-Debrah’s hospital visits were linked to illegal levels on air pollution near her home in South London.    Cox said that the evidence meant the family could apply for a new inquest at the High Court.
        She would be the first person in Britain to have her death legally linked to air pollution as charities and pressure groups bid to raise awareness of the impact poor air quality has on health.
        “Thousands of lives are lost every year in the UK because the air we breathe contains dangerous particles,” said Simon Gillespie, Chief Executive at the British Heart Foundation, adding the strategy need matching with legislative action.
        “We urgently need these guidelines adopted into national law, to accelerate coordinated, bold and ambitious action that will protect people’s heart and circulatory health wherever they live in the UK.”
    (Reporting by Alistair Smout; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
  • 1/14/2019 Texas wild canines linked to red wolves by David Warren, ASSOCIATED PRESS
        DALLAS – Researchers say a pack of wild canines found frolicking near the beaches of the Texas Gulf Coast carry a substantial amount of red wolf genes, a surprising discovery because the animal was declared extinct in the wild nearly 40 years ago.
        The finding has led wildlife biologists and others to develop a new understanding that the red wolf DNA is remarkably resilient after decades of human hunting, loss of habitat and other factors had led the animal to near decimation.
        “Overall, it’s incredibly rare to rediscover animals in a region where they were thought to be extinct and it’s even more exciting to show that a piece of an endangered genome has been preserved in the wild,” said Elizabeth Heppenheimer, a Princeton University biologist involved in the research on the pack found on Galveston Island in Texas.
        The genetic analysis found that the Galveston canines appear to be a hybrid of red wolf and coyote, but Heppenheimer cautions that without additional testing, it’s difficult to label the animal.
        Ron Sutherland, a North Carolina based conservation scientist with the Wildlands Network, said it’s exciting to have found “this unique and fascinating medium-sized wolf.”    The survival of the red wolf genes “without much help from us for the last 40 years is wonderful news,” said Sutherland.
        The discovery coincides with similar DNA findings in wild canines in southwestern Louisiana and bolsters the hopes of conservationists dismayed by the dwindling number of red wolves in North Carolina that comprised the only known pack in the wild.
        The red wolf was once common across a vast region extending from Texas to the south, into the Southeast and up into the Northeast.    It was federally classified as endangered in 1967 and declared extinct in the wild in 1980.    The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service in the 1970s captured a remnant population in Texas and Louisiana that led to a successful captive breeding program.    Those canines in 1986 became part of the experimental wild population in North Carolina. A federal report in April said only about 40 remained.
    Red wolves watch offspring at the Museum of Life and Science in Durham, N.C. Red wolves were thought to have become extinct in the wild 40 years ago. AP
  • 1/20/2019 Magnitude 6.7 quake strikes Chile, no tsunami threat: USGS by Manuel Farías
    People outside their houses are seen along a street after an earthquake in
    Coquimbo, Chile January 19, 2019. Picture taken January 19, 2019. REUTERS/Alejandro Pizarro     LA SERENA (Reuters) – A magnitude 6.7 earthquake hit the coast of north-central Chile on Saturday evening, the U.S. Geological Survey said, and witnesses said it rattled buildings farther south in the capital city of Santiago but left only minor damage in its wake.
        The quake struck at 10:32 p.m. local time (0132 GMT) about 15.6 km (9.7 miles) south-southwest of Coquimbo, the USGS said. The quake was 53 km (33 miles) below the surface, a relatively shallow tremor that shook homes and had some worried about a possible tsunami.
        The Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, however, quickly discarded a tsunami threat following the tremor.
        A Reuters witness reported minor damage to older buildings and power outages in the nearby coastal city of La Serena, a popular beach town about 400 kilometers (250 miles) north of Santiago.
        “It felt very strong…the tourists were very nervous, but nothing serious happened,” Camila Castillo, a receptionist at a hotel in La Serena, told Reuters.
        Chilean miner Antofagasta Plc said operations were normal at its Los Pelambres copper mine following the nearby earthquake.
        Chile, located on the so-called “Pacific Ring of Fire,” has a long history of deadly quakes, including a 8.8 magnitude quake in 2010 off the south-central coast, which also triggered a tsunami that devastated coastal towns.
        But death and destruction are limited by strict construction codes especially designed to withstand earthquakes.
    (Reporting by Manuel Farias in La Serena, Dave Sherwood and Fabian Cambero in Santiago; writing by Dave Sherwood, Editing by David Gregorio)
  • 1/21/2019 Dems ask Pentagon for rewrite on climate by Ledyard King, USA TODAY
        WASHINGTON – Key Democratic lawmakers say the Trump administration is putting U.S. armed forces at greater risk by not properly acknowledging and preparing for the effects of climate change.
        A law Congress passed in 2017 reauthorizing Department of Defense programs requires that the Pentagon spell out how rising sea levels, intensifying wildfires and other risks posed by a warming planet threaten military installations.    The law also requires a list of the top 10 most vulnerable installations within each service.
        But top Democrats slammed the 22 page report Defense officials sent to lawmakers Thursday as inadequate and “half baked” while demanding the Pentagon issue a more thorough version.
        The report lists 79 installations and whether they face current and potential (within the next 20 years) effects of climate change such as flooding and desertification.
        Democrats faulted the report for not even mentioning two installations hit last year: Tyndall Air Force Base in Florida, which sustained more than $5 billion in losses from Hurricane Michael; and Camp Lejeune in North Carolina, which will cost the Marine Corps roughly $3.7billion to rebuild after Hurricane Florence.
    [Of course they are assuming that the damage was caused by Climate Change since hurricanes have been occurring for ages.].
    
  • 1/21/2019 Chinese scientist who made gene-edited babies evaded oversight to seek fame: report
    FILE PHOTO: Scientist He Jiankui speaks at his company Direct Genomics in
    Shenzhen, Guangdong province, China July 18, 2017. Picture taken July 18, 2017. REUTERS/Stringer     BEIJING (Reuters) – A Chinese scientist who said he made the world’s first “gene-edited” babies intentionally evaded oversight and broke national guidelines in a quest for fame and fortune, according to a government investigation quoted in state media on Monday.
        Scientist He Jiankui said in November that he used a gene-editing technology known as CRISPR-Cas9 to alter the embryonic genes of twin girls born that month, sparking an international outcry about the ethics and safety of such research.
        Hundreds of Chinese and international scientists condemned He and said any application of gene editing on human embryos for reproductive purposes was unethical.
        Chinese authorities also denounced He and issued a temporary halt to research activities involving the editing of human genes.
        He had “deliberately evaded oversight” with the intent of creating a gene-edited baby “for the purpose of reproduction,” according to the initial findings of an investigating team set up by the Health Commission of China in southern Guangdong province, Xinhua news agency reported.
        He had raised funds himself and privately organized a team of people to carry out the procedure in order to “seek personal fame and profit,” Xinhua said, adding that he had forged ethical review papers in order to enlist volunteers for the procedure.
        The safety and efficacy of the technologies He used are unreliable and creating gene-edited babies for reproduction is banned by national decree, the report said.
        The case files of those involved who are suspected of committing crimes have been sent to the ministry of public security, an unnamed spokesperson for the investigation team was quoted by Xinhua as saying.
        Neither He nor a representative could be reached for comment on Monday.
        He defended his actions at a conference in Hong Kong in November, saying that he was “proud” of what he had done and that gene editing would help protect the girls from being infected with HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
        He’s announcement sparked a debate among Chinese legal scholars over which laws He had technically broken by carrying out the procedure, as well as whether he could be held criminally responsible or not.
        Many scholars pointed to a 2003 guideline that bans altered human embryos from being implanted for the purpose of reproduction, and says altered embryos cannot be developed for more than 14 days.
    (Reporting by Christian Shepherd; editing by Darren Schuettler)
    [So we now have mad sceintists running around.].
  • 1/22/2019 Keep humans in good jobs in the robot era, ILO commission urges by Tom Miles
    South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and International Labour Organization Director-General
    Guy Ryder launch the report of the Global Commission on the Future of Work at a news conference held at
    ILO headquarters in Geneva, Switzerland, January 22, 2019. REUTERS/Tom Miles     GENEVA (Reuters) – Governments must ensure the global economy keeps providing decent jobs – and not just for robots, a global commission set up by the International Labour Organization said on Tuesday.
        The “Global Commission on the Future of Work,” co-chaired by South African President Cyril Ramaphosa and Swedish Prime Minister Stefan Lofven, said in a report that governments, employers and unions needed to adapt to revolutionary changes in the world of work.
        “In short, the future of our societies depends on how we deal with the challenges and opportunities related to the world of work, we need to reorient policies as well as actions to deliver a human-centred agenda, which is what this report basically focuses on,” Ramaphosa told a news conference.
        Among the commission’s recommendations was the establishment of an international governance system for digital labor platforms to ensure technology supports, rather than supplants, decent work.
        To illustrate that such an international labor code was workable, Ramaphosa and ILO Director-General Guy Ryder cited the ILO’s 2006 Maritime Labour Convention, which set minimum working and living standards for all seafarers working on ships flying the flags of ratifying countries.
        The commission, which deliberated for 18 months, proposed other far-reaching reforms to promote decent work, including ending the corporate focus on quarterly financial reporting, investment in lifelong learning and using broader metrics than simple GDP to measure success.
        Ryder said the commission had also vigorously discussed the merits of governments providing a universal basic income, but decided against recommending such a step directly.
        He said one of the questions raised most often about the future of work is: “Will my job be lost to a robot?” but the commission preferred not to take a binary view of technology in which “it’s us or them.”
        “The future of employment is not going to be determined alone by the autonomous forward march of technology and technologies.    It depends on policy,” Ryder said.
        Depending on policy choices, technology could create positive outcomes for jobs and societies, or lead to what Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel had called 19th century-style “digital day laborers,” he said.
        “We have to make the right policy choices to put humans in control of the forward application of technology.”
        Ramaphosa said robots had cut worker numbers in South Africa’s car industry, but he wanted to see jobs in associated industries “mushrooming,” which he said could be a win-win situation.
        “We are now involved in a real, serious conversation with the automakers about how best we can limit the loss of jobs that continues to ensue as a result of robots being deployed.”
        More than three million industrial robots will be in use in factories around the world by 2020, according to the International Federation of Robotics.
    (Reporting by Tom Miles, Editing by William Maclean)
  • 1/23/2019 ‘The trash never stops’: Indonesia battles to clean up rivers
    FILE PHOTO - Children stand on a bridge near a river covered by rubbish in
    Bekasi, West Java province, Indonesia, January 7, 2019. REUTERS/Willy Kurniawan/File Photo     PISANG BATU RIVER, Indonesia (Reuters) – Boys played and chatted on a rickety wooden ramp under a baking sun in West Java, while just below their feet flowed one of Indonesia’s most horribly polluted rivers, clogged with hundreds of tonnes of smelly trash.
        Authorities in the nation of 260 million are battling a lack of recycling culture or environmental awareness to achieve an ambitious target of a 70 percent cut in marine plastic debris by 2025, despite having devoted $1 billion a year to the task.
        “Every time it rains and floods, the whole village goes down to help with the trash and clean the river,” said Marzuki, a resident of Tarumajaya, on the banks of the Pisang Batu river that carries along waste from villages upstream.
        “We never get tired of it, but the trash never stops coming.”
        Yet the river is just one of many thickly carpeted with trash formed mostly of plastic waste, of which Indonesia churns out about 3.2 million tonnes each year, with nearly half ending up in the sea, a 2015 study in the journal Science showed.
        The archipelago of more than 17,000 islands is estimated to be the world’s second-largest contributor of plastic pollutants in the oceans after China, the study added.
        “Even though we’ve brought an armada of 25 garbage trucks that take three turns every day, the reality is…we haven’t cleared even half of it,” said Suseno, the village security chief in Tarumajaya.
        As Java struggles with its rivers, the resort island of Bali this year banned the use of plastic bags by large supermarkets and grocery stores, a measure it aims to widen to smaller shops.
        Yet that caused its own backlash.
        “I’ve seen people protest because they didn’t get plastic bags after they shop,” said one supermarket shopper, Thomas Wibowo, while adding that he understood the need to cut back.
        “But if we are suddenly forbidden from using plastic, as Indonesians, we’d be shocked.”
        The risks to marine life were graphically highlighted last November, when a dead sperm whale on a beach was found to have 6 kg (13lb) of plastic waste in its stomach.
        “I think this is also a global issue, not just a national problem,” said Ida Bagus Rai Dharmawijaya Mantra, the mayor of Bali’s capital of Denpasar.
        “I’ve seen that a lot of citizens are accepting and helping of this movement, including tourists.    They too want to help replace plastic bags.”
    (Reporting by Yuddy Cahya at Pisang Batu River and Sultan Anshori and Wayan Sukarda in Denpasar; Writing by Clarence Fernandez)
  • 1/24/2019 Overflowing dam kills at least 30 in Indonesia
    Rescue workers push an inflatable boat as they evacuate residents following floods in Makassar,
    South Sulawesi, Indonesia, January 23, 2019 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/Abriawan Abhe/ via REUTERS     JAKARTA (Reuters) – An overflowing dam has killed at least 30 people in Indonesia and forced thousands to flee their villages, authorities said on Thursday.    Twenty-five people are missing.
        Indonesia’s disaster mitigation agency has set up temporary shelters and field kitchens for residents fleeing floodwaters over a meter high that inundated riverside settlements in South Sulawesi province, including in the provincial capital Makassar, on Wednesday and Thursday.
        “So far we have found 30 people who drowned or were caught in landslides triggered by heavy rains and when the Bili-Bili dam started overflowing,” said agency official Hasriadi.
        One major highway has been blocked, prompting authorities to deliver aid via helicopter, according to media.
        Aerial images showed muddy brown water covering swaths of lands and, in some areas, rushing water washing away houses and debris.
        Indonesia is an archipelago of over 17,000 islands and frequently suffers natural disasters.
    (Reporting by Kanupriya Kapoor; Editing by Nick Macfie)
  • 1/24/2019 Microsoft welcomes regulation on facial recognition technology: Nadella
    Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella attends the World Economic Forum (WEF) annual
    meeting in Davos, Switzerland, January 24, 2019. REUTERS/Arnd Wiegmann     DAVOS, Switzerland (Reuters) – Microsoft Chief Executive Satya Nadella said on Thursday that with the growth of facial recognition technology, he would “welcome regulation that will help the marketplace not be a race to the bottom.”
        Nadella said there is no discrimination now between right and wrong use of the technology, which has drawn concern from civil liberties groups about surveillance and violation of privacy.
        Microsoft has “principles to build it and make sure (there are) fair and robust uses of the technology,” Nadella said at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
    [We are under surveillance all the time5.].
    
  • 1/25/2019 Cal Fire: Private electrical system caused 2017 Calif. wildfire, not PG&E by OAN Newsroom
        The 2017 ‘Tubbs Fire,’ which destroyed 5,600 structures and killed 22 people in Northern California, was not caused by state utility Pacific Gas and Electric.    On Thursday, investigators found the state’s second most destructive blaze ever was caused by a private electrical system — not PG&E equipment.
        Cal Fire said it traced the fire’s source next to a residence and did not find any violations of state law by the utility company.
        “After a very thorough, lengthy investigation…Cal Fire determined that this was not a PG&E caused fire — this was actually traced back to the point of origin, which was a private land area that had power on it with no responsibility to the utility,” stated Cal Fire Deputy Director Mike Mohler.
        According to an earlier court filing, it is believed someone performing unlicensed electrical work in Nappa County started the fire.    It was concluded to be caused by an unknown electrical problem affecting a privately owned conductor, but both the owner of the property and their address were blacked out.
    FILE – In this Oct. 9, 2017, file photo, a firefighter walks near a flaming house in Santa Rosa, Calif. Investigators
    say the deadly 2017 wildfire that killed 22 people in California’s wine country was caused by a private electrical system,
    not embattled Pacific Gas & Electric Co. The state’s firefighting agency said Thursday, Jan. 24, 2019, that the Tubbs Fire
    started next to a residence. They did not find any violations of state law. (AP Photo/Jeff Chiu, File)     Governor Gavin Newsom said Cal Fire’s report will likely make it harder for victims to recover damages.
        “As it relates to the issue of the 22 lives lost, the 5600-plus structures that were impacted by the ‘Tubbs Fire,’ PG&E was found not to be liable in that instance,” said Newsom.    "Now, that said, PG&E was found liable for 17 other fires in 2017; this obviously begs the question now what? Do we anticipate that PG&E will move forward as they have, well as they previewed this next week to file bankruptcy, that is an opened ended question and that’s a question for PG&E.”
        This news likely comes as a relief to PG&E, who announced plans to file for bankruptcy, but still faces billions of dollars in potential liabilities for several other state fires.
  • 1/25/2019 Seven bodies found after dam burst at Brazil mine, hundreds missing by Anthony Boadle and Marta Nogueira
    General view from above of a dam owned by Brazilian miner Vale SA that burst, in Brumadinho, Brazil January 25, 2019. REUTERS/Washington Alves BRASILIA/RIO DE JANEIRO (Reuters) – Brazilian rescuers were searching for some 200 missing people after a tailings dam burst on Friday at an iron ore mine owned by Vale SA, with seven bodies recovered but the death toll expected to rise sharply.
        Avimar de Melo Barcelos, the mayor of the town of Brumadinho where the dam burst in Brazil’s mining hub of Minas Gerais state, said seven bodies had been recovered by nightfall.
        However, Vale Chief Executive Fabio Schvartsman said only one-third of the roughly 300 workers at the site of the disaster had been accounted for.    He said a torrent of sludge tore through the mine’s offices, including a cafeteria during lunchtime.
        U.S.-listed shares of Vale tumbled as much as 10 percent after the incident, the second major disaster at a Brazilian tailings dam involving Vale in just over three years.
        Both hit Minas Gerais, which is still recovering from the collapse of a larger dam in November 2015 that killed 19 people.    That dam, owned by a joint venture between Vale and BHP Billiton called Samarco Mineracao SA, buried a nearby village and devastated a major river with toxic waste in Brazil’s worst environmental disaster.
        Operations at Samarco remain halted over legal disputes relating to damages even after the companies settled a $5.28 billion civil lawsuit last year.
        Schvartsman said the dam that burst on Friday at the Feijao iron mine was being decommissioned and had a capacity of 12 million cubic meters – a fraction of the roughly 60 million cubic meters of toxic waste released by the Samarco dam break.
        “The environmental impact should be much less, but the human tragedy is horrible,” he told journalists at Vale’s offices in Rio de Janeiro.    He said equipment had shown the dam was stable on Jan. 10 and it was too soon to say why it collapsed.
        Fire brigade spokesman Lieutenant Pedro Aihara said the torrent of mud stopped just short of the local Paraopeba river, a tributary of Brazil’s longest river, the Sao Francisco.
        “Our main worry now is to quickly find out where the missing people are,” Aihara said on GloboNews cable television channel.    Scores of people were trapped in nearby areas flooded by the river of sludge released by the dam failure.
        Helicopters plucked people covered in mud from the disaster area, including a woman with a fractured hip who was among eight injured people taken to hospital, officials said.
        The Feijao mine is one of four in Vale’s Paraoeba complex, which includes two processing plants and produced 26 million tonnes of iron ore in 2017, or about 7 percent of Vale’s total output, according to information on the company’s website.     Feijao alone produced 7.8 million tonnes of ore in 2017.
    (Additional reporting by Marta Nogueira in Rio de Janeiro, Ricardo Brito and Jake Spring in Brasilia; editing by Daniel Flynn, Sonya Hepinstall and Chris Reese)
  • 1/25/2019 Robots serve up food and fun in Budapest cafe
    A robot waiter serves customers at a cafe in Budapest, Hungary, January 24, 2019. REUTERS/Bernadett Szabo BUDAPEST (Reuters) – The robots at the Enjoy Budapest Cafe can do it all – they can serve up food and drink, tell jokes, dance with the kids or just hang out for a chat with customers.
        The cafe, opened by IT company E-Szoftverfejleszto in the Hungarian capital, is staffed by a whole team of robots that aim to help familiarize the public with the technological revolution in automation and artificial intelligence.
        The robot waiters follow fixed paths to deliver food and drink orders to customers, who are asked to keep out of the robots’ way.
        Others serve up entertainment, such as Pepper, a “receptionist” robot that can hold a conversation and also dance with customers.
        Developed by Japanese company Softbank, Pepper needed to be modified to be able to hear customers in the noisy environment of a cafe, owner Tibor Csizmadia says.
        From online reviews customers appear to be charmed by Pepper’s antics and were forgiving of the laborious service style of her ‘waiter’ colleagues.
        Despite fears that increasing automation and artificial intelligence will take away employment from humans, Enjoy Budapest Cafe’s robots aren’t putting anyone out of a job yet.
        “We actually employ twice as many people as before, because to operate 16 to 20 robots from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. we need to have IT specialists in the background,” Csizmadia says.
    (Reporting by Krisztina Fenyo; Writing by Lewis Macdonald; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
  • 1/26/2019 Death toll from Indonesian floods, landslides, climbs to 59
        JAKARTA, Indonesia – A disaster official says the number of people killed after days of torrential rain triggered flash floods and landslides on Indonesia’s Sulawesi island has climbed to 59 with 25 others missing.
        Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, the National Disaster Mitigation Agency spokesman, says more bodies were recovered Friday as floodwaters subsided.    Thirteen districts and in South Sulawesi province including the capital, Makassar, have been affected by flooding that began late Tuesday, forcing more than 3,000 people to flee.
  • 1/26/2019 Brazil rescuers search for hundreds missing after mining dam burst by Gram Slattery
    Rescue crew work in a tailings dam owned by Brazilian miner Vale SA that burst, in Brumadinho, Brazil January 25, 2019. REUTERS/Washington Alves     BRUMADINHO, Brazil (Reuters) – Brazilian rescuers continued searching on Saturday for some 200 missing people after a tailings dam burst at an iron ore mine owned by Vale SA, just over three years after the miner was involved in a similar disaster nearby.
        Seven bodies were found in the hours after the Friday dam burst, but the toll was expected to rise sharply, said Avimar de Melo Barcelos, the mayor of the hard-hit town of Brumadinho in the mining-intensive state of Minas Gerais.
        Vale Chief Executive Fabio Schvartsman said only one-third of the roughly 300 workers at the site had been accounted for.    He said a torrent of sludge tore through the mine’s offices, including a cafeteria during lunchtime.
        President Jair Bolsonaro was set to visit Minas Gerais and fly over the disaster area on Saturday morning, after dispatching three ministers there on Friday.
        The state is still recovering from the collapse in November 2015 of a larger dam that killed 19 people in Brazil’s worst environmental disaster.    That dam, owned by the Samarco Mineracao SA joint venture between Vale and BHP Group Ltd, buried a village and poured toxic waste into a major river.
        Schvartsman said the dam that burst on Friday at the Feijao iron mine was being decommissioned and its capacity was about a fifth of the total waste spilled at Samarco.    He said equipment had shown the dam was stable on Jan. 10 and it was too soon to say why it collapsed.
        The Feijao mine is one of four in Vale’s Paraoeba complex, which includes two processing plants and produced 26 million tonnes of iron ore in 2017, or about 7 percent of Vale’s total output, according to information on the company’s website. Schvartsman declined to comment on how output would be affected.
        Operations at Samarco remain halted over new licensing, while the companies have worked to pay damages out of court, including an agreement that quashed a 20 billion reais ($5.31 billion) civil lawsuit last year.    Federal prosecutors suspended but have still not closed an even larger lawsuit.
    (Reporting by Gram Slattery; Writing by Brad Haynes; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)
  • 1/26/2019 Death toll climbs to 34 in Brazil mining dam burst by Gram Slattery
    Brazil's President Jair Bolsonaro looks out of the window of a helicopter as he flies over a
    tailings dam owned by Brazilian miner Vale SA that burst, in Brumadinho, Brazil January 26, 2019. Isac Nobrega/Presidency Brazil/Handout via Reuters     BRUMADINHO, Brazil (Reuters) – Brazilian firefighters said on Saturday that at least 34 people were killed when a dam burst at an iron ore mine owned by Vale SA , as rescuers continued to search for hundreds still missing.
        The Minas Gerais state fire department also said 23 people have been hospitalized after the dam released a torrent of mud on Friday, leaving a roughly 150-meter-wide (500-foot-wide) wake of destruction.
        In an earlier statement, the department had said 300 people were still missing and 46 had been found alive, a figure that it did not update in its latest disclosure.
        Firefighters focused their hopes for finding survivors on a bus, a train, mining offices and nearby homes that were buried on Friday in mud after the dam break at Vale’s Corrego do Feijao facility in Minas Gerais state.
        Frantic family members of the missing crowded into a warehouse set up by Vale for those affected, next to a stretch of river now demolished by the sludge. More than a dozen helicopters helping to survey the area took off and landed from a soccer field nearby.
        “Unfortunately, at this point, the chances of finding survivors are minimal.    We’re likely to just be recovering bodies,” Romeu Zema, governor of Minas Gerais, told local media.
    (Reporting by Gram Slattery; Additional reporting by Marta Nogueira and Marcela Ayers; Writing by Jake Spring; Editing by Brad Haynes, Paul Simao and Sandra Maler)
  • 1/27/2019 Indonesia death toll from floods, landslides climbs to 68
    FILE PHOTO: Rescue workers push an inflatable boat as they evacuate residents following floods in Makassar, South Sulawesi,
    Indonesia, January 24, 2019 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Picture taken January 24, 2019. Antara Foto/Sahrul Manda Tikupadang/ via REUTERS     JAKARTA (Reuters) – At least 68 people have been killed and nearly 7,000 forced to take refuge in emergency shelters after floods, landslides and a tornado battered the Indonesian island of Sulawesi in the past week, authorities said on Sunday.
        Rescue teams were still looking for seven missing people, while 47 had been injured during the devastation that saw heavy rains cause a dam to overflow, said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman for Indonesia’s disaster mitigation agency.
        More than 5,000 homes had been submerged with scores of bridges, schools and places of worship damaged, as well as thousands of acres of rice paddies destroyed, he said in a statement.
        Some displaced people had started to return to their homes as flood waters receded, but heavy equipment was needed to clear a thick layer of mud that had enveloped roads and houses, he said.
        Others had chosen to remain in camps after being traumatized, Nugroho said, adding that there was still an urgent need for food, blankets and medical services.
        The devastation that has struck Southern Sulawesi in the past week had also extended to Makassar, the capital of the province.
    (Reporting by Agustinus Beo Da Costa; Writing by Ed Davies; Editing by Simon Cameron-Moore)
  • 1/27/2019 Hopes dim in search for survivors after Brazil dam collapse by Gram Slattery
    A rescue helicopter flies over mud after a tailings dam owned by
    Brazilian miner Vale SA burst, in Brumadinho, Brazil January 27, 2019. REUTERS/Adriano Machado     BRUMADINHO, Brazil (Reuters) – Brazilian rescuers on Sunday soldiered on in the search for hundreds of people missing after a breached mining dam triggered a deadly mudslide, but hopes of finding survivors dimmed more than two days after the disaster.
        Search efforts were paralyzed for much of the day on fears another dam could give way in the Vale SA iron ore mining complex in the state of Minas Gerais.
        The collapsed dam at Vale’s Corrego do Feijao mine buried mining facilities and nearby homes in the town of Brumadinho and killed at least three dozen people.
        Firefighters spent Sunday morning evacuating thousands from their homes before resuming search-and-rescue efforts in the afternoon once civil defense authorities ruled out the risk of another dam burst and called off the evacuation.
        “Until the last body is found, the fire department is acting on the possibility there could be people alive,” state fire department spokesman Pedro Aihara told reporters.    “Obviously, given the nature of the accident, as time passes this chance will go down.”
        Nearly 300 people were still missing, with the list of those unaccounted for being constantly updated, Godinho told reporters.    Most of the missing are presumed dead, officials said.
        The figure could rise as authorities reconcile its list of missing residents with the tally of Vale employees who are not accounted for, he said.    The confirmed death toll rose to 37 by Sunday morning, according to the fire department.
        The cause of the dam burst remained unclear.    Recent inspections did not indicate any problems, according to the German firm that conducted the inspection.
        Avimar de Melo Barcelos, the mayor of Brumadinho, blasted Vale for being “careless and incompetent,” and blamed the mining company for the tragedy and the state of Minas Gerais for poor oversight.    He vowed to fine the miner 100 million reais ($26.5 million).
        Vale Chief Executive Officer Fabio Schvartsman said in a television interview on Sunday the disaster had happened, even after the company followed experts’ safety recommendations.
        “I’m not a mining technician.    I followed the technicians’ advice and you see what happened.    It didn’t work,” Schvartsman said.    “We are 100 percent within all the standards, and that didn’t do it.”
        The CEO promised “to go above and beyond any national or international standards … We will create a cushion of safety far superior to what we have today to guarantee this never happens again.”
    ECHOES OF SAMARCO
        In 2015, a tailings dam collapsed at an iron ore mine belonging to Samarco Mineracao SA, a Vale joint venture with BHP Group, less than 100 km (60 miles) to the east.    The resulting torrent of toxic mud killed 19 people, buried a small village and contaminated a major river in Brazil’s worst environmental disaster on record.
        Fears of another dam burst in Brumadinho on Sunday triggered evacuation sirens in the town before dawn, adding to the anxiety of residents still waiting for word about lost relatives and friends.
        Fire department spokesman Aihara initially said 24,000 people would be evacuated, but later lowered the total to 3,000. In all, 24,000 people have been affected in some way by the disaster, he said.
        Renato Maia, a 44-year-old salesman whose best friend’s daughter remained missing, fled his home in panic early Sunday morning and waited for hours with his wife at a police barricade on the outskirts of town, stewing at the situation.
        “We’re all fed up with Vale … and this is really adding to the tension,” he said.    “It was a huge tragedy and now we don’t know what might come next.”
        The Brazilian government ordered Vale to halt operations at the Corrego do Feijao mining complex.    On Sunday, courts nearly doubled to 11 billion reais the amount of Vale assets frozen in anticipation of damages and fines.
        Federal prosecutor Jose Adercio Sampaio told Reuters on Saturday that state and federal authorities have failed to apply more stringent regulation to the hundreds of tailings dams around the country.
        Schvartsman said all of Vale’s tailings dams were checked after the 2015 disaster and periodic reviews are carried out.
    (Reporting by Gram Slattery; Additional reporting by Pedro Fonseca; Writing by Jake Spring; Editing by Brad Haynes, Kirsten Donovan and Jeffrey Benkoe)
    [This incident is an easy condemnation of Brazil's previous Socialist regime neglecting their job.]
  • 1/28/2019 Death toll rises to 58 as hope dims after Brazil dam collapse by Gram Slattery
        BRUMADINHO, Brazil (Reuters) – Brazilian rescuers searched into the night on Sunday for hundreds of people missing after a burst mining dam triggered a deadly mudslide, as the death toll rose to 58 and was expected to keep climbing more than two days after the disaster.
        Rescuers worked past sunset to search a bus thought to have bodies inside and a home where three bodies were already found, state fire department spokesman Pedro Aihara told reporters.
        The collapsed dam at Vale SA’s Corrego do Feijao mine buried mining facilities and nearby homes in the town of Brumadinho, killing dozens and leaving the community in shock.
        “Until the last body is found, the fire department is acting on the possibility there could be people alive,” Aihara told reporters.    “Obviously, given the nature of the accident, as time passes, this chance will go down.”
        After announcing the latest number of confirmed dead, state civil defense agency spokesman Flavio Godinho told reporters he expected the death toll to continue rising.
        Just over 300 people were still missing, with the list of those unaccounted for being constantly updated, Godinho said. Most of the missing are presumed dead, officials said.
        The cause of the dam burst remained unclear.    Recent inspections did not indicate any problems, according to the German firm that conducted the inspection.
        Avimar de Melo Barcelos, the mayor of Brumadinho, blasted Vale for being “careless and incompetent,” and blamed the mining company for the tragedy and the state of Minas Gerais for poor oversight.    He vowed to fine the miner 100 million reais ($26.5 million).
        Vale Chief Executive Officer Fabio Schvartsman said in a television interview on Sunday the disaster happened even after the company followed experts’ safety recommendations.
        “I’m not a mining technician.    I followed the technicians’ advice and you see what happened.    It didn’t work,” Schvartsman said.    “We are 100 percent within all the standards, and that didn’t do it.”
        The CEO promised “to go above and beyond any national or international standards. … We will create a cushion of safety far superior to what we have today to guarantee this never happens again.”
        Vale’s board of directors suspended its planned shareholder dividends, share buybacks and executive bonuses in light of the disaster, according to a securities filing on Sunday.
        The board also created independent committees to investigate the causes of the dam burst and to monitor relief efforts.
    ECHOES OF SAMARCO
        In 2015, a tailings dam collapsed at an iron ore mine belonging to Samarco Mineracao SA, a Vale joint venture with BHP Group, less than 100 km (60 miles) to the east.    The resulting torrent of toxic mud killed 19 people, buried a small village and contaminated a major river in Brazil’s worst environmental disaster on record.
        Fears of another dam burst in Brumadinho on Sunday triggered evacuation sirens in the town before dawn, adding to the anxiety of residents waiting for word about lost relatives and friends.
        Firefighters halted searching and evacuated thousands from their homes until the afternoon when civil defense authorities ruled out the risk of another dam burst, calling off the evacuation and reinstating search-and-rescue efforts.
        Aihara initially said 24,000 people would be evacuated, but later lowered the total to 3,000.    In all, 24,000 people have been affected by the disaster, he said.
        Renato Maia, a 44-year-old salesman whose best friend’s daughter remained missing, fled his home in panic early on Sunday and waited for hours with his wife at a police barricade on the outskirts of town.
        “We’re all fed up with Vale … and this is really adding to the tension,” he said.    “It was a huge tragedy and now we don’t know what might come next.”
        The Brazilian government ordered Vale to halt operations at the Corrego do Feijao mining complex.    On Sunday, courts nearly doubled to 11 billion reais the amount of Vale assets frozen in anticipation of damages and fines.
        Federal prosecutor Jose Adercio Sampaio told Reuters on Saturday that state and federal authorities had failed to apply more stringent regulation to the hundreds of tailings dams around the country.
        Schvartsman said all of Vale’s tailings dams were checked after the 2015 disaster and periodic reviews carried out.
    ($1 = 3.7695 reais)
    (Reporting by Gram Slattery; Additional reporting by Pedro Fonseca; Writing by Jake Spring; Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe and Peter Cooney)
  • 1/28/2019 Brazil’s grief turns to anger as death toll from Vale disaster hits 60 by Gram Slattery
    Members of rescue team carry a body recovered after a tailings dam owned by Brazilian
    mining company Vale SA collapsed, in Brumadinho, Brazil, January 27, 2019. REUTERS/Adriano Machado     BRUMADINHO, Brazil (Reuters) – Grief over the hundreds of Brazilians feared killed in last week’s mining disaster has quickly hardened into anger as victims’ families and politicians say iron ore miner Vale SA and regulators have learned nothing from the recent past.
        By Monday, firefighters in the state of Minas Gerais had confirmed 60 people dead in Friday’s disaster, in which a tailings dam broke sending a torrent of sludge into the miner’s offices and the town of Brumadinho.    Nearly 300 other people are unaccounted for, and officials said it was unlikely that any would be found alive.
        Shares of Vale, the world’s largest iron ore and nickel producer, plummeted 21.5 percent in Monday trading on the Sao Paulo stock exchange, erasing $16 billion in market cap.
        Brazil’s top prosecutor, Raquel Dodge, said the company should be held strongly responsible and criminally prosecuted. Executives could also be personally held responsible, she said.
        Brazil’s Vice President Hamilton Mourao, who is acting president since Monday morning when Jair Bolsonaro underwent surgery, also said the government needs to punish those responsible for the dam disaster.
        In a tweet, Brazilian Senator Renan Calheiros asked Justice Minister Sergio Moro “how many people should die before federal police changes Vale management, before key evidence disappears.”    Moro is a previous judge in charge of Brazil’s largest-ever corruption probe.
        One of Vale’s lawyers, Sergio Bermudes, told newspaper Folha de S. Paulo that the executives should not leave the company and that Calheiros was trying to profit politically from the tragedy.
        Vale Chief Executive Fabio Schvartsman said during a visit to Brumadinho on Sunday that facilities there were built to code and equipment had shown the dam was stable two weeks earlier.
        The disaster at the Corrego do Feijao mine occurred less than four years after a dam collapsed at a nearby mine run by Samarco Mineracao SA, a joint venture by Vale and BHP Billiton, killing 19 and filling a major river with toxic sludge.
        While the 2015 Samarco disaster dumped about five times more mining waste, Friday’s dam break was far deadlier, as the wall of mud hit Vale’s local offices, including a crowded cafeteria, and tore through a populated area downhill.
        “The cafeteria was in a risky area,” Renato Simao de Oliveiras, 32, said while searching for his twin brother, a Vale employee, at an emergency response station.
        “Just to save money, even if it meant losing the little guy… These businessmen, they only think about themselves.”
        As search efforts continued on Monday, firefighters laid down wood planks to cross a sea of sludge that is hundreds of meters wide in places, to reach a bus in search of bodies inside.    Villagers discovered the bus as they tried to rescue a nearby cow stuck in the mud.
        Longtime resident Ademir Rogerio cried as he surveyed the mud where Vale’s facilities once stood on the edge of town.
        “The world is over for us,” he said.    “Vale is the top mining company in the world.    If this could happen here, imagine what would happen if it were a smaller miner.”
        Nestor José de Mury said he lost his nephew and coworkers in the mud.
        “i>I’ve never seen anything like it, it killed everyone,” he said.
    SAFETY DEBATE
        The board of Vale, which has raised its dividends over the last year, suspended all shareholder payouts and executive bonuses late on Sunday, as the disaster put its corporate strategy under scrutiny.
        “I’m not a mining technician.    I followed the technicians’ advice and you see what happened.    It didn’t work,” Vale CEO Schvartsman said in a TV interview.    “We are 100 percent within all the standards, and that didn’t do it.”
        Many wondered if the state of Minas Gerais, named for the mining industry that has shaped its landscape for centuries, should have higher standards.
        “There are safe ways of mining,” said Joao Vitor Xavier, head of the mining and energy commission in the state assembly.    “It’s just that it diminishes profit margins, so they prefer to do things the cheaper way – and put lives at risk.”
        Reaction to the disaster could threaten the plans of Brazil’s newly inaugurated president to relax restrictions on the mining industry, including proposals to open up indigenous reservations and large swaths of the Amazon jungle for mining.
        Mines and Energy Minister Bento Albuquerque proposed in an interview late on Sunday with newspaper O Estado de S. Paulo that the law should be changed to assign responsibility in cases such as Brumadinho to the people responsible for certifying the safety of mining dams.
        “Current law does not prevent disasters like the one we saw on Brumadinho,” he said.    “The model for verifying the state of mining dams will have to be reconsidered.    The model isn’t good.”
        The ministry did not immediately respond to questions about the interview.
        German auditor TUV SUD said on Saturday it inspected the dam in September and found all to be in order.
    (Reporting by Gram Slattery; Additional reporting by Tatiana Bautzer; Editing by Frances Kerry and Marguerita Choy)
  • 1/28/2019 Havana hit by rare tornado, at least three dead
    People walk among the debris after a tornado ripped through a neighbourhood in Havana, Cuba January 28, 2019. REUTERS/Fernando Medina     HAVANA (Reuters) – A rare tornado ripped through several working class districts of eastern Havana late Sunday night, leaving at least three dead and scores injured as it reduced some buildings to rubble, tore off roofs and flipped vehicles in its path.
        The storm left much of Havana without electricity on Monday, and the streets of the worse-hit districts were strewn with shards of glass and fallen power poles and trees.
        It was the first twister to hit the Cuban capital in decades and was described by the daily of the ruling Communist Party as an “extraordinary” event.
        “It felt like the jet engine of a large plane,” said Julio Cesar Garcia Martinez, a resident of 10 de Octubre, one of the worst-affected neighborhoods.    A large palm tree had fallen and crushed his Lada.
        “The cars were turning over in the street, the roofs falling down,” he said.
        President Miguel Diaz-Canel, who toured one of the hardest-hit districts, tweeted: “The damage is severe and up to now we regret the loss of three lives and we are attending to 172 injured.”
        The reports of deaths and injuries were preliminary as rescue workers combed through damaged buildings in the blacked-out neighborhoods, where much of the housing is dilapidated.
        “It took everything.    We lost the fridge, the air conditioner, the mattress – it tore everything apart,” said Lazaro Diaz, who had been walking in the street when he saw the earth whipped up by the winds and sought refuge at a neighbor’s.    The tornado ripped off the roof of his home.
        “If I hadn’t done that, then I wouldn’t be here today,” he said.
        New and expectant mothers at a nearby maternity hospital were evacuated after the tornado shattered its windows.
        State-run media had warned residents that an approaching cold front from the north and winds from the south would create high winds, thunderstorms and heavy rainfall in the area.
        “This was a huge catastrophe, the like of which I hadn’t seen in all my 58 years,” said Nicanor Pidal.    “I have never seen such a thing; it destroyed more than a hurricane would.”
    (Reporting by Marc Frank; additional reporting by Sarah Marsh and Reuters TV; Editing by Alison Williams and Dan Grebler)
  • 1/28/2019 Insurance losses for California wildfires top $11.4 billion by Sharon Bernstein and Suzanne Barlyn
    Firefighters battle a wildfire near Santa Rosa, California, U.S., October 14, 2017. REUTERS/Jim Urquhart TPX IMAGES OF THE DAY     SACRAMENTO, Calif./NEW YORK (Reuters) – The deadliest and most destructive California wildfires in a century caused insurers more than $11.4 billion in losses, the state’s insurance regulator said Monday.
        The total amount of insured losses for the November Camp Fire, which destroyed most of the town of Paradise in northern California, jumped 25 percent since December, California Insurance Commissioner Ricardo Lara told reporters during a media event.
        More than 13,000 insured homes and businesses were destroyed out of more than 46,000 claims reported by insurers.
        The figures are “unprecedented,” Lara said.    “These are massive numbers for us.”    Lara said.
        The November wildfires, combined with other blazes in the state drove total 2018 insured losses to $12.4 billion.
        A total of 89 people died in the Camp Fire and thousands were left homeless.
    (Reporting by Sharon Bernstein in Sacramento, California and Suzanne Barlyn in New York; Editing by James Dalgleish)
  • 1/29/2019 Measles rises in anti-vax hot spot by Ashley May, USA TODAY
        After health officials near Portland, Oregon, declared a public health emergency over a measles outbreak that’s affecting mostly young children, the viral infection continues to spread.
        Clark County, Washington, has identified 34 cases and nine suspected cases; 24 of those are among children younger than 10, officials said Sunday. In at least 30 cases, the infected people were not vaccinated to prevent measles.    The immunization status of the other four is not yet known.
        The county has one of the lowest vaccination rates in the state, with more than 22 percent of public school students not having completed their vaccinations, The Oregonian reports, citing state records.
        Measles is so contagious that 90 percent of unvaccinated people who come in contact with an infected person will get the virus, according to the Centers for Disease.
        Control and Prevention.    The virus can also spread four days before and after symptoms appear.
        Officials identified airports including the Portland International Airport, health care facilities, schools and churches as possible locations where people might have been exposed to this outbreak.
        The two-dose measles vaccine is 97 percent effective against the virus, according to the CDC.
  • 1/31/2019 Brazil dam burst death toll rises to 110; search goes on for 238
    A rescue helicopter is seen over Paraopeba river after a tailings dam owned
    by Brazilian mining company Vale SA collapsed, in Brumadinho, Brazil January 31, 2019. REUTERS/Adriano Machado     BRUMADINHO, Brazil (Reuters) – The death toll from a dam burst in the Brazilian town of Brumadinho rose to 110 people, with 238 still unaccounted for, according to rescuers working at the site on Thursday.
        They said that 71 bodies had been identified so far, recovered after mud flowed from the ruptured tailings dam, which belongs to iron ore miner Vale SA.
    (Reporting by Marta Nogueira; Writing by Marcelo Teixeira, Editing by Rosalba O’Brien)
    
    
• FEBUARY 2019
  • 2/1/2019 Hong Kong customs seize record haul of pangolin scales bound for Vietnam
    Ivory tusks and pangolin scales seized by Hong Kong Customs are displayed
    at a news conference in Hong Kong, China, February 1, 2019. REUTERS/Stringer     HONG KONG (Reuters) – Hong Kong customs busted a massive endangered species smuggling operation from Africa, seizing a record quantity of pangolin scales along with more than 1,000 ivory tusks, as authorities step up the fight against illegal wildlife trafficking.
        The value of the seized goods – which equates to around 500 elephants and up to 13,000 pangolins – was over HK $62 million, ($7.90 million) officials said on Friday.    Originating in Nigeria, the shipment was bound for Vietnam, they added.
        In a separate incident, customs officials in the northern Vietnamese port of Hai Phong discovered another 1.4 tonnes of pangolin scales in a shipping container sent from Nigeria, the state-run Vietnam News Agency reported on Friday.
        Last October, Vietnam intercepted more than more than eight metric tonnes of pangolin scales and ivory, also from Nigeria, in one of the Southeast Asian country’s largest wildlife trafficking cases for years.
        The Chinese territory of Hong Kong, located on the country’s southern coast, is a global blackspot for wildlife trafficking.    The city is a key transit point, supplying an array of wildlife products including timber, shark’s fin and rhino horn across Asia and particularly mainland China.
        Customs on January 16th, seized about 8,300 kilograms of pangolin scales and 2,100 kilograms of ivory tusks at the Kwai Chung cargo port located in the former British colony.
        It was the largest single seizure of pangolin parts in Hong Kong.
        Yueng Ka-yan, head of command at Hong Kong’s Customs and Excise Department, said the smugglers used a new method to hide the endangered species by a process of ‘solidification’ where they used ice bags and frozen meat to obscure the species.
        “The low temperature environment created by the ice bags and frozen meat helped mask the distinctive smell of the pangolin scales.”
        Pangolins, also known as scaly anteaters, are critically endangered.    They are coveted for their meat — considered a delicacy — and their scales, which are used in traditional Chinese medicine to treat aliments from cancer to arthritis.
        “It is clearly impossible that the pangolin species can withstand such high rates of poaching, trafficking and trade. Eight tonnes is outrageous,” said Alex Hofford, campaign manager for conservation group WildAid in Hong Kong.
        WildAid estimates 100,000 pangolins are poached from the wild each year, with all 8 species of pangolin in Africa, and especially Asia, now under threat.
        Customs officials who worked with their mainland counterparts to intercept the goods, found the species buried under frozen meat inside a refrigerated container.
        Officials said two people had been arrested in connection with the case.
        In a 2018 review released on Thursday, customs officials said there had been a 72 percent increase in seizures of endangered species with the total volume of goods seized increasing more than treble.
        ADM Capital Foundation, which focuses on environmental challenges across Asia, wrote in a January report that wildlife trafficking should be incorporated under Hong Kong’s Organised and Serious Crime Ordinance (OSCO).
        Doing so would provide “a powerful disincentive to wildlife criminals, and importantly, would prevent reinvestment of profits into further criminal activities,” the report said.
    (Reporting by Vincent Chow; Additional reporting by James Pearson in HANOI; Writing by Farah Master; Editing by James Pomfret and Michael Perry)
  • 2/2/2019 Quake hits Mexico; no reports of death or serious injury
        MEXICO CITY – A strong earthquake jolted southern Mexico on Friday, rattling nerves and swaying tall buildings hundreds of miles away in the capital, but there were no reports of serious damage, injuries or deaths.    The U.S. Geological Survey reported that the quake had a magnitude of 6.6.    It was centered about 10 miles from the city of Tapachula in Chiapas state and struck at a depth of 40 miles.    Chiapas civil defense official Arturo Barrientos told The Associated Press that there were no reports of serious damage.
  • 2/2/2019 Dark energy may be growing stronger, study says by Brett Molina, USA TODAY
        Dark energy, a mysterious invisible force believed to play a role in how the universe expands, may be growing stronger over time, a new study says.
        Dark energy, discovered 20 years ago by scientists measuring the distances to supernovas, or exploding stars, is described as an energy of empty space that never changes over space and time. Researchers believe it represents about 70 percent of the total universe.
        The study published this week in the peer-reviewed British journal Nature Astronomy instead measures the distances to quasars, bright celestial objects located in the center of galaxies.
        Using data from NASA’s Chandra Xray Observatory and the European Space Agency’s XMM-Newton observatory, researchers found the expansion rate of the universe is different from the model using supernovas.
        “We observed quasars back to just a billion years after the Big Bang, and found that the universe’s expansion rate up to the present day was faster than we expected,” Guido Risalti, a study co-author from the department of physics and astronomy at the University of Florence in Italy, said in a statement.    “This could mean dark energy is getting stronger.”
        Elisabeta Lusso of Durham University in the United Kingdom said because this technique for assessing dark energy is new, researchers took extra steps to make sure it was a reliable way to measure.    “We showed that results from our technique match up with those from supernova measurements over the last 9 billion years, giving us confidence that our results are reliable at even earlier times,” she said.
        Researchers say they used quasars to measure because they have a much farther reach compared with supernovas.
        Adam Riess, a professor of physics at Johns Hopkins University, said while the discovery would be “a really big deal” if confirmed, quasars have not proven to be historically reliable.
        Robert Kirshner, a Clowes Research Professor of Science, Emeritus at Harvard University, said that while the results of the study could prove true, there is no other evidence to date showing dark energy has changed with time.
    
  • 2/3/2019 Fruit juices may have harmful levels of lead - Researchers recommend limiting kids’ exposure by Mike Snider, USA TODAY
        Another knock against fruit juices: Many contain potentially harmful levels of arsenic, cadmium and lead, according to Consumer Reports.
        The non-profit consumer research and advocacy group tested 45 fruit juices (apple, grape, pear and fruit blends) sold across the U.S. and found elevated levels of those heavy metals in nearly half of them.    Particularly concerning to the researchers was that many of the juices were marketed to children.
        Consumer Reports tested 45 drinks and found 21 contained enough of a single heavy metal or a combination of the metals to concern experts who worked with Consumer Reports on the study.    Drinking just 4 ounces a day can cause concern, said Consumer Reports chief science officer James Dickerson.
        Drinking lots of fruit juice could compound their risk, the researchers say, because children may also encounter elevated levels of heavy metals in baby foods, rice products, and other foods, as well as from water and the environment.
        “Exposure to these metals early on can affect their whole life trajectory,” says Jennifer Lowry, a physician and chairperson of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Council on Environmental Health, in the report.    “There is so much development happening in their first years of life.”
        The drinks tested were from 24 national, store, and private-label brands including Capri Sun, Gerber, Minute Maid, Mott’s and Welch’s.    Researchers bought three samples of each product from retailers across the country.
        The researchers noted that their findings should not lead to “definitive conclusions about specific brands.”
        Among the findings:
    • Each of the 45 products had measurable levels of at least cadmium, inorganic arsenic, lead, or mercury.
    • Twenty-one of the juices had concerning levels of cadmium, arsenic, and/or lead.
    • Seven of those 21 juices had levels that could harm children who drink 4 ounces or more daily; nine posed risks to kids at 8 ounces, or 1 cup, or more daily.
    • Five of the potentially harmful drinks were juice boxes or pouches containing 4 to 6.75 ounces.
    • Grape juice and juice blends had the highest average levels of heavy metal.
    • Juice brands marketed to children did not fare better or worse.
    • Organic juices did not have lower levels of heavy metals than conventional ones.
        The seven juices that Consumer Reports found could harm children who drink 4 ounces or more daily were: Trader Joe’s Fresh Pressed Apple Juice, 100% Juice; 365 Everyday Value (Whole Foods) Organic 100% Juice, Concord Grape; R.W. Knudsen Organic Just Concord Grape Juice; Welch’s 100% Grape Juice, Concord Grape; Welch’s 100% Grape Juice, With Grape; Great Value (Walmart) 100% Juice, Cranberry Grape; Welch’s 100% Juice with Antioxidant Superberry.
        For the full list, including healthier alternatives, go to Consumer Reports’ website.
        The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has a guideline for lead in juice of 50 parts per billion (ppb), but the CR researchers think that should be lower.    That’s because more than half of the drinks tested 1 ppb or less.    Only Welch’s 100% Juice With Antioxidant Superberry and Welch’s 100% Grape Juice, Concord Grape were found to have an average of more than 5 ppb.
        CR asked Welch’s about the “comparatively high lead levels” in those juices and a company spokesperson said, “All Welch’s juice is safe and strictly complies with all applicable legal requirements.    Naturally occurring elements such as lead and arsenic are present in the soil, air, and water.    Therefore, they are also found in very low, harmless levels in many fruits and vegetables.”
        The FDA has not set a guideline on inorganic arsenic, but five years ago proposed limiting it to 10 ppb in apple juice, the equivalent to the standard for drinking water.    Only one juice, Trader Joe’s Fresh Pressed Apple Juice, had inorganic arsenic levels above the FDA’s proposed guideline – and 58 percent of the juices had levels below CR’s recommended cutoff of 3 ppb.    The FDA has not proposed a limit on cadmium for juice.    However, three juices had cadmium levels above CR’s recommendation of 1 ppb higher than that amount.
        This is just the latest health flag raided about fruit juice and children.    Two years ago, the American Academy of Pediatrics said children should not drink fruit juices in their first year, citing concerns about obesity, tooth decay and other health concerns.
        The academy’s recommendations include limiting children ages 1 to 3 years old to 4 ounces of juice daily or less and kids 4 to 6 years old from 4 to 6 ounces each day.    Older kids up to age 18 should not drink more than 8 ounces per day.
        The problem is caused, in part, because of the globalization of the food supply and lack of regulation in other countries, says Natalie Sexton, health expert and vice president of marketing at Natalie’s Orchid Island Juices in Fort Pierce, Florida.    “Only 4 percent of apples produced in the world are from the US,” she said.    “Most are sourced from China where regulations are not as stringent in terms of what chemicals can be used in the pesticides, insecticides and fertilizers.”
        Apples and grapes are processed with the skin “co-mingling with the inside of the fruit,” which can elevate heavy metal levels, she said.
        The researchers note that heavy metals can also be harmful to adults.    “Five of the juices we tested pose a risk to adults at 4 or more ounces per day, and five others pose a risk at 8 or more ounces,” Dickerson says.
        Lifetime exposure to “modest amounts of heavy metals,” the researchers say, can increase risk of bladder, lung, and skin cancer; cognitive and reproductive problems, as well as type 2 diabetes.    Lead is also linked to high blood pressure, heart disease, and fertility problems, while arsenic is associated with cardiovascular disease.    Cadmium can increase the risk of bone damage and kidney disease.
        “Exposure to these metals early on can affect their whole life trajectory.” Jennifer Lowry Physician, chairperson of the American Academy of Pediatrics’ Council on Environmental Health
    The drinks tested were from national, store and private-label brands. GETTY IMAGES
  • 2/3/2019 Californians fleeing storms, flooding by Christopher Weber, ASSOCIATED PRESS
        LOS ANGELES – The second in a string of powerful storms battered California on Saturday, shutting key highways after water and mud rushed into lanes from bare hillsides in wildfire burn areas where thousands of residents were under evacuation orders.
        Flash flood warnings were issued for swaths of Southern California. Forecasters said the system will bring several inches of rain at lower elevations and heavy snow in the mountains.
        A wind gust in Santa Barbara County topped 80 mph as the storm moved south and later dropped more than a half-inch of rain in five minutes. Trees and power lines were down across the region.
        In the Montecito area of Santa Barbara County, several miles of U.S 101, a vital route between Los Angeles and points north and west, were closed because of flooding.
        Elsewhere in the county, evacuations were ordered or recommended for neighborhoods near the scars of several wildfires.
        “This is a dangerous situation,” the National Weather Service said, warning that the high rates of rain could send boulders sluicing down denuded hillsides along with the mud and debris.
        Rescue crews scrambled Saturday to pluck motorists from cars caught in rising waters, said Mike Eliason, a spokesman for the Santa Barbara County Fire Department.    He urged drivers who come upon flooded intersections to find alternate routes.
        Multiple accidents were reported on slick highways, including a crash on Interstate 5 that killed a volunteer member of a sheriff ’s search and rescue team and injured several others.
        A minivan carrying a family was traveling too fast for the wet conditions, lost control and plowed into members of the team, Los Angeles County fire Capt.    Tony Imbrenda said. Nine people were transported to hospitals, including a member of the rescue team who was in critical condition.
        “This is a very unfortunate situation that could’ve been avoided,” Imbrenda said, warning motorists to slow down in the rain.
        The National Park Service warned visitors to Yosemite National Park of possible road closures and strongly advised drivers to bring tire chains in the event of snow or icy conditions.
        Winter storm warnings were in place for the Sierra Nevada along with avalanche warnings on the Nevada side of the range.
        The Sierra is already loaded with snow from a series of storms in January.    The weather service said areas could see accumulations of up to 10 feet over the next few days.
    A woman walks past sand bags in San Francisco on Friday, where about an inch of rain
    was recorded before the storm moved south Saturday. JEFF CHIU/AP [My comment: I lived in Thousand Oaks, Calif. for 13 years between 1975-1988, and I saw the fires engulf the hills across I-101.    What happened back then is everyone who could afford a house wanted to build their houses on the hills for the views, but back then the cities did not build the roads and landscape with protection against fires.    So when the fires devastated them.    The next thing that came was the mudslides.    So here it is is 2019 and they have still not done anything to prevent the mudslides after the devastating fires.]
  • 2/3/2019 Top German conservative hints at slower coal phase-out in nod to party right
    FILE PHOTO: Water vapour rises from the cooling towers of the Jaenschwalde lignite-fired power plant of
    Lausitz Energie Bergbau AG (LEAG) in Jaenschwalde, Germany, January 24, 2019. REUTERS/Hannibal Hanschke/File Photo     BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s phasing out of coal-fired power stations could be delayed beyond 2038 if the deadline creates problems for the security of electricity supply, a senior legislator in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s party said.
        The phase-out, proposed last Saturday by a commission tasked with mapping out Germany’s transition to a more environmentally friendly low-carbon economy, drew criticism from some in industry who fear the impact of higher energy prices.
        But in remarks that appeared aimed at the right of a party not always comfortable with Merkel’s centrist approach, Ralph Brinkhaus, chair of the conservative benches in parliament, said it was crucial not to be “dogmatic” in pursuing a goal that was widely accepted.
        “Energy supply security must be guaranteed,” he told Welt am Sonntag newspaper.    “If it is endangered, we should be free to do another round and address that, without abandoning the path we’ve chosen.    There’s no reason to be dogmatic about this.”
        Brinkhaus, from the Christian Democrats’ (CDU) most pro-business wing, last year toppled a Merkel ally in the race for the influential parliamentary leader post, precipitating the sequence of events that led to Merkel resigning as party leader and announcing that this would be her last term as chancellor.
        That sparked a fight for the soul of the party, whose members have chafed at the centrist course that Merkel plotted over the 14 years of her chancellorship, during which time she has often seemed closer to leftists and Greens than some in her own party.
        While her ally Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer’s narrow victory in the race to succeed her as party leader was seen as a win for her centrist vision, Brinkhaus’s remarks are a reminder that the party’s right has not gone away as the CDU gears up for a series of tough European and regional elections.
        The coal commission unveiled its hard-won compromise after marathon talks early last Saturday, proposing to shut 12.7 GW of coal capacity by 2020 and promised 40 billion euros to help regions affected by the end of coal mining.
        Brinkhaus also called in the interview for a rethink on government spending.    “Do we have too many regulations or even a nanny state?” he asked.
        An INSA poll for Bild newspaper on Saturday showed that the CDU is still by far the most popular party on 30 percent.    But a disappointing election year could yet re-open the internal party war.
    (Reporting by Thomas Escritt; Editing by Hugh Lawson)
  • 2/3/2019 Swine fever outbreak may bury China’s small pig farmers by Hallie Gu and Ryan Woo
    Pigs are seen on the farm of pig farmer Han Yi at a village in Changtu county,
    Liaoning province, China January 17, 2019. Picture taken January 17, 2019. REUTERS/Ryan Woo     CHANGTU COUNTY, China (Reuters) – For farmers Zhang Shiping and Bai Fuqin in northeast China, there is little to celebrate this Lunar New Year.
        Since African swine fever struck a farm in nearby Shenyang city last August, the couple has racked up about 300,000 yuan ($44,712.72) in debt, 10 times what they make in a good year raising pigs.
        The incurable disease has since traveled thousands of kilometers, striking mainly small farms in the world’s biggest pork-producing country and triggering unprecedented upheaval in China’s $1 trillion hog sector.
        Though Zhang’s farm was not infected, measures to halt its spread have effectively killed his family’s livelihood.
        Beijing banned the transport of live pigs from infected provinces in September, part of its “protracted war” on a disease that typically takes years to eradicate.
        The restrictions crippled trade, particularly in northeast Liaoning province, which produces about a third more pigs than it consumes and relies heavily on exporting.
        Prices in the province dropped below 4 yuan per kilogram this month – the lowest price in a decade – just weeks away from the Lunar New Year holiday, normally a time of peak pork demand.
        Zhang and Bai got rid of about 30 pigs this month, losing about 800 yuan on each, after feeding them months after they should have been slaughtered while waiting for prices to pick up.
        They still have almost 50 left, now so overweight and fatty that no processors want them.
        “We can barely survive,” Bai said during an interview at her modest farmhouse in Changtu county, a two-and-a-half-hour drive north of Shenyang, capital of Liaoning.
        Bai and three other farmers in Changtu said they would not continue raising pigs, even though they have few other options in the region, one of China’s slowest growing.
        Tens of thousands like them are expected to abandon pig farming after months of weak prices and restrictions on moving pigs to market.    That will reduce production in the country by one-fifth this year, according to some estimates, and boost prices and demand for cheaper imports.
        “I have experienced all kinds of ups and downs in the pig industry.    But nothing has been as hard and bitter as this year,” said Sun Hongbo, another Changtu farmer.
        He will quit pig farming for good, he added, seeking manual work after the holiday.
    Graphic: China pig farming structure in 2016 – https://tmsnrt.rs/2CM4uHb
    NO SUPPORT
        Small farmers producing fewer than 500 pigs for slaughter each year account for about 40 percent of China’s output, or around 280 million pigs a year, according to 2016 figures from consultants at Rabobank.
        But the African swine fever epidemic looks set to accelerate change in an industry already shifting towards more industrialized farms, particularly in the north.
        “Even if you want to raise pigs, the government won’t give you loans because you lost money.    Feed sellers won’t lend you feed either.    How can you raise pigs then?” Sun said.
        Policy measures put in place to tackle African swine fever strongly favor larger farms considered better able to prevent the spread of disease with higher hygiene standards.    A Dec. 27 government document that loosened the rules on transporting pigs out of infected counties only applied to incorporated farms.
        Another rule has outlawed the use of kitchen waste for pig feed, significantly boosting costs for many farmers who can’t buy commercial feed at reasonable cost.
        “The government won’t encourage small farmers to raise pigs, that’s the direction,” said Wang Chuduan, professor at China Agriculture University.
        It’s a sharp reversal from the years following the 2007 Blue Ear epidemic, which cut production by an estimated 10 percent.    After that, Beijing gave generous subsidies to all farmers to replenish their herds, said Wang.
        Corporate farmers like Muyuan Foods Co. Ltd and Wens Foodstuff Group Co Ltd are suffering too, reporting a sharp plunge in profits last year.    But with large, efficient farms and access to loans, they are able to ride out the tough times.
    RURAL BURDEN
        Beijing has repeatedly called for the scaling up and industrialization of farming to raise efficiency and quality. For China’s livestock industry, consolidating around more efficient producers is good, Wang said.
        For some regions, however, it could bring an additional burden, just as the country’s growth slows to its weakest pace in 28 years.
        Pig production in China’s northeast has expanded rapidly in recent years as Beijing sought to move its livestock away from heavily populated regions and closer to grain production in the north, bringing a much-needed source of revenue to laggard local economies.
        Changtu, with about 1 million people, produced 1.6 million pigs in 2016 and 2.66 million tonnes of corn, positioning it to benefit under that policy.
        But swine fever looks set to halt, or even reverse, the trend.    Liaoning’s GDP grew 5.7 percent in 2018, well below its target that year.
        “I think the expansion roadmap will be different in the next few years; there’ll be less investment in the northeast,” said Pan Chenjun, senior analyst at Rabobank.
        Agriculture minister Han Changfu said this week the government would work to reduce the impact of the epidemic on other areas of the economy and society.
        Changtu farmers said they had seen no sign of government support.    A county official said the local government had poured so much money and resources into preventing and controlling African swine fever that it risked bankrupting the county.
        He declined to be named because he was not authorized to speak to the media.    But he added that declining pig production in the county would hurt local revenue.
        The Changtu farmers have few options.    Bai, who is illiterate, said after the holiday – which welcomes the Year of the Pig – she would look for work washing dishes in the city.
        “The pig cycle has never really brought me down, but then the policy did,” said Zhang Haitao, another farmer struggling to get rid of his overweight pigs.
    (Reporting by Hallie Gu, Ryan Woo and Dominique Patton; Additional reporting by Thomas Suen; Editing by Gerry Doyle)
  • 2/4/2019 Landslide kills at least eight people on Bolivian highway
        EL CHORO, Bolivia – Bolivian authorities say they recovered eight bodies from a landslide that buried cars on a highway northeast of the capital. At least 18 other people were injured.    Tons of earth and mud collapsed on the mountain highway Saturday.    Public Works chief Oscar Coca says the bodies had been in two cars that were swept some 650 feet down a canyon.    Searchers were hunting for victims and survivors on Sunday.    Heavy rains had been falling for two days when the mountainside gave way.
  • 2/4/2019 Desperate Mongolians send children into countryside to escape choking winter smog by Munkhchimeg Davaasharav
    Women walk with their belongings amid smog in Sukhbaatar district of
    Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia January 31, 2019. Picture taken January 31, 2019. REUTERS/B. Rentsendorj ULAANBAATAR (Reuters) – Mongolia has extended school winter holidays in the world’s coldest capital and many families have sent children to live with relatives in the vast, windswept grasslands to escape choking smog and respiratory diseases such as pneumonia.
        The temperature is expected to drop to minus 32 degrees Celsius (minus 26F) in Ulaanbaatar on Monday night, as residents burn coal and trash to try to keep warm and concentrations of smog particles known as PM2.5 routinely exceed 500 mg per cubic meter, 50 times the level considered safe by the WHO.
        Mongolia, a former Soviet satellite landlocked between Russia and China, has invested public money and foreign aid to tackle pollution, but improvement has been slow, with residents saying inaction has been compounded by a corruption scandal that has paralyzed parliament.
        In a crowded township more than 40 miles from Ulaanbaatar, Jantsandulam Bold’s five grandchildren are breathing more easily after fleeing the capital.
        “Fresh air and sun are most important for kids to grow healthy and robust,” says Jantsandulam, 57, making milk tea for her grandchildren in her home, a thickly padded felt hut known as a “ger,” or in Russian, a “yurt.”
        “This little one had flu when he came here but the fresh air has treated him well,” she said, pointing at her five-year-old grandson.
        The children are nearing the end of a two-month break, with schools due to reopen next Monday.
        About 60 percent of Mongolia is covered by grassland, where the mining of copper, gold, coal and other minerals provides employment, while the Gobi desert envelops the South.    But almost half the population live in Ulaanbataar.
        Reuters calculations based on U.S. Embassy data show annual average PM2.5 concentrations hit 100 micrograms in Ulaanbaatar in 2018.    They soared to 270 in December.    PM2.5 in China’s most polluted city of Shijiazhuang stood at an average 70 micrograms last year, down 15.7 percent from 2017.    The World Health Organisation recommends a concentration of no more than 10 micrograms.
        The WHO said 80 percent of Ulaanbaatar’s smog was caused by coal burning in “ger” districts, where thousands of rural migrants, used to a nomadic lifestyle, have pitched huts.    It estimates air pollution causes more than 4,000 premature deaths a year.
        A joint study by the U.N. International Children’s Emergency Fund (UNICEF) and Mongolia’s National Centre for Public Health said children living in one smog-prone district of Ulaanbaatar had 40 percent less lung function than those living in the countryside.
        “Air pollution aggravates respiratory diseases and children under five are most vulnerable as their organs are still not mature,” said Bolormaa Bumbaa, a doctor at Bayangol District’s Children’s hospital in Ulaanbaatar.
        Families have already set up a pressure group known as Moms and Dads Against Smog, but after the protests they organized in Ulaanbaatar were ignored, the group decided to focus on encouraging residents to take action to protect themselves, said Mandakhjargal Tumur, a group coordinator.
        “I don’t believe the government will do enough to reduce pollution in coming years,” she said.    “That’s why we are now focusing on raising awareness.”
        At the Bayangol hospital, Ulzii-Orshikh Otgon, 34, was forced to bring her 10-month-old daughter Achmaa in with pneumonia for the second time in a month.
        “I believe it’s because of the pollution,” she said, adding that home air purifiers did little to help.
        “Just by opening the door, our home fills with smog,” she said while breastfeeding Achmaa in the waiting room.
        Doctors advised her to take her children out of Ulaanbaatar but she has no relatives in the countryside and rent is expensive.
        “Decision makers have said for years they are fighting pollution,” she said.    “They just wasted billions of tugriks on useless stoves and processed coal, which don’t change anything.”
    (Reporting by Munkhchimeg Daavasharav; Editing by David Stanway and Nick Macfie)
  • 2/4/2019 Death toll from Vale dam disaster in Brazil rises to 134
    Rescue workers search for victims of a collapsed tailings dam owned by Brazilian mining company
    Vale SA, in Brumadinho, Brazil February 2, 2019. REUTERS/Adriano Machado
  • 2/5/2019 Experts call for emergency declaration on Congo’s Ebola
        DAKAR, Senegal – An international group of public health experts on Monday called on the World Health Organization to convene an emergency committee to consider declaring Congo’s Ebola outbreak an international public health emergency.    The group of experts wrote in the Lancet that such a call would help galvanize “support to address the Ebola outbreak that started last May.”    The outbreak, declared just over six months ago in Congo’s east, is the country’s 10th-and the world’s second-largest recorded.
  • 2/5/2019 Two bodies found after floods in Australia’s Queensland by Paulina Duran
    An aerial view shows flood waters in the suburb of Hyde Park, Townsville,
    North Queensland, Australia, February 4, 2019. AAP Image/Dave Acree/via REUTERS     SYDNEY (Reuters) – Australian authorities pulled the bodies of two men from a storm water drain during cleanup efforts after catastrophic flooding in the northeastern state of Queensland, police said on Tuesday.
        Days of severe rainfall in the town of Townsville caused insurance losses estimated at more than A$45 million ($32.63 million), industry figures show, while weather officials have warned that heavy showers could continue in some areas.
        “The bodies were found around midday and have been identified,” police said in a statement, without revealing the cause of death.
        More than 1,100 people had to be evacuated on Monday after authorities opened the dam gates of overflowing rainwater reservoirs.    Crocodiles were even spotted in suburban streets, pictures on social media showed.
        “As the waters recede here and we start to move from the response phase to the recovery phase, there will be big shocks for the community,” Prime Minister Scott Morrison told reporters in Townsville.
        “As they return to their homes, as they assess the damage to their homes; yes, there’s the physical loss, but there is also the mental shock and just coming to terms with it.”
    ($1=1.3789 Australian dollars)
    (Reporting by Paulina Duran; Editing by)
  • 2/5/2019 Brazil court frees Vale and Tuv Sud employees in dam burst case
    A view of the aftermath from a failed iron ore tailings dam owned by
    Brazilian miner Vale SA that burst, in Brumadinho, Brazil January 27, 2019. REUTERS/Adriano Machado     BRASILIA (Reuters) – Brazil’s Superior Court of Justice (STJ) has freed five Vale SA and Tuv Sud employees that had been arrested after the burst of a dam in Brumadinho that killed more than 100 people and left more than 200 others unaccounted for.
        The ruling overturned a lower court decision and set free executives Andre Yassuda, Makoto Namba, Rodrigo Artur Gomes de Melo, Ricardo de Oliveira and Cesar Augusto Paulino Grandchamp, stating that there was no reason for them to be held, the STJ press office said.
    (Reporting by Ricardo Britto; Editing by Chizu Nomiyama)
  • 2/5/2019 Himalayan ice at risk by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Antarctica and Greenland aren’t the Earth’s only frozen places threatened by human-caused climate change: The Himalayas are also at risk, scientists announced Monday
    .     In fact, two-thirds of Himalayan glaciers could melt by 2100 if global warming continues, a new report says.
        Such a catastrophic melt would disrupt the flow of Asian rivers, a crucial resource for crops for billions of people in China, India and six other countries.
        “This is the climate crisis you haven’t heard of,” said Philippus Wester, a scientist with the International Centre for Integrated Mountain Development, which released the report.    “Global warming is on track to transform the frigid, glacier-covered mountain peaks ... to bare rocks in a little less than a century.”
        The glaciers are a source of water for about 250 million people in the mountains and 1.65 billion others who live in the river valleys below, the report said.    Water from the melting glacial ice could lead to floods along such major rivers as the Ganges and the Indus, potentially destroying crops.
        According to the report, the region is known as the world’s “Third Pole” for its huge store of ice.    It is home to Mount Everest, and other iconic peaks.
        Prepared over a five-year period with contributions from more than 350 researchers, the report is the first “to lay down in definitive detail the region’s critical importance to the well-being of billions and its alarming vulnerability, especially in the face of climate change,” said David Molden, director general of the development group that published the study.
        Said Dasho Rinzin Dorji of of the international mountain development organization: “We need to start thinking of mountain regions as climate hotspots worthy of urgent attention.”
  • 2/7/2019 Hot streak holds: 2018 4th-warmest - Temperatures helped fuel USA’s weather disasters by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Earth’s fever shows no signs of stopping.
        The global temperature in 2018 was the fourth-hottest on record, scientists announced Wednesday.    Only 2016 (warmest), 2015 (second-warmest) and 2017 (third-warmest) were hotter than 2018.
        Overall, the past five years have been the five warmest years since records began in the late 1800s, according to a report released Wednesday.
        “2018 is yet again an extremely warm year on top of a long-term global warming trend,” said NASA’s Gavin Schmidt, director of the agency’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies.
        NASA said global temperatures in 2018 were 1.5 degrees Fahrenheit above the average from 1951 to 1980.
        In the USA, unusual warmth in the West in 2018 contributed to a disastrous wildfire season that killed dozens of people.    In monetary terms, the nation endured its costliest wildfire season on record: $24 billion in damage.
        Hurricanes Michael ($25 billion) and Florence ($24 billion) were the other two big weather disasters in 2018.
        Almost 250 Americans were killed in the disasters in 2018.    The total cost to the nation was $91 billion.
        The global warming trend is strongest in the Arctic, which has continued to lose sea ice, NASA said.    Mass loss from the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets contributed to an increase in sea levels.
        Increasing temperatures can be a factor in longer fire seasons and some extreme weather, Schmidt said.    “The impacts of long-term global warming are already being felt – in coastal flooding, heat waves, intense precipitation and ecosystem change,” he said.
        The planet has experienced 42 straight years (since 1977) with an above-average global temperature.
        The warming closely parallels the increasing amount of greenhouse gases, such as carbon dioxide and methane, released into the Earth’s atmosphere and oceans.
        “This is yet another reminder that our future will not resemble our past,” said Shaun Martin of the World Wildlife Fund.    “Even if we dramatically curb emissions in the coming years, things are going to get a lot worse before they get better.    We’ve already locked in certain levelsofwarming which will continue to harm millions of people and nature in the U.S. and worldwide.”    Brenda Ekwurzel, a climate scientist with the Union of Concerned Scientists, said: “Eighteen of the 19 warmest years since record keeping began have occurred since 2001.    That means kids graduating from high school have only known a world of record-breaking temperatures.    With global emissions rising for the second year in a row, this disastrous trend shows no signs of changing any time soon.”
        The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), which prepared the report along with NASA, said the USA endured 14 separate weather disasters that each caused at least $1 billion in damage.    Eight of those disasters were tornadoes or severe thunderstorms.
        From 1980 to 2013, the USA averaged about six separate big weather disasters a year, NOAA said.    Over the most recent five years, that number has jumped to more than 12.
    Higher than average temperatures are in red and colder than average ones in blue. NASA GISS
  • 2/10/2019 New Zealand wildfires show no sign of easing, 3,000 flee by Alison Bevege
    New Zealand Defence Force firefighters combat the Richmond fire near Nelson,
    South Island, New Zealand, February 8, 2019. Chad Sharman/New Zealand Defence Force/Handout via REUTERS     SYDNEY (Reuters) – Strong winds on Sunday are expected to fan forest fires that have been burning for a week through New Zealand’s South Island, forcing thousands of people from their homes, with more residents expected to flee, officials said.
        The Pigeon Valley fire covers 2,300 ha (5,700 acres) with a 25 km (15 mile) perimeter, NZ Civil Defence said in a statement on its website.
        No deaths have been reported and only one home destroyed.
        “There is some concern about predicted high winds this afternoon, which are expected to test the control lines,” the agency said.
        Early on Sunday, 155 firefighters were battling the blaze on the ground with air support from 23 helicopters and 3 fixed wing planes, the agency said, making it the largest aerial firefight on record in New Zealand.
        Up to 3,000 people have been forced to leave the Wakefield and Pigeon Valley areas, NZ Civil Defence Controller Roger Ball told a Saturday news conference on Saturday.
        More people were likely to be forced from their homes on Sunday.
        New Zealand Red Cross Communications Manager Ellie van Baaren said evacuees were tired and frustrated.
        “When you have to leave your home and in some cases your livestock and animals and you don’t know what’s become of them, and you’re staying with friends and family, then it’s an uncertain situation for everybody,” she told Reuters by telephone.
        Much of the affected area south of Nelson was used for forestry but it also has many small farms.    Some livestock has also been moved to safety.
        Fires started on Monday and Tuesday and quickly spread.    On Wednesday, authorities declared a state of emergency.
        Hundreds of volunteer and professional firefighters, police, civil defense and military personnel are battling the fires.
    (Reporting by Alison Bevege; Editing by Robert Birsel)
  • 2/10/2019 Climate change seen as top threat, but U.S. power a growing worry: poll
    FILE PHOTO: Vapor is released into the sky at a refinery in Wilmington, California March 24, 2012. REUTERS/Bret Hartman     BERLIN (Reuters) – Climate change is the top security concern in a poll conducted by the Washington-based Pew Research Center, followed by Islamist terrorism and cyber attacks while respondents in a growing number of countries worried about the power and influence of the United States.
        In 13 of 26 countries, people listed climate change as the top global threat, with the Islamic State militant group topping the list in eight and cyber attacks in four, the non-profit, non-partisan Pew Research Center said in its report.
        Worries about climate change have increased sharply since 2013, with double-digit percentage point increases seen in countries including the United States, Mexico, France, Britain, South Africa and Kenya, according to the poll of 27,612 people conducted between May and August, 2018.
        North Korea’s nuclear program and the global economy were also significant concerns, while respondents in Poland named Russian power and influence as the top threat.
        The largest shift in sentiment centered on the United States, it said, with a median of 45 percent of people naming U.S. power and influence as a threat in 2018, up from 25 percent in 2013, when Barack Obama was U.S. president.
        In 10 countries, including Germany, Japan and South Korea, roughly half of respondents or more saw U.S. power and influence as a major threat to their nation, up from eight in 2017 and three in 2013, the poll showed.
        In Mexico, where those concerns have spiked since the election of U.S. President Donald Trump, the percentage jumped to 64 percent, the poll showed.
        Trump has railed against illegal migration and the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), and is pressing to build a wall between the two countries.
        In 2018, a median of 61 percent of respondents across all countries represented viewed cyber attacks as a serious concern, up from 54 percent in 2017.
        The number of countries that saw Islamic State as a threat fell by double-digit percentage points in Israel, Spain, the United States and Japan.
    (Reporting by Andrea Shalal; editing by Jason Neely)
  • 2/11/2019 The new Picasso? Meet Ai-Da the robot artist by Matthew Stock
    A woman interacts with Ai-Da, a humanoid robot capable of drawing people from life using her bionic eyes and hand, at the
    offices of robotics company Engineered Arts, in Falmouth, Cornwall, Britain February 7, 2019. Picture taken February 7, 2019. REUTERS/Matthew Stock     FALMOUTH, England (Reuters) – Can robots be creative?    British gallery owner Aidan Meller hopes to go some way towards answering that question with Ai-Da, who her makers say will be able to draw people from sight with a pencil in her bionic hand.
        Meller is overseeing the final stages of her construction by engineers at Cornwall-based Engineered Arts.     He calls Ai-Da – named after British mathematician and computer pioneer Ada Lovelace – the world’s first “AI ultra-realistic robot artist,” and his ambition is for her to perform like her human equivalents.
        “She’s going to actually be drawing and we’re hoping to then build technology for her to paint,” Meller said after seeing Ai-Da’s prosthetic head being carefully brought to life by specialists individually attaching hairs to form her eyebrows.
        “But also as a performance artist she’ll be able to engage with audiences and actually get messages across; asking those questions about technology today.”
        Her skeletal robotic head may stand disembodied on a workbench, but her movements are very much alive.
        Cameras in each of her eyeballs recognize human features – she will make eye contact and follow you around the room, opening and closing her mouth as you do. Get too close and she’ll back away, blinking, as if in shock.
        Ai-Da’s makers say she will have a “RoboThespian” body with expressive movements and she will talk and answer questions.
        “There’s AI (artificial intelligence) running in the computer vision that allows the robot to track faces to recognize facial features and to mimic your expression,” said Marcus Hold, Design & Production Engineer at Engineered Arts.
        Ai-Da’s makers are using “Mesmer” life-like robot technology for her head, and once finished she will have a mixed race appearance with long dark hair, silicone skin and 3D printed teeth and gums.
        “(Mesmer) brings together the development of software mechanics and electronics to produce a lifelike face with lifelike gestures in a small human sized package,” Hold said.
        Ai-Da will present her inaugural exhibition “Unsecured Futures” in May at the University of Oxford, and her sketches will go on display in London in November.
    (Reporting by Matthew Stock; writing by Marie-Louise Gumuchian; editing by John Stonestreet)
    [We'll, we are only halfway to the future 'Terminators' hopefully.].
  • 2/12/2019 Officials scramble to contain measles by Ken Alltucker, USA TODAY
        Measles outbreaks in New York and Washington state have public health officials scrambling to contain a disease that was eliminated in the United States nearly two decades ago.
        Washington state has declared a public emergency in an outbreak in Clark County that has infected at least 53 people, mostly children.    An additional four cases have been confirmed in neighboring Multnomah County, Oregon.
        Another case has been identified in King County, which includes Seattle.
        Clark County public health officials have long feared a measles outbreak could spread rapidly given the county’s cluster of unvaccinated children.
        Nearly one in four Clark County kindergarten students during the 2017-18 school year did not get all their immunizations, according to data from the Washington Department of Health.    At three schools in the county, more than 40 percent of kindergartners did not receive all recommended shots before starting school.
        “When you have large numbers of unimmunized people and you introduce measles into that population, it’s like putting a lighted match into a can of gasoline,” said Alan Melnick, Clark County’s public health director.
        In general, Melnick said, public health departments want to immunize up to 95percent of the population against measles to create herd immunity.    Such widespread vaccination protects against the highly contagious virus, which can be spread through the air.    It also protects people who are unable to get vaccinated because they have other medical conditions.
        State laws generally require parents of school-age children to show proof of immunization or claim an exemption before beginning school.
        All but three states – California, Mississippi and West Virginia – allow parents to reject vaccinations for nonmedical reasons, such as religious or personal beliefs, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
        The risk is when there are large numbers of children in a single setting, such as a school or a church, who are not vaccinated.
        “You need a high enough vaccination rate to prevent measles from spreading,” Melnick said.
        The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has reported 79 cases of measles in the United States.    Beyond Washington and Oregon, cases have been reported in California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, New Jersey, New York and Texas.
    
  • 2/12/2019 Northern China pollution up 16 percent in January by David Stanway
    A woman wearing a mask walks past buildings on a polluted day in Handan, Hebei province, China January 12, 2019. REUTERS/Stringer     SHANGHAI (Reuters) – Air pollution in 39 major northern Chinese cities rose 16 percent on the year in January, official data showed, with surging industrial activity making it increasingly unlikely they will meet their winter emissions targets.
        Average concentrations of small, hazardous particles known as PM2.5 in two major northern Chinese emissions control zones climbed 16 percent from a year earlier to 114 micrograms per cubic meter, according to Reuters analysis of official pollution data.
        China has vowed not to ease up when it comes to fighting pollution even amid an economic slump, but rising emissions of lung-damaging smog last month suggests that some provinces could struggle to balance that goal with an upturn in industrial production.
        “The reasons for the increases in PM2.5 levels are not hard to identify,” said Lauri Myllyvirta, energy analyst with environmental group Greenpeace, who noted that steel, thermal power and cement production surged throughout the region in the final quarter of 2018.
        “The outsourcing of industrial output that took place last winter in order for Beijing to hit its air quality targets was reversed this winter, driving air pollution levels up in the region while the rest of the country has seen improvements.”
        The worst performer over the month was the coal city of Linfen in Shanxi province, which saw average PM2.5 levels of 174 micrograms, up 23 percent from a year earlier.    Shijiazhuang, the provincial capital of Hebei, China’s biggest steelmaking region, also saw emissions rise 30 percent to 144 micrograms.
        China’s official air quality standard is 35 micrograms, while the World Health Organization recommends an annual average of no more than 10.
        Over the three months beginning in November 2018, when coal-fired heating systems are switched on throughout the north, average PM2.5 in the 39 cities reached 93.5 micrograms, up 12 percent on the year.
        Anyang, a coal and steel producing city in Henan province, was the worst performer over that period, with average concentrations at 124 micrograms, up 27 percent.    Henan has blamed its poor performance this winter on “unfavorable weather conditions.”
        China’s environment ministry did not respond to a request for comment. However, senior official Liu Bingjiang told reporters last month that local governments would be held fully accountable for any failures, regardless of the weather.
        Most of the cities are aiming to cut pollution by 3 percent compared to 12 months earlier, far lower than last year’s target of around 15 percent. The compliance period also began a month earlier in October, when pollution is normally much lower.    However, they are still struggling to meet targets.
        “With four months of the October-March period passed and two to go, it would take a very steep 20-percent reduction in February-March to get to the 3-percent reduction target,” said Myllyvirta.
    (Reporting by David Stanway; Editing by Joseph Radford)
  • 2/12/2019 IBM says Watson AI services will now work on any cloud by Paresh Dave
    FILE PHOTO: The IBM logo is seen at the SIBOS banking and financial conference in
    Toronto, Ontario, Canada October 19, 2017. REUTERS/Chris Helgren/File Photo     SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) – IBM Corp announced on Tuesday that some of its Watson artificial intelligence services will now work on rival cloud computing providers as it seeks to win over customers that want greater flexibility in how they store and analyze data.
        The announcement builds on IBM’s moves to position its services as compatible with nearly any form of computer infrastructure a customer wants to operate.    Other efforts include a pending acquisition of open-source software company Red Hat for $34 billion.
        With the change, companies will be able to use Watson AI tools such as Watson Assistant, which can help them develop conversational services such as a virtual customer service agent, in mobile apps hosted on Amazon.com Inc and Microsoft Corp as well as IBM servers.
        “With most large organizations storing data across hybrid cloud environments, they need the freedom and choice to apply AI to their data wherever it is stored,” Rob Thomas, general manager of IBM Data and AI, said in a news release on Tuesday as it opened “Think,” its annual conference in San Francisco to showcase new technology.
        IBM will rely on an open-source software package known as Kubernetes to make the links to rival clouds.
        IBM in recent years has sought to bolster its faster-growing cloud and analytics businesses while moving away from slumping hardware products and traditional software offerings.
        Charles King, president at technology consulting firm Pund-IT, described extending Watson to other clouds as “a significant step forward in making Watson AI more customer-friendly.”
        Nick Patience, co-founder and research vice president at 451 Research, said IBM’s strategy is an “acknowledgement that we are living – and will continue to live – in a hybrid cloud environment where companies don’t want to be locked into a single cloud vendor for every type of service, be it for AI or anything else.”
    (Reporting by Paresh Dave; Editing by Sonya Hepinstall)
  • 2/12/2019 Symantec acquires Israel’s Luminate, with an eye on cloud security
    FILE PHOTO - The Symantec booth is seen during the 2016 Black Hat cyber-security conference
    in Las Vegas, Nevada, U.S. August 3, 2016. REUTERS/David Becker/File Photo     JERUSALEM (Reuters) – Cyber security firm Symantec Corp said on Tuesday it acquired Israel’s Luminate Security in an effort to boost its security systems for cloud computing.
        Financial details of the deal were not disclosed
        Luminate, founded in 2017, says its technology can securely connect users from any device, anywhere in the world, to corporate applications on-premises and in the cloud.
        “Luminate incorporated into Symantec’s Integrated Cyber Defense puts us at the forefront of security in the cloud era,” said Symantec CEO Greg Clark.
        Based in Tel Aviv, Luminate has so far raised $14 million.
    (Reporting by Ari Rabinovitch and Tova Cohen; Editing by Steven Scheer)
  • 2/13/2019 Many insect species are in decline by Brett Molina, USA TODAY
        More than 40 percent of the world’s insect species could go extinct over the next several decades leading to “catastrophic” results for the planet’s ecosystems, a new study says.
        The study published in the April edition of the peer-reviewed journal Biological Conservation said dung beetles, butterflies, moths, bees and wasps are among those species that appear to be most affected.
        The study cites habitat loss because of “intensive agriculture and urbanization,” pollution and climate change as key reasons for the rapid declines.
        “The repercussions this will have for the planet’s ecosystems are catastrophic to say the least, as insects are at the structural and functional base of many of the world’s ecosystems,” reads an excerpt from the study conducted by researchers at the University of Sydney, the University of Queensland and the China Academy of Agricultural Sciences.
        The study is based on a review of 73 comprehensive reports from around the world detailing insect declines.    The study said more than 60 percent of dung beetles in Mediterranean countries are in decline, while one in six species of bees have gone regionally extinct.
        Researchers note most studies on extinction among species tend to focus on birds or mammals, but insects were underrepresented despite their “paramount importance” in keeping ecosystems functioning.
        The study advises several changes to slow or halt the decline, including a serious reduction in the use of pesticides.
  • 2/15/2019 UN: Experts to develop oversight standards for gene editing
        LONDON – The World Health Organization is convening an expert meeting next month to develop global standards for the governance and oversight of human gene editing, months after a Chinese researcher rocked the scientific community with his announcement that he had created the world’s first gene-edited babies.    In a statement Thursday, the U.N. health agency announced it had chosen an expert panel to examine the scientific, ethical, social and legal challenges linked to gene editing.
  • 2/15/2019 Hong Kong snares record haul of rhino horns from South Africa
    Rhino horns seized by Hong Kong Customs are on display in Hong Kong, China, in this handout photo released by Hong Kong Customs and
    Excise Department February 14, 2019, obtained by Reuters February 15, 2019. Hong Kong Customs and Excise Department/Handout via REUTERS     HONG KONG (Reuters) – Hong Kong customs seized a record 40 kg (88 pounds) of rhino horns worth around HK$8 million ($1 million) from Johannesburg en route to Vietnam, the latest bust for authorities trying to tackle the rising volume of endangered species trafficked through the Chinese territory.
        The seizure came less than one month after customs busted a massive smuggling operation from Africa, seizing a record quantity of pangolin scales, along with more than 1,000 ivory tusks.
        Customs said the rhino horns were found in two check-in carton boxes, destined for Ho Chi Minh City.    Two men were arrested, they said in a statement on Thursday, adding it was a record haul for airline passengers.
        “It’s shocking to us that today’s 40 kg rhino horn seizure equates to about 20 percent of the total amount of rhino horn seized in Hong Kong from 2013 to the end of October 2018,” conservation group WildAid said.
        The former British colony on China’s southern coast is one of the world’s primary wildlife trafficking transit points, supplying an array of wildlife products including shark’s fin and rhino horn across Asia and particularly mainland China.
        Much of the trade supplies the traditional Chinese medicine sector.    Highly valued rhino horn for instance, is believed to treat issues from cancer to clearing toxins and curing hangovers.
        The city remains a global blackspot with organized criminal gangs taking advantage of the special administrative region’s geographic location, logistics network and relatively lax enforcement.
        All species of rhino are listed under CITES Appendix 1 which means it is illegal to trade them internationally.    There are under 29,000 rhinos alive in the wild and in captivity.
        China has made significant strides in wildlife protection in recent years but it also has formidable profit driven wildlife business interests.
        After pressure from some breeders, China’s State Council said in October that it would replace a 1993 ban on the trade of tiger bones and rhino horn, opening up exceptions under “special circumstances,” including medical research.
        But in November, Beijing postponed the move following widespread protest from conservation groups.
        Hong Kong authorities last year raised penalties for smuggling endangered species to a maximum fine of HK$10 million and a 10 year prison sentence.    However conservation groups say wildlife crime is treated less seriously with prosecutions still paltry.
        ADM Capital Foundation, which focuses on environmental challenges across Asia, wrote in a January report that wildlife trafficking should be incorporated under Hong Kong’s Organised and Serious Crime Ordinance (OSCO).
        Doing so would provide “a powerful disincentive to wildlife criminals, and importantly, would prevent reinvestment of profits into further criminal activities,” the report said.
    (This version corrects date of Wildaid comment to 2018 from 2019)
    (Reporting by Farah Master; Editing by Michael Perry)
  • 2/18/2019 Grand Canyon tourists exposed to radiation - Buckets of uranium ore were placed near exhibits by Dennis Wagner, Arizona Republic USA TODAY NETWORK
        For nearly two decades at the Grand Canyon, tourists, employees and children on tours passed by three paint buckets stored in the National Park’s museum collection building, unaware they were being exposed to radiation.
        Although federal officials learned last year that the 5-gallon containers were brimming with uranium ore, then removed the radioactive specimens, the park’s safety director alleges nothing was done to warn park workers or the public that they might have been exposed to unsafe levels of radiation.
        In a rogue email sent to all Park Service employees on Feb. 4, Elston Stephenson – the safety, health and wellness manager – described the alleged cover-up as “a top management failure” and warned of possible health consequences.
        “If you were in the Museum Collections Building (2C) between the year 2000 and June 18, 2018, you were ‘exposed’ to uranium by OSHA’s definition,” Stephenson wrote.    “The radiation readings, at first blush, exceeds ( sic) the Nuclear Regulatory Commission’s safe limits.    … Identifying who was exposed, and your exposure level, gets tricky and is our next important task.”
        In a Feb. 11 email to acting Interior Secretary David Bernhardt and Deputy Inspector General Mary Kendall, Stephenson said he had repeatedly asked National Park Service executives to inform the public, only to get stonewalled.
        “Respectfully, it was not only immoral not to let Our People know,” he added, “but I could not longer risk my (health and safety) certification by letting this go any longer.”
        According to Stephenson, the uranium specimens had been in a basement at park headquarters for decades, and were moved to the museum building when it opened, around 2000.
        One of the buckets was so full that its lid would not close.
        Stephenson said the containers were stored next to a taxidermy exhibit, where children on tours sometimes stopped for presentations, sitting next to uranium for 30 minutes or more.    b>By his calculation, those children could have received radiation dosages in excess of federal safety standards within three seconds, and adults could have suffered dangerous exposure in less than 30 seconds.    [They paid a lot of money to get zapped.].
        The Nuclear Regulatory Commission measures radiation contamination in millisieverts per hour or per year.    According to Stephenson, close exposures to the uranium buckets could have exposed adults to 400 times the health limit and children to 4,000 times what is considered safe.
        Emily Davis, a public affairs specialist at the Grand Canyon, said the park service is coordinating an investigation with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Arizona Department of Health Services.
        Davis stressed that a recent review of the building in question uncovered only background radiation, which is natural in the area and is safe.
        “There is no current risk to the park employees or public,” Davis said.    “The building is open. … The information I have is that the rocks were removed, and there’s no danger.”
        Davis declined to address Stephenson’s assertion that thousands of people may have been exposed to dangerous levels of radiation, or his allegation that the Park Service violated the law by not issuing a public warning.
        “We do take our public and employee safety and allegations seriously,” she said.
    The government sent inspectors to the Grand Canyon’s museum building, where
    buckets of uranium had been stored. COURTESY OF ELSTON STEPHENSON
  • 2/19/2019 Spider fossil has a twinkle in its eye by Brett Molina, USA TODAY
        A collection of spider fossils was discovered in South Korea, including two with eyes that appeared to glow, scientists have reported.
        The fossils were discovered in an area of shale rock in South Korea called the Jinju Formation, according to the study published last month in the peer-reviewed Journal of Systematic Palaeontology.
        Researchers say two of the fossils of the spider family Lagonomegopidae, believed to have lived 110 million to 113 million years ago, have reflective eyes that were helpful for hunting at night.
        The study says the find is the first preservation on the fossil record of a spider’s tapetum, the structure inside the eye that allows it to reflect light.
        “Because these spiders were preserved in strange slivery flecks on dark rock, what was immediately obvious was their rather large eyes brightly marked with crescentic features,” said a statement from Paul Selden, a professor of geology and director of the Paleontological Institute at the University of Kansas’ Biodiversity Institute and Natural History Museum.
        The study was completed in collaboration with a researcher at the Korea Polar Research Institute and a teacher with the Daejeon Science High School for the Gifted in South Korea who discovered the fossils.    Typically, spiders and other insects are preserved in amber because their bodies are softer, unlike animal fossils composed of harder substances such as bones or teeth.
        Selden said researchers were trying to figure out how the spiders stayed preserved in the shale without decaying.
        “It has to be a very special situation where they were washed into a body of water,” he said.    “Normally, they’d float.    But here, they sunk, and that kept them away from decaying bacteria – it may have been a low-oxygen condition.”
    The fossil of a spider that may have lived more than 110 million years ago has reflective eyes. PAUL SELDEN
  • 2/20/2019 Study traces rocky roots of Stonehenge by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Scientists discovered the location of the quarries where dozens of Stonehenge’s massive stones came from, a study released Tuesday said.
        In addition to pinpointing the location of the quarries – in western Wales, about 180 miles from Stonehenge – archaeologists said they know how and when the stones were quarried.
        “What’s really exciting about these discoveries is that they take us a step closer to unlocking Stonehenge’s greatest mystery – why its stones came from so far away,” said study lead author Mike Parker Pearson of University College London.    “Every other Neolithic monument in Europe was built of megaliths brought from no more than 10 miles away.”
        The answer?    The stones were quarried so far away from Stonehenge because they were relatively “easy” to remove, Pearson theorized, since they were natural vertical pillars: Using wood mallets, quarry workers only had to bash wedges into the ready-made joints between the pillars to break them apart, the study says.
        The 2-ton stones were lowered onto wooden sledges and dragged or carried to their new location in present-day England.
        The quarried stones are the interior rocks of Stonehenge, separate from the larger outer ring.
        Unlike stone quarries in ancient Egypt, where obelisks were carved out of solid rock, the Welsh quarries were easier to exploit, the study says.
        Though geologists have long known that many of Stonehenge’s smaller stones came from present-day Wales, the new study identifies the exact locations of two of these quarries:
    the Preseli Hills in Pembrokeshire, west Wales.
        The study suggests the stones were quarried around roughly 3000 B.C., based on pieces of charcoal found at the site, which were dated to that era.
        The stones at Stonehenge may have been part of a circle of stones in Wales, which might have been disassembled and reassembled at its present location.
        Stonehenge, one of the most impressive prehistoric megalithic monuments on Earth, is a World Heritage site known for its alignment with the movements of the sun.
        Thousands of people travel there each year to mark the solstices in summer and winter.
    Archaeologists say dozens of Stonehenge’s massive stones came from quarries, such as
    this one, in the Preseli Hills in western Wales. UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON
  • 2/21/2019 Experts dispute Grand Canyon radiation threat by Dennis Wagner, Arizona Republic USA TODAY
        GRAND CANYON NATIONAL PARK, Ariz. – It’s no cause for alarm. That’s what some experts said about a Grand Canyon safety manager’s allegation that thousands of people may have been exposed to dangerous radiation for nearly two decades inside a National Park building.
        At issue are three buckets of stones, believed to be uranium specimens, that were collected decades ago and stored from 2000 to 2018 in a museum collections building that was sometimes visited by tourists and students, as well as employees.
        Elston “Swede” Stephenson, federal health and safety manager at the South Rim, recently fired off letters warning colleagues, members of Congress and media that untold numbers of people may have been endangered, yet National Park Service officials struck a “secrecy pact” and did not notify the public.
        Stephenson based his assertion on radioactivity readings gathered by park officials, which appeared to be hundreds of times higher than thresholds set by the government for exposure.
        The U.S. Occupational Safety and Health Administration and the Arizona Bureau of Radiation Control are investigating the matter with the Park Service, and have declined comment on Stephenson’s assertion.    Instead, they say readings at the building – taken after the buckets’ contents were dumped into a defunct mine – show no danger.
        As the controversy went viral this week, however, a number of experts declared that uranium ore is simply not a threat to humans, and questioned either the radiation readings taken by the Park Service or Stephenson’s interpretation of that data.
        “It’s just a bucket of rocks,” declared Craig Little, a physicist who worked 25 years at the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and now serves as a consultant at uranium facilities.    “I wouldn’t line my baby’s crib with it, but …” Little and Modi Wetzler, a chemistry professor at Clemson University who studies nuclear waste, said there are three types of radiation, and uranium ore emits only the least-dangerous rays, comprising gamma particles.
        Wetzler said gamma rays are hazardous if inhaled or swallowed, but not externally dangerous because they can be absorbed and rendered harmless by a sheet of paper, a few inches of air, or a person’s outer layer of dead skin.
        “The safety manager doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” Wetzler said.
  • 2/21/2019 Neptune’s been hiding a secret: A tiny moon by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        A new moon was discovered orbiting Neptune, joining the other 13 we already knew about, scientists announced in a study Wednesday.
        The moon, named Hippocamp after the sea creature of Greek mythology, is Neptune’s smallest moon, with a diameter of only 21 miles.    Hippocamp orbits close to Proteus, the largest and outermost of the planets’ inner moons.
        Compared with the planet’s other inner moons, Hippocamp is tiny, “which suggests a violent history for the region,” Anne Verbiscer, a University of Virginia astronomer, said in a companion article in Nature.
        The moon may have formed from ejected fragments of the larger moon after it was hit by a comet billions of years ago, according to the study.    This supports the idea that all of Neptune’s seven inner moons were formed and shaped by powerful collisions with comets.
        “You wouldn’t expect to find such a tiny moon right next to Neptune’s biggest inner moon,” said study lead author Mark Showalter, a SETI astronomer.    “In the distant past, given the slow migration outward of the larger moon, Proteus was once where Hippocamp is now.”
        It’s so small that it wasn’t detected in 1989 during the Voyager 2 flyby of Neptune.    Hippocamp was spotted by astronomers using the Hubble Space Telescope.    Showalter and his colleagues discovered it using a special image-processing technique that made Hubble’s cameras extra-sensitive.
        “Applying the techniques that were used to find (Hippocamp) might result in the detection of other small moons around giant planets, or even planets that orbit distant stars,” Verbiscer said.
  • 2/21/2019 DOJ, SEC subpoena Johnson & Johnson over baby powder products by OAN Newsroom
        Johnson & Johnson has been in the spotlight after a Reuters report stated the company failed to disclose critical test information on its products from regulators and the public.    Officials are now seeking answers.
        On Wednesday, the company confirmed it received subpoenas from the Department of Justice and Securities and Exchange Commission.
        This comes after the Reuters investigation, released in December, found that Johnson & Johnson knew for decades that its talc and powder products sometimes contained traces of asbestos.    The report also revealed the company failed to share the results to regulators and the public.
    Johnson’s Baby Powder is squeezed from its container to illustrate the product. (AP Photo/Matt Rourke)     Johnson & Johnson chairman and CEO Alex Gorsky responded to the report’s findings and defended the company.
        “For over 100 years, Johnson & Johnson has known that the talc in our baby powder is the purest, safest, pharmaceutical grade talc on Earth,” he stated.    “Very importantly, if we believe our products are unsafe they would be off the shelves and out of the markets immediately.”
        Johnson & Johnson is facing lawsuits from some 13,000 plaintiffs, who allege the talc in its products caused cancer.    This includes thousands of women with ovarian cancer.
        The company said it plans to fully cooperate with the latest inquiries, while defending its products.
  • 2/21/2019 Swedish student leader wins EU pledge to spend billions on climate by Clare Roth
    A combination of pictures shows European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker greeting 16-year old Swedish
    environmental activist Greta Thunberg at a conference in Brussels, Belgium February 21, 2019. REUTERS/Yves Herman     BRUSSELS (Reuters) – The European Union should spend hundreds of billions of euros combating climate change during the next decade, its chief executive said on Thursday, responding to a Swedish teen who has inspired a global movement of children against global warming.
        In a speech alongside 16-year-old Greta Thunberg in Brussels, European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker also criticized U.S. President Donald Trump for suggesting climate change was “invented” and “ideological.”
        “In the next financial period from 2021 to 2027, every fourth euro spent within the EU budget will go towards action to mitigate climate change,” Juncker said of his proposal for the EU budget, which is typically 1 percent of the bloc’s economic output, or 1 trillion euros ($1.13 trillion) over seven years.
        “Mr. Trump and his friends believe that climate change is something that has just been invented and its an ideological concept, but … something dangerous is already underway,” Juncker said.
        Thunberg was in Brussels to join a seventh week of demonstrations by Belgian children skipping school to protest against global warming.
        More than 10,000 students, some holding up banners saying “stop denying the earth is dying,” protested across Belgium on Thursday, including in Brussels and the western city of Ghent.
        Thunberg said young people around the world wanted politicians to heed scientists’ warnings.
        “Unite behind the science, that is our demand,” Thunberg told a plenary session of the European Economic and Social Committee (EESC).    “Talk to the scientists, listen to them.”
        Trump has cast doubt on the science of climate change.    In 2017, he announced his intent to withdraw the United States from the Paris deal to combat climate change, although he cannot quit the deal until after the 2020 presidential election.
        The Paris accord aims to limit the global temperature rise to less than 2 degrees Celsius and prevent damaging levels of global warming, which scientists say would limit water availability, alter coastlines and undermine human health.
        Trump’s new pick to run the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency said last month climate change was not a major crisis.
        But Thunberg said she and hundreds of thousands like her were skipping school each week to focus politicians minds on a U.N. conference in 2020 when countries need to present new plans for more ambitious greenhouse gas emissions cuts.
        Students in Germany, Switzerland, France and Australia have followed her lead and also skipped classes to protest, while Thunberg took her protest to last month’s World Economic Forum in Davos to galvanize leaders meeting there to action.
        Politicians’ failure to act “would be the greatest failure of human history and they will be remembered as the greatest villains of all time,” she said.
    (Writing by Robin Emmott; Editing by Toby Chopra, William Maclean)
  • 2/22/2019 Volcanoes may have helped dinos’ demise by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Maybe it wasn’t just the asteroid that killed off most of the dinosaurs 66 million years ago: New research reveals how volcanoes half a world away may have played a role.
        An asteroid slammed into the Earth near present-day Mexico, unleashing tsunamis and ash that blotted out the sun.    That led to a “nuclear winter” that wiped out more than half the species on the planet.
        Volcanoes in what’s now India may have contributed to the extinctions, and the studies pinpoint when those eruptions occurred and how long they lasted.    This should give further clues as to what caused the extinction.
        “To understand volcanoes’ role in mass extinction, we need to understand when the eruptions were occurring, how long they occurred for and how much volume was erupted during what time,” study co-author Courtney Sprain, a geoscientist at the University of Liverpool, told Gizmodo.
        Sprain and other researchers traveled to India to study those long-past volcanic eruptions, looking at immense mounds of hardened lava known as “Deccan Traps.”
        Those lava flows, which began before the asteroid impact but erupted for several hundred thousand years afterward, probably spewed immense amounts of carbon dioxide and other noxious, climate-modifying gases into the atmosphere, according to the University of California–Berkeley.
        Thursday, in the peer-reviewed journal Science, two separate research teams published studies about what they found in the Deccan Traps.
        One study, led by Sprain, says it’s likely that the asteroid caused the volcanic eruptions in India to intensify as most of the lava erupted about 600,000 years after impact.
        The other research, headed by geoscientist Blair Schoene of Princeton University, said the eruptions occurred before the asteroid hit.
  • 2/22/2019 CO2 buildup could end up choking our grandchildren by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Emissions of carbon dioxide – the greenhouse gas most responsible for global warming – could soar to levels not seen in 56 million years by the middle of next century, scientists warned in a study Wednesday.
        Though it won’t happen in our lifetimes, it could very well happen in the lives of our grandchildren or greatgrandchildren.
        “You and I won’t be here in 2159, but that’s only about four generations away,” said study author Philip Gingerich, a University of Michigan paleoclimate researcher.
        He said humans pump carbon dioxide into the atmosphere at a rate nine to 10 times higher than it was during a natural global warming event roughly 56 million years ago.
        That era, known by scientists as the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM), was Earth’s warmest period since the extinction of the dinosaurs 66 million years ago.    According to the study, during that period, the poles were ice-free, and the Arctic was home to palm trees and crocodiles.
        That warmth caused a major extinction of organisms in the deep ocean that are a key link in the marine food web.
        Scientists aren’t sure what caused that spike in carbon dioxide during that era, but we know what’s causing it now.
        The burning of fossil fuels such as coal, oil and gas releases greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide and methane into Earth’s atmosphere and oceans.    That extra carbon has caused temperatures to rise to levels over the past century and a half that cannot be explained by natural factors, scientists say.
        “The rates of carbon release that are happening today are really unprecedented,” said Gabriel Bowen, a University of Utah geophysicist.
        The increase in gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide fuels climate change, making “the planet more dangerous and inhospitable for future generations,” the World Meteorological Organization said.
        Experts said that to slow or stop carbon emissions and this unnatural warming of the planet, people, governments and businesses must reduce burning fossil fuels and shift to renewable, carbon-free energy.
        “It’s not just about 100 years from now; it’s going to take significant periods of time for that carbon dioxide to make its way back into the Earth’s crust,” said Larisa DeSantis, a paleontologist at Vanderbilt University.    “It’s not a short-term event.    We’re really committing ourselves to many thousands of years of a warmer world if we don’t take action quickly.”
        Paleoceanography and Paleoclimatology, a journal of the American Geophysical Union, published the study.
    Scientists warn that by the middle of the next century, carbon dioxide emissions could climb to levels not seen since
    a natural global warming event 56 million years ago, when palm trees grew in the Arctic. KEVIN FRAYER/GETTY IMAGES
  • 2/22/2019 U.S., Canada, Mexico work to prevent swine fever reaching region by Julie Ingwersen
    FILE PHOTO: Pigs are seen on the farm of pig farmer Han Yi at a village in
    Changtu county, Liaoning province, China January 17, 2019. REUTERS/Ryan Woo     ARLINGTON, Va. (Reuters) – The United States, Canada and Mexico are coordinating efforts to prevent the arrival of a highly contagious swine disease that has swept through China’s hog herd and parts of Europe, U.S. Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue said on Thursday.
        The disease, African swine fever, can cause death for hogs in just two days.    China, home to the world’s largest hog herd, has reported more than 100 cases of the disease in 27 provinces and regions since last August.    Efforts to contain the fever have disrupted Chinese pork supplies.
        The virus has spread to China’s neighbor, Vietnam. Eastern Europe has suffered an outbreak and Belgium has found the virus in wild boar.    If it were to reach the United States, swine fever could curb shipments in the $6.5 billion export market for American pork at a time when the industry is already reeling from the impact of trade disputes with China and Mexico.
        “Sharing the long borders that we do both on the north and south, it’s important that we function together as one,” Perdue said at the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s annual outlook forum, where he shared a stage with Canadian Agriculture Minister Lawrence MacAulay and Mexico’s Secretary of Agriculture Victor Villalobos Arambula.
        “All the things that go on in a very mobile world today will only increase the likelihood of things transferring from one nation to another,” Perdue said.
        “We are committing even further, based on the most recent African swine fever, to up our game.”
        MacAulay said Canada has taken steps including raising fines for those caught illegally importing meat.
        “This type of thing is so vitally important because it takes one (case) to cost us billions of dollars,” MacAulay said.    “I hope we can deal with this issue not after it comes, but before it comes.”
        Smithfield Foods, the world’s biggest pork producer and a division of China’s WH Group, has increased safety procedures at U.S. farms, while U.S. hog farmers are leaving animal-feed ingredients imported from China in storage in an attempt to keep the disease out.
        Though not harmful to humans, there is no vaccine for the disease and transmission can occur in many ways, including direct contact between animals, through contaminated food and by people contaminated with the virus traveling from one place to another.
        News of the spread of the disease in Asia has lifted CME Group lean hog futures at times, as traders consider the potential for improved U.S. pork exports to China.
        The USDA’s chief economist, Robert Johansson, said prospects for U.S. pork producers to export more to Asia to compensate for hogs culled due to the disease may be overstated.
        Johansson said plentiful supply in the United States would push hog prices down 7.5 percent in 2019.
        “Producers in the United States are very efficient at producing pigs, and they are producing a lot of them right now,” he said.
    (Reporting by Julie Ingwersen; Editing by Simon Webb and Phil Berlowitz)
  • 2/22/2019 Japanese space probe touches down on asteroid to collect samples by Kaori Kaneko and Malcolm Foster
    FILE PHOTO: A H-IIA rocket carrying Hayabusa 2 space probe blasts off from the launching pad at Tanegashima Space Center on the
    Japanese southwestern island of Tanegashima, in this photo taken by Kyodo December 3, 2014. Mandatory credit Kyodo/via REUTERS     TOKYO (Reuters) – A Japanese space probe named after a falcon, Hayabusa 2, has touched down on an asteroid more than 300 million km (186 million miles) from Earth on a mission to seek clues about the origins of life, Japan’s space agency said on Friday.
        The spacecraft’s landing on the asteroid Ryugu, just 900 meters (3,000 feet) in diameter, came after an initial attempt in October was delayed because it was difficult to pick a landing spot on the asteroid’s rocky surface.
        The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, said on Friday Hayabusa 2 fired a small projectile into the surface of Ryugu to collect particles scientists hope the spacecraft will bring back to Earth for analysis.
        “We may have caused some worry due to the delay but we carried out our plan flawlessly over the past four months to bring it to a successful landing,” project manager Yuichi Tsuda told a news conference.
        “It landed in the best circumstances among the scenarios we envisioned,” he said.
        It is the second Japanese spacecraft to land on an asteroid after Hayabusa touched down on a near-Earth asteroid named Itokawa in 2005.    It was the first to bring asteroid dust back to Earth, although not as much as hoped.
        Asteroids are believed to have formed at the dawn of the solar system and scientists say Ryugu may contain organic matter that may have contributed to life on Earth.
        JAXA’s plan is for Hayabusa 2 to lift off Ryugu and touch back down up to three times.    It blasted off in December 2014 and is scheduled to return to Earth at the end of 2020.
    (Reporting by Kaori Kaneko and Malcolm Foster; Editing by Paul Tait)
  • 2/22/2019 Winter snow storm surprises the Southwest by OAN Newsroom
        Rare snow falls in the Southwest are confusing thousands of residents and creating an unexpected winter wonderland.     A winter storm hit the Southwest late this week, blanketing Las Vegas and dusting parts of Los Angeles. Forecasters believe the storm will produce heavy snow in the Southwest before moving in to the Midwest.
        Las Vegas experienced its second snowstorm in a week Wednesday, with one-to-three inches of snow in some areas of the city.    Schools remained open Thursday, but Fridays classes were cancelled.    The storm has also closed several freeways and delayed hundreds of flights at McCarran International Airport, because they did not have snowplows.
    A dusting of snow covers an area along the Las Vegas Strip, Thursday, Feb. 21, 2019, in Las Vegas.
    A winter storm is expected to drop up to 3 inches (8 centimeters) of snow on Las Vegas’ southern and western
    outskirts while other parts of the metro area will get rain mixed with snow. (AP Photo/John Locher)     The winter storm also caused chaos in Southern California, where Los Angeles, Pasadena and Santa Clarita received a rare snowfall on Thursday.    Although the snow was fleeting in most areas, Southern California experienced major road closures, including large portions of Interstate 5.
        The storm also hit several parts of Arizona, with Flagstaff reported over 33-inches snow, making it the snowiest day of all-time for the city.    A State of Emergency was declared in the city Thursday due to the storm.    Forecasters believe it will spread to the four corners region by Friday night.
        While the cold front is a surprise to most southwestern residents, meteorologists believe it will benefit many areas in the west that have experienced serious drought conditions.
  • 2/22/2019 Deep 7.5-magnitude quake hits Ecuador-Peru border region by Alexandra Valencia and Mitra Taj
    People gather outside the hospital after an earthquake in Guayaquil, Ecuador February 22, 2019
    in this image obtained from social media. Edison Manjarrez via REUTERS     QUITO/LIMA (Reuters) – A deep magnitude-7.5 earthquake struck the Peru-Ecuador border region early on Friday morning, the U.S. Geological Survey said, causing tremors that the Ecuadorian president said were felt around the country.
        The quake’s epicenter was in a sparsely populated area 224 km (140 miles) east-southeast of Ambato, Ecuador, at a depth of 132 km.    The USGS’s initial reading assessed the quake, which occurred at 5:17 a.m. local time (1017 GMT), at magnitude 7.7.
        There was no risk of a tsunami being triggered, according to the Pacific Tsunami Warning Center, and there were no initial reports of casualties or damage.
        Ecuadorian President Lenin Moreno said on Twitter that preliminary reports “do not indicate major damage,” though he added that provincial response teams had been activated and that the tremors had been “felt throughout the country.”
        One resident in Cuenca, Ecuador, 253 km (157 miles) from the epicenter, described the temblor as very strong, while a second resident there reported experiencing “a good 30-second shake,” according to witness statements on the European-Mediterranean Seismological Center website.
        Ecuador’s emergency response service said the main quake and other smaller ones had shook the south of the country with reports of some minor injuries, evacuation of patients and staff from several hospitals and damage reported in some Amazonian towns.
        Some areas were without electrical power, authorities said, while the country’s oil pipelines and hydroelectric dams were operating normally.
        In towns near the epicenter of the quake, the tremors caused alarm.    “I felt the walls and the floor move.    I was very scared and we went out to the street,” Lissette Alarcón, a 25-year-old university student, told Reuters.
        “We still aren’t used to these earthquakes,” she said.
        A magnitude-7.1 earthquake struck Peru’s southern coast in January 2018, killing one person, injuring scores more and causing roads and homes to collapse.    A 7.8-magnitude quake in Ecuador killed around 700 people in 2016.
    (Reporting by Mitra Taj in Lima, Alexandra Valencia in Quito and Jason Neely and John Stonestreet in London; Writing by Adam Jourdan; Editing by Alison Williams and Jeffrey Benkoe)
  • 2/22/2019 Climate plan ‘not pie in the sky’ before election, says Spain by Isla Binnie
    FILE PHOTO: Spain's Energy and Environment Minister Teresa Ribera arrives for a cabinet meeting
    at the Moncloa Palace in Madrid, Spain, July 6, 2018. REUTERS/Juan Medina     MADRID (Reuters) – Spain’s government presented a draft proposal on how to drastically reduce carbon emissions on Friday, less than two weeks before parliament is due to be dissolved ahead of a general election that may nix its chances of becoming law.
        The package aims to make Spain carbon neutral by 2050, through measures including phasing out coal and nuclear power generation in favor of renewable and making sure all new cars are emission-free by 2040.
        The ruling Socialists have emphasized their green ambitions since taking power last summer, promising support for renewable energy generation and passing measures aimed at cooling Europe’s fourth-highest electricity prices.
        But the long-promised draft has reached parliament two months before an April 28 snap election that Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez was forced to call after a spat with his regional separatist partners.
        Presenting the package, Energy Minister Teresa Ribera said it was worthwhile to forge ahead.
        “This is not pie in the sky,” she told a news conference.    “There is no reason for us to delay this debate.    I am convinced that whoever (is in government), this will be approved and broadly supported by all Spaniards and political forces.”
        A shift away from fossil fuels necessitates deep change and hefty investment across Europe to meet national and regional objectives for renewable generation while guaranteeing the lights stay on.
        Sanchez has said implementing the carbon-reduction plans would require 200 billion euros ($227 billion) of total investment in the next decade, 47 billion euros of which he said would come from the public sector.
        By favoring cheaper, renewable generation, the package would reduce Spaniards’ steep electricity bills, before taxes, by 12 percent by 2030, the energy ministry calculated.
        An energy ministry source said the government expects investment in renewable generation projects, which are set for a record year in 2019, will not need much public money, but works to increase the energy efficiency of the housing stock would.
    NATURAL PHASE-OUT
        The package includes the draft law, a national climate proposal all European countries have to send to Brussels, and a strategy for offsetting job losses in polluting industries.
        The government submitted the national plan on Friday to European authorities who will start assessing it.
        The plan foresees the weight of coal – which fired 13.5 percent of mainland Spain’s electricity last year – dwindling although perhaps not entirely disappearing from the energy mix by 2030, the draft document showed.
        “We do not expect to force closures, we believe that the companies will naturally stop their coal businesses,” the ministry source said, adding the plan envisaged incentives to close coal plants.
        Meanwhile, nuclear plants, which provided just over 20 percent of Spain’s electricity in 2018, would close gradually in order of age between 2025 and 2035, the source added.
        Ribera said the obligation for cars to be emission-free did not imply a prohibition of any type of vehicle, but she did not explain how such a result would be possible without a ban.
        A previous draft of the law which said new petrol, diesel and hybrid cars would not be allowed in Spain from 2040 caused some consternation in the industry.
    (Additional reporting by Jose Elias Rodriguez and Belen Carreno; Editing by Susan Fenton)
  • 2/22/2019 Botswana considers allowing big game hunting, culling elephants
    FILE PHOTO: A herd of elephants leaves a drinking spot in the Mababe area, Botswana,
    September 19, 2018. REUTERS/Siphiwe Sibeko/File Photo     GABORONE (Reuters) – Botswana, home to almost a third of Africa’s elephants, is considering lifting a ban on big game hunting, to combat what the government says is growing conflict between humans and wildlife Conservationists estimate the southern African country has around 130,000 elephants, but some lawmakers say it is much higher and causes problems for small-scale farmers.
        A committee appointed by President Mokgweetsi Masisi to review the 2014 hunting ban handed a report on the matter to Masisi late on Thursday.
        “We recommend … a legal framework that will enable the growth of a safari hunting industry and manage the country’s elephant population within the historic range,” said Frans Van Der Westhuizen who chaired the committee that also called for “regular but limited” elephant culling.
        Masisi set up the committee in June 2018 to consider the ban imposed by former president Ian Khama after surveys showed declining wildlife populations in the north.
        Botswana, the size of France and mostly arid, has a population of around 2.3 million people and vast tracts of remote wilderness that make it a magnet for foreign tourists who want to view wildlife.
        Masisi said he would present the report to his cabinet before making a decision.
    (Reporting by Brian Benza; editing by Emma Rumney and Robin Pomeroy)
  • 2/25/2019 Exxon asks U.S. regulator to block climate-change resolution: investors by Suzanne Barlyn
    FILE PHOTO: An airplane comes in for a landing above an Exxon sign at a gas station in the
    Chicago suburb of Norridge, Illinois, U.S., October 27, 2016. REUTERS/Jim Young/File Photo/File Photo     (Reuters) – Exxon Mobil Corp is trying to block an investor proposal that calls on the world’s largest publicly traded oil company to set targets for lowering its greenhouse gas emissions, two of the investor groups involved said on Sunday.
        Exxon in late January wrote to the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission that the proposal, which is set for a vote at its May annual meeting, is misleading and an attempt to “micro-manage the company,” spokespeople for investors supporting the proposal said.
        The Financial Times reported on the letter earlier on Sunday.
        The Church Commissioners for England (CCE), the endowment fund of the Church of England, an institutional investor that supports the proposal, as well as New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who manages the state’s pension fund that is pushing the proposal, both saw the Exxon letter, officials for both groups told Reuters.
        “Trying to strike out a shareholder proposal from institutional investors with a fiduciary responsibility to manage climate risk is an outdated reflex,” CCE head of responsible investment Edward Mason said in a statement.    “Our proposal deserves more serious consideration.”
        Exxon rivals Royal Dutch Shell PLC and BP Plc have taken steps to broaden disclosure on greenhouse gas emissions or tied executive pay to reducing emissions.
        Investors supporting the Exxon proposal manage a total of $1.9 trillion and are led by DiNapoli.
        “Exxon is trying to deny shareholders’ right to vote on a significant climate risk concern,” DiNapoli said in a statement on Sunday. Exxon’s position is “shortsighted and disappointing.”
        Exxon spokesman Scott Silvestri said in an email on Sunday that the company did not have anything to share ahead of the company proxy being filed.
        The proposal, led by New York state’s pension fund, calls on Exxon to start setting targets for cutting greenhouse gas emissions that are “aligned with the greenhouse gas reductions goals established by the Paris climate agreement,” including for use of its own products.
        But those short, medium and long-term targets would allow shareholders to supervise its “day-to-day” considerations, Exxon wrote to the SEC.
        CCE spokesman Mark Arena said that Exxon told the SEC that it has already put many of the measures the proposal requires in place.
        The 2015 Paris Agreement which aims to limit a rise in average world temperatures to “well below” two degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times.
        In 2017, DiNapoli spearheaded a campaign that convinced a majority of shareholders to call on Exxon to detail risks it could face from rising global temperatures.
        Exxon produced a report last year outlining how global oil demand could drop sharply by 2040, but critics said the report fell short on areas like how climate policies could affect company finances.
    (Reporting by Suzanne Barlyn; Editing by Cynthia Osterman)
  • 2/25/2019 Evidence for man-made global warming hits ‘gold standard’: scientists by Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
    FILE PHOTO: Ocean water is pushed up by the bottom of a pinnacle iceberg as it falls back during a large calving
    event at the Helheim glacier near Tasiilaq, Greenland, June 22, 2018. REUTERS/Lucas Jackson/File Photo     OSLO (Reuters) – Evidence for man-made global warming has reached a “gold standard” level of certainty, adding pressure for cuts in greenhouse gases to limit rising temperatures, scientists said on Monday.
        “Humanity cannot afford to ignore such clear signals,” the U.S.-led team wrote in the journal Nature Climate Change of satellite measurements of rising temperatures over the past 40 years.
        They said confidence that human activities were raising the heat at the Earth’s surface had reached a “five-sigma” level, a statistical gauge meaning there is only a one-in-a-million chance that the signal would appear if there was no warming.
        Such a “gold standard” was applied in 2012, for instance, to confirm the discovery of the Higgs boson subatomic particle, a basic building block of the universe.     “The narrative out there that scientists don’t know the cause of climate change is wrong,” he told Reuters.    “We do.”
        Mainstream scientists say the burning of fossil fuels is causing more floods, droughts, heat waves and rising sea levels.
        U.S. President Donald Trump has often cast doubt on global warming and plans to pull out of the 197-nation Paris climate agreement which seeks to end the fossil fuel era this century by shifting to cleaner energies such as wind and solar power.
        Sixty-two percent of Americans polled in 2018 believed that climate change has a human cause, up from 47 percent in 2013, according to the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication.
    SATELLITE DATA
        Monday’s findings, by researchers in the United States, Canada and Scotland, said evidence for global warming reached the five sigma level by 2005 in two of three sets of satellite data widely used by researchers, and in 2016 in the third.
        Professor John Christy, of the University of Alabama in Huntsville which runs the third set of data, said there were still many gaps in understanding climate change.    His data show a slower pace of warming than the other two sets.
        “You may see a certain fingerprint that indicates human influence, but that the actual intensity of the influence is minor (as our satellite data indicate),” he told Reuters.
        Separately in 2013, the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded that it is “extremely likely,” or at least 95 percent probable, that human activities have been the main cause of climate change since the 1950s.
        Peter Stott of the British Met Office, who was among the scientists drawing that conclusion and was not involved in Monday’s study, said he would favor raising the probability one notch to “virtually certain,” or 99-100 percent.
        “The alternative explanation of natural factors dominating has got even less likely,” he told Reuters.
        The last four years have been the hottest since records began in the 19th century.
        The IPCC will next publish a formal assessment of the probabilities in 2021.
        “I would be reluctant to raise to 99-100 percent, but there is no doubt there is more evidence of change in the global signals over a wider suite of ocean indices and atmospheric indices,” said Professor Nathan Bindoff, a climate scientist at the University of Tasmania.
    (Reporting by Alister Doyle, editing by Ed Osmond and Angus MacSwan)
  • 2/25/2019 Look but don’t touch as smartphone’s flexible future unfolds by Paul Sandle
    FILE PHOTO: People take pictures of the new Mate X smartphone, ahead of the
    Mobile World Congress (MWC 19) in Barcelona, Spain, February 24, 2019. REUTERS/Sergio Perez     BARCELONA (Reuters) – Flexible and folding formats framed the future of smartphones this week as manufacturers focused on new forms in an effort to jolt the market out of uniformity and re-invigorate sales.
        But anyone hoping to tap or swipe Huawei’s Mate X, a smartphone that wraps the screen around the front and back, was soon disappointed at Barcelona’s Mobile World Congress.
        Initial cheers were quickly followed by gasps when the Chinese firm revealed its eye-watering 2,299 euros ($2,600) price tag, although that includes a 5G connection.
        This is even more than Samsung’s Galaxy Fold, which was unveiled last week and will be priced from $1,980 when it goes on sale in some markets in April.    It was on display in Barcelona in a glass case like a museum artefact.
        While the hands-off stance indicates neither firm has a consumer-ready device, 2019 would be remembered as the year of the foldable, Ben Wood, chief of research at CCS Insight, said, adding that the new format was still in its infancy.
        “But we are at the stone age of devices with flexible displays; it’s a whole new phase of experimentation after the sea of smartphone sameness we have seen for the last decade.”
        Samsung took the opposite approach to Huawei by putting its folding screen on the inside of its device, with another smaller screen on the front panel for use when its is closed.
        “That was the solution we felt was best for longevity,” Samsung’s European Director of Mobile Portfolio & Commercial Strategy Mark Notton told Reuters.
        Smartphone makers have been trying to innovate to persuade consumers to upgrade from devices which already meet most of their needs, in an effort to reverse falling sales.
        And although more vendors will soon follow with their own takes on foldable displays, 2019 will not be the year they go mainstream, market analysts Canalys said.    They will remain exclusively ultra-luxury devices with fewer than 2 million expected to be shipped worldwide this year, Canalys added.
        The mobile market slipped 1.2 percent in 2018, research company Gartner says, although it expects growth of 1.6 percent in 2019, driven by replacement cycles in the largest and most saturated markets China, the United States and Western Europe.
    GEARING UP FOR 5G
        With 5G next generation mobile networks not becoming widely available until 2023 in the United States and China and 2026 in Europe, analysts say, the vast majority of customers will be buying the latest 4G devices like Samsung new Galaxy S10.
        Nonetheless, manufacturers such as LG were keen to show they could squeeze 5G technology into 4G smartphone form, although most lacked launch or pricing information.
        Chinese maker OnePlus had a 5G device running a video game using a 5G connection on show, but visitors were teased with only a glimpse of the phone’s screen in a display cabinet.
        “For us, launching means commercial availability, it doesn’t mean PowerPoint,” OnePlus co-founder Carl Pei told Reuters.
        “We are confident we are going to be one of the first with a commercially available smartphone in Europe,” he said, adding that this would be within the first half of 2019.
        Xiaomi Corp, which ranked fifth in smartphone shipments in the last quarter according to IDC, did reveal pricing information along with its first 5G device.
        “Xiaomi has fired the starting gun with a $599 price.    That will bring tears to the eyes of many other mobile phone makers,” Wood said, adding that many sub-scale makers such as Sony, LG and others could find it tough to make any kind of margin on 5G.
        Sony did not show a 5G device, relying instead on its ownership of a major Hollywood studio to release a new line of Xperia phones with a 21:9 display ratio optimised to watch movies and Netflix content.
    (Additional reporting by Douglas Busvine, Jack Stubbs and Isla Binnie; Editing by Alexander Smith)
  • 2/26/2019 Fears rise over fatal measles outbreak by Ashley May, USA TODAY
        As public health officials monitor a measles outbreak in Washington state, the World Health Organization says a measles epidemic in Madagascar has killed more than 900 people.
        Since the outbreak began in September, the country in East Africa has seen more than 68,000 cases of the highly infectious disease, according to WHO.    The organization says 553 people have died and an additional 373 are suspected to have died because of the measles.    Babies are most at risk.
        WHO spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said the high death toll and number of infections has been blamed on a low immunization rate, less than 60 percent, for measles across the island. More than 90 percent of Americans do get recommended immunizations, according to CDC data.    So, an outbreak of that size in the U.S. would be rare, but officials are concerned that measles cases could increase with a growing anti-vaccination trend.
        People choosing not to vaccinate have become a global health threat in 2019, WHO reported.    The CDC recognized that the number of children who aren’t being vaccinated by 24 months old has been gradually increasing.    Last week, an Arizona legislative panel endorsed bills that could expand vaccine exemptions for the state’s children.
        Before the measles, mumps, rubella, and varicella (chickenpox) vaccine was available in the U.S., about 450 to 500 people died from measles each year.    Alan Melnick, director of public health for Clark County, Washington, told USA TODAY that if current outbreaks grew larger and infected infants, it wouldn’t be unusual to see more deaths in the U.S., too.
        Clark County, a known anti-vaccination hot spot, has identified 65 confirmed cases and two suspected cases of measles since the beginning of the year.    Most cases are affecting unvaccinated children younger than 10. No deaths have been reported.
        The CDC says, that 90 percent of unvaccinated people who come in contact with an infected person will get the virus.    The measles two-dose vaccine is 97 percent effective against the virus, according to the CDC.
    Contributing: The Associated Press; Ken Alltucker, USA TODAY.
  • 2/26/2019 UN: Polio outbreak in Afghanistan linked to open border with Pakistan by OAN Newsroom
        The United Nations is blaming “unchecked borders” for polio making a comeback in Afghanistan.    On Monday, the UN said nearly all of the polio cases in Afghanistan are linked to neighboring Pakistan, where people are freely crossing the border and spreading the disease.
        Many people in the area do not trust the polio vaccine, because a fake vaccination program was used as a cover to search for Osama Bin Laden in Pakistan.    This led to rumors the injection is used for spying.
    A Pakistani health worker gives a polio vaccine to a student at a school in Peshawar, Pakistan. (AP/Photo)     In response, the UN is continuing to have teams travel around Afghanistan to administer the vaccine in hopes of eradicating the disease.
        “Polio is a dangerous virus in the world which targets children.    We had 21 positive cases in Afghanistan last year.    Most cases were linked to Pakistan.    In 2019, we have plans to continue our anti-polio campaigns until we completely eliminate the polio virus.” — Qudratullah Shekib, spokesperson – UNICEF polio program.
        The two countries, along with Nigeria, are the only places in the world where the disease is still prevalent.
        The largest outbreak of the disease happened in 2014, when the Taliban repeatedly attacked vaccination teams.
        However, the group recently promised not to interfere in efforts to eradicate the disease.
  • 2/27/2019 Huge iceberg breaking off in Antarctica by Brett Molina, USA TODAY
        An iceberg about twice the size of New York City is expected to break on an ice shelf in Antarctica, NASA says.
        Researchers are monitoring a giant crack in the center of the Brunt Ice Shelf in Antarctica.    The crack had been stable for 35 years but has started accelerating toward another fissure called the Halloween crack.
        When the larger crack makes its way completely across, it will create an iceberg of at least 660 square miles in a process called calving.
        “We don’t have a clear picture of what drives the shelf’s periods of advance and retreat through calving,” said Chris Shuman, a glaciologist with NASA and the University of Maryland Baltimore County.    “The likely future loss of the ice on the other side of the Halloween crack suggests that more instability is possible.”
        The iceberg itself isn’t as big as other recent masses.    In 2017, an iceberg the size of Delaware broke off the Antarctic ice shelf.
        It’s not clear when the iceberg will break off, Shuman said.    “It could calve within the next few days, or weeks, or possibly even longer.”
  • 2/27/2019 Lawmaker rips Trump climate science panel by Ledyard King, USA TODAY
        WASHINGTON – The Democratic chairman of a key congressional panel Tuesday characterized the Trump administration’s latest efforts to challenge the science behind climate change as “dangerous.”
        The comments by Rep. Jose Serrano, D-N.Y., chairman of a House Appropriations subcommittee overseeing federal climate funding, came amid news reports that White House officials are putting together a national security advisory panel aimed at countering the science behind human-caused global warming.
        The panel’s findings could give President Donald Trump, who has challenged his own government’s conclusions about the causes of and threats from climate change, more ammunition to ignore it.
        Serrano, who chairs the Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies, said that would be perilous.
        “This unaccountable working group appears set to deliberately cherry-pick data and science with the sole purpose of pushing back against the widely accepted science around climate change,” he said at a hearing Tuesday that featured government scientists testifying on the crisis.    “This only serves to diminish the magnitude of this crisis, and it is dangerous.”
        The science is largely settled on climate change, but the public relations war is heating up as both sides navigate an issue that is expected to be a top issue in the 2020 election.
        Democrats who retook the House after the 2018 midterm election have been holding numerous hearings on the crisis.
  • 2/27/2019 Explainer: Securing the 5G future – what’s the issue? by Jack Stubbs
    A visitor uses a mobile phone next to a 5G sign at the Mobile World Congress in
    Barcelona, Spain February 26, 2019. REUTERS/Rafael Marchante     BARCELONA (Reuters) – The security of next-generation 5G networks has dominated this year’s Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, with conflicting views on the risks of moving to the new technology being debated on stage and in backroom meetings.
        5G promises super-fast connections which evangelists say will transform the way we live our lives, enabling everything from self-driving cars to augmented-reality glasses and downloading a feature-length film to your phone in seconds.
        But there are also security concerns, some of which have fueled a drive by the United States and others to remove Chinese-made equipment from Western networks.
        The concerns can be broken down into three main areas:
    CRITICAL INFRASTRUCTURE
        As 5G becomes embedded in everything from hospitals to transport systems and power plants it will rapidly become a part of each country’s critical national infrastructure.
        This makes the consequences of the networks failing or being deliberately sabotaged in a cyber attack significantly more serious.
        “What makes people concerned is that you are not going to use 5G only for smartphones and consumers, you will connect, over time, infrastructure that is at the very core of our societies,” said Thomas Noren, head of 5G commercialization business area networks at equipment maker Ericsson.
        Ericsson, Huawei and Nokia are the world’s leading suppliers of telecoms equipment.
    MORE CONNECTIONS
        As 5G makes high-speed internet increasingly available, the number of devices in the network will increase dramatically.
        These will include traditional mobile and broadband connections, but also internet-enabled devices from dishwashers through to advanced medical equipment. Industry association GSMA forecasts the number of internet-enabled devices will triple to 25 billion by 2025.
        The larger the network, the more opportunities there are for hackers to attack, meaning there is an increasingly complex system with more parts that need protecting.
        “Once you have complexity across a broader system, regardless of what it is, the complexity itself is a vulnerability,” said Gee Rittenhouse, senior vice president for security at networking gear maker Cisco.
        “You don’t have a coherent view through the system, and once you don’t have that coherent view there are gaps, and the adversaries… take advantage of those gaps, which open up security holes.”
    DISTRIBUTED SYSTEM
        One of 5G’s biggest changes is the ability to take the advanced computing power usually kept in the protected “core” of a network and distribute it to other parts of the system.
        This will provide more reliable high-speed connections, and also means that future technologies such as augmented-reality glasses will not need inbuilt computing power because they can pull it from the network instead.
        But it also means engineers will no longer be able to clearly segregate the sensitive and less-restricted parts of the system.
        “It is going to fundamentally change the architecture of the network,” Nokia CEO Rajeev Suri told Reuters.
        The United States and others have warned that this means equipment made by Chinese companies such as Huawei Technologies, which Washington has accused of spying for Beijing, will have access to protected information.
        Huawei has denied the allegations.
    (Additional reporting by Douglas Busvine; Editing by Georgina Prodhan and Jane Merriman)
  • 2/28/2019 Lawmaker minimizes measles threat in USA by Ashley May, USA TODAY
        Texas state Rep. Bill Zedler says a resurgence of measles across the United States isn’t worrying him.
        Zedler, R-Arlington, is promoting legislation that would allow Texans to opt out of childhood vaccinations.
        “They want to say people are dying of measles.    Yeah, in Third World countries they’re dying of measles,” Zedler said, the Texas Observer reports.    “Today, with antibiotics and that kind of stuff, they’re not dying in America.”
        There is no treatment for measles, a highly contagious virus that can be fatal.    Antibiotics treat bacterial infections and can’t kill viruses.
        Right now, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention is tracking six measles outbreaks across the nation, including one in Texas.
        Before the measles, mumps and rubella vaccine was available in America, about 450 to 500 people died from measles each year.    The CDC reports there has been at least one case of a measles death within the past five years.    National and world health officials worry that an anti-vaccination movement could increase that number.
        The CDC recognized that the number of children who aren’t being vaccinated by 24 months old has been gradually increasing.    People choosing not to vaccinate have become a global health threat in 2019, the World Health Organization reported.
        Some parents opt not to vaccinate because of the discredited belief that vaccines are linked to autism.    The CDC has said that there is no link and that there are no ingredients in vaccines that could cause autism.
        Alan Melnick, director of public health for Clark County, Washington, told USA TODAY that if pockets of unvaccinated people in the United States grow, there could be more measles deaths.    Clark County, an anti-vaccinations hot spot, is battling a public health emergency as more than 60 people, most of them unvaccinated children, in the area have measles.
        Measles is so contagious that 90 percent of unvaccinated people who come in contact with an infected person will get the virus.    The measles two-dose vaccine is 97 percent effective against the virus, according to the CDC.
    Texas state Rep. Bill Zedler is supporting a bill that would make it easier for schoolchildren
    in the state to opt out of vaccines. PAUL MOSELEY/ STAR-TELEGRAM VIA AP
  • 2/28/2019 Measles outbreak addressed on Capitol Hill by OAN Newsroom
        With a significant rise in measles cases across the U.S., lawmakers met in a congressional hearing on Capitol Hill to discuss what’s being called a “growing public health threat.”
        Wednesday’s hearing included talks around response efforts for the current measles outbreak, and where in the country vaccination rates of the recommended measles vaccine are found to be low.
        Lawmakers discussed concerns around the spread of medically inaccurate information online relating to the measles vaccine, and whether addressing that misinformation might be a way to stop outbreaks before they start.
    FILE – In this Jan. 30, 2019 file photo signs posted at The Vancouver Clinic in Vancouver, Wash., warn patients and visitors
    of a measles outbreak. A measles outbreak near Portland, Ore., has revived a bitter debate over so-called personal belief exemptions to
    childhood vaccinations. Four percent of Washington secondary school students have non-medical vaccine exemptions. (AP Photo/Gillian Flaccus, File)     “Truth is, this is an incredibly safe vaccine. We have a host of experience with it. The vaccine has been used for a really long time.    We in the United States enjoy one of the most robust systems to monitor the safety of vaccines and that’s why we can say with confidence that this is a safe vaccine.    The most common side effects are a sore arm which goes way pretty quickly.” — Dr. Nancy Messonnier, director – National Center for Immunization and Respiratory Diseases, CDC
        The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said there have been 159 cases of measles confirmed across ten states, including California, Connecticut, Texas and Washington.
    [Guess which states has the most illegal immigration which could be where eradicated diseases are entering the United States.].
    
  
  
• MARCH 2019
  • 3/1/2019 German students walk out of school in climate change protest
    16-year-old Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg takes part in a protest claiming for urgent
    measures to combat climate change, in Hamburg, Germany, March 1, 2019. REUTERS/Morris Mac Matzen     HAMBURG, Germany (Reuters) – Thousands of students in the German port city of Hamburg marched out of school on Friday led by teenage Swedish environmental activist Greta Thunberg to call for more action on climate change.
        The protest is part of a global movement known as “School Strike 4 Climate” or “Fridays For Future” launched last August when Thunberg began protesting outside the Swedish parliament on school days.
        About 3,000 students marched through the streets of the port city chanting: “We are here, we are loud, because you are stealing our future.”
        Thunberg said the school strikes would go on until politicians took firmer action against climate change.
        “For way too long, the politicians and the people in power have gotten away with not doing anything to fight the climate crisis.    But we will make sure that they will not get away with it any longer,” she said.
        The Hamburg demonstrators also demanded an end to coal-fired energy.    Germany is planning to phase out coal by 2038 and has imposed higher emission standards on cars, but higher costs for cleaner vehicles and power are concerns for the government and the industry.
        Last month the 16-year-old Thunberg joined protests in Belgium, where she won a European Union pledge to spend billions of euros combating climate change during the next decade.
        The youth initiative has called for nationwide strikes on March 15 as part of an international day of action by students in which more than 40 countries are expected to participate.
        German Environment Minister Svenja Schulze said on Twitter the protests were impressive.
        But Ties Rabe, education senator for Hamburg state, said that although he supported the young people’s attempts to make the world a better place: “No one improves the world by skipping school.”
    (Reporting by Reuters TV in Hamburg and Riham Alkousaa in Berlin; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
    [WOW!    That will become a new fad as a way to get out of school for a day.].
    
  • 3/1/2019 World Health Organization promoting vaccines amid global surge in measles by OAN Newsroom
        Officials are working to raise awareness and to promote vaccinations as the number of measles cases continues to rise around the world.
        Health workers are reaching out to various locations to focus on outbreaks like the one in the Ukraine, where over 20,000 people have been infected since the beginning of the year.
        While there is no treatment for measles once someone becomes infected, officials said the vaccines are very effective in preventing people from catching the illness.
    Philippine National Red Cross and Health Department volunteers conduct house-to-house measles vaccination to children at
    an informal settlers community in Manila, Philippines following an outbreak of measles that already spread to four regions
    in the country and has claimed the lives of more than five dozen victims Saturday, Feb. 16, 2019. (AP Photo/Bullit Marquez)     “We have a fantastic vaccine against measles.    Unfortunately, this vaccine isn’t being used to the degree that it needs to be used. Since the year 2000, we’ve had a massive reduction in the cases of measles and deaths from measles.    Unfortunately, we’re back sliding now and we’re having an increase in the number of cases and this is actually a tragedy for families and children.” — Dr. Katherine O’Brien, director of immunization – World Health Organization
        The World Health Organization is working to carry out its strategic plan to eliminate measles, and another viral infection called “rubella” from certain regions.
  • 3/2/2019 Warming chips away at fish species by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Fish in the Northeast Atlantic – including cod, the prime ingredient in fish-and-chips – saw a dramatic drop of 34 percent in the past several decades as the Earth warmed, according to a study released Thursday.
        Warming oceans from human caused climate change has shrunk the populations of many fish species around the world, the study found.    Overfishing and poor management have only intensified the problem.
        Some of the biggest drops were in the seas near China and Japan, where fish populations dropped by as much as 35 percent from 1930 to 2010, the decades analyzed in the study.
        “We were stunned to find that fisheries around the world have already responded to ocean warming,” said study co-author Malin Pinsky, a Rutgers University ecologist.    “These aren’t hypothetical changes sometime in the future.”
        Globally, the drop is 4.1 percent for many species of fish and shellfish, according to the study, which was led by Chris Free, formerly of Rutgers and now of the University of California, Santa Barbara.
  • 3/3/2019 Record Australian heat brings fire to a scorched land by Alison Bevege
    A supplied image obtained on March 2, 2019, shows smoke rising from the bushfire burning in
    Victoria's east, Australia. AAP Image/Supplied by Steven Clarke/via REUTERS     SYDNEY (Reuters) – Firefighters battled 25 blazes across the Australian state of Victoria on Sunday as a record-breaking heatwave delivered the hottest start to March on record for the southern third of the country.
        The continent is prone to deadly blazes thanks to its combination of remote terrain, high summer temperatures and flammable eucalyptus bush.
        A severe four-day heatwave has brought fire weather across the southern parts of Western Australia, South Australia, Victoria and Tasmania over the weekend.
        The south-eastern state of Victoria was the worst hit, with more than 2,000 firefighters, water-bombing aircraft and volunteers battling blazes on Sunday.
        A cool change was forecast for late on Sunday but an associated wind change would bring danger for firefighters.
        “It’s a dangerous time, putting it bluntly,” Victoria’s Emergency Management Commissioner Andrew Crisp said in a televised emergency briefing on Sunday.
        “Not just for communities but for firefighters.”
        In 2009, the worst bushfires on record destroyed thousands of homes in Victoria, killing 173 people and injuring 414 on a day the media dubbed “Black Saturday.”
        The largest fire in Bunyip State Park was sparked by multiple lightning strikes on Friday.
        Rural townships were evacuated with no reported injuries or deaths, but three homes and several properties had been destroyed by noon on Sunday.
        Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology said the heatwave, defined as three consecutive days and nights of above-average temperatures, had broken more than a century of records.
        “It’s broken heat records for March in four states along the southern coastline,” meteorologist Dean Narramore told Reuters by telephone on Sunday.
        Temperatures in Tasmania, Australia’s southernmost state, reached 39.1 degrees Celsius (102°F) on Saturday, the hottest in 131 years of records, Narramore said.
        Australia’s hottest summer on record is causing several industries to wilt, including the $4.4 billion wine industry with grape yields set to drop to the lowest in years.
        Drought has also damaged the winter wheat crop and is expected to drag the wool clip to a record low.
        The Pacific nation had its third warmest year on record in 2018, a year marked by severe drought in parts of the country and a prolonged bushfire season.
        Australia continued the trend into 2019 with its hottest January on record.
    (Reporting by Alison Bevege; Editing by Kim Coghill)
    
  • 3/3/2019 Climate change plan sounds like science fiction, and it could work by Elizabeth Weise, USA TODAY
        PALISADES, N.Y. – Peter Kelemen spends time in Oman looking for ways to pull carbon out of the air and put it back underground.    His colleague, David Goldberg, looks at ways to store it far below the sea floor off the Oregon coast.    Chemical engineer Alissa Park is working with steel mills in China to turn slag and waste carbon dioxide into reusable material.
        The goal of all three Columbia University researchers – and thousands of other scientists and engineers globally – is to find ways to pull some of the carbon dioxide that’s causing global warming out of the atmosphere and store it away.    It’s called carbon capture and storage, and experts increasingly say it’s going to be essential to saving the planet.
        Carbon capture and storage might sound like the plot of a crazy science fiction movie, one where an intrepid band of risk-takers swoop in to save the Earth from certain destruction with engineering, grit and (in some scenarios) good old American knowhow.
        Except it’s no Hollywood film.    Humanity is facing catastrophe as climate change causes the Earth to warm.    Modeling by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change suggests that to keep from wreaking climate havoc, we can add no more than 800 metric gigatons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere by 2100.    We’re adding 37 gigatons a year now, meaning that at this rate, we’ll have used up our entire carbon budget for the century in just under 22 years.
        In the atmosphere, carbon dioxide acts like a blanket, keeping the heat in.    The more of it there is, the hotter things get.    Before the Industrial Revolution of the 1800s, carbon dioxide levels in Earth’s atmosphere were about 280 parts per million. Today, they’ve reached 410 ppm.
        “People think that if the U.S. consumer just reduces her energy consumption that will solve the problem.    But it won’t,” said Kelemen, a geochemistry professor at Columbia’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, New York.
    A tax credit to save the planet?
        Carbon capture means just that, using industrial-strength scrubbers to grab carbon dioxide pollution as it’s emitted from the chimneys of power plants, steel mills, cement factories, ethanol distillers and other industries so it’s not spewed into the atmosphere.    Or in some cases simply sucking it out of the air itself.     Making large-scale carbon capture and storage happen became a lot more likely a year ago in February when Congress passed potentially momentous legislation aimed at combating climate change.    Close to 20 years in the making and long fought for by a remarkably diverse coalition of environmental groups, oil and gas companies, industries and unions, it turned an older tax credit for capturing and storing carbon into what could be a potent tool for fighting global warming.
        Called 45Q in the tax code, it creates a tax credit of $35 for each ton of carbon dioxide stored permanently underground in oil and gas fields and a higher value credit of $50 for each ton of carbon dioxide stored in other geologic formations from which no oil is produced.
        The government subsidy moves taking carbon dioxide out of energy and industrial processes from the “nice idea but generally impractical” side of the balance sheet to the “we could make money if we do this” side, said Brad Crabtree, vice president for carbon management at the Great Plains Institute, a non-profit energy and policy organization in Bismarck, North Dakota.
        The U.S. is uniquely situated to capitalize on carbon capture and storage efforts because it has multiple industries that produce lots of carbon dioxide as waste, a large oil industry and, crucially, 4,000 miles of carbon dioxide pipeline to get it from one location to the other.
        Getting this all up and running at scale won’t be easy, but neither is it impossible.
        In the United States, the focus has been on removing carbon dioxide from power plant exhaust or industrial processes by using industrial “i>scrubbers” to separate it.    The carbon dioxide can then be used for enhanced oil recovery, or simply pumped underground for longterm storage.
        Another option is direct air capture and storage.    This involves constructing huge fan-like machines to suck in air, pull out carbon dioxide via chemical processes and then store it underground.    Pilot projects to do this are underway in Switzerland and Iceland.
        The hope is that in the United States, the tax credit will make carbon capture and storage more affordable.
  • 3/4/2019 To a warming planet’s rescue: Carbon capture by Elizabeth Weise, USA TODAY
        PALISADES, N.Y. – Peter Kelemen spends time in Oman looking for ways to pull carbon out of the air and put it back underground.    His colleague, David Goldberg, looks at ways to store it far below the sea floor off the Oregon coast.    Chemical engineer Alissa Park is working with steel mills in China to turn slag and waste carbon dioxide into reusable material.
        The goal of all three Columbia University researchers – and thousands of scientists and engineers globally – is to find ways to pull some of the carbon dioxide that’s causing global warming out of the atmosphere and store it away.    It’s called carbon capture and storage, and experts increasingly say it’s going to be essential to saving the planet.
        Carbon capture and storage might sound like the plot of a science-fiction movie, one where an intrepid band of risk-takers swoops in to save the Earth from certain destruction with engineering, grit and (in some scenarios) good old American know-how.
        Except it’s no Hollywood film.
        In the atmosphere, carbon dioxide acts like a blanket, keeping the heat in.    The more of it there is, the hotter things get.    Before the Industrial Revolution of the 1800s, carbon dioxide levels in Earth’s atmosphere were about 280 parts per million. Today, they’ve reached 410 ppm.
        “People think that if the U.S. consumer just reduces her energy consumption, that will solve the problem.    But it won’t,” said Kelemen, a geochemistry professor at Columbia’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory in Palisades, New York.
    Calling on a tax credit
        Carbon capture means just that: using industrial-strength scrubbers to grab carbon dioxide pollution as it’s emitted from the chimneys of power plants, steel mills, cement factories, ethanol distillers and other industries so it’s not spewed into the atmosphere.    Or in some cases, simply sucking it out of the air itself.
        Making large-scale carbon capture and storage happen became a lot more likely a year ago in February when Congress passed potentially momentous legislation aimed at combating climate change.
        Close to 20 years in the making and long fought for by a diverse coalition of environmental groups, oil and gas companies, industries and unions, the legislation turned an older tax credit for capturing and storing carbon into what could be a powerful tool for fighting global warming.    Called 45Q in the tax code, it creates a credit of $35 for each ton of carbon dioxide stored permanently underground in oil and gas fields and a higher value credit of $50 for each ton of carbon dioxide stored in other geologic formations from which no oil is produced.
    Assigning a dollar value
        The subsidy moves taking carbon dioxide out of energy and industrial processes from the “nice idea but generally impractical” side of the balance sheet to the “we could make money if we do this” side, said Brad Crabtree of the Great Plains Institute, a nonprofit energy and policy organization in Bismarck, North Dakota.
        “For the first time, it actually puts a price on carbon dioxide – it’s the first step of a design for a carbon market,” said Julio Friedmann of Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy and a former official at the Department of Energy during the Obama administration.
        It’s a technology the U.S. could be a global leader on, said Kurt Waltzer of the Clean Air Task Force, a Bostonbased environmental group that focuses on pragmatic climate solutions.
        The U.S. is uniquely situated to capitalize on carbon capture and storage efforts because it has multiple industries that produce lots of carbon dioxide as waste, a large oil industry and, crucially, 4,000 miles of carbon dioxide pipeline to get it from one location to the other.
    Common ground in the debate
        It’s no secret that since the 1990s, climate policy debates in the U.S.have been characterized by deep political divisions between Republicans and Democrats, between the coasts and the heartland, and between fossil fuel and renewable energy.    Carbon capture has brought them together.
        The 45Q tax credit created some surprising bedfellows.    Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse, a Democrat from Rhode Island, supported it because he worried about his state drowning.    Sen. John Barrasso, a Republican from Wyoming, wanted a future for coal.
        “You’ve got environmental organizations sitting right next to coal companies and labor unions — when does that happen?” said Lee Anderson, governmental affairs director for the Utility Workers Union of America.
        Carbon capture and storage is by no means the only solution.    But to keep Earth from heating up, humanity will need to use every tool in its toolbox.
        “We have to do lots and lots and lots of things, a whole laundry list of things,” Anderson said.    “You can’t just pick the ones you like and ignore the others.    You’ve got to do them all.”
        In the race against climate change, scientists are looking for ways pull CO2 out of the Earth’s atmosphere and store it away.
  • 3/4/2019 UN: Heavy rains, floods leave 20 dead in southern Afghanistan
        A U.N. humanitarian agency said at least 20 people died as heavy rains and flooding over the past few days swept away their homes and cars in Afghanistan’s southern Kandahar province.
        The U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said on Saturday night that at least 10 people remain missing.    OCHA’s statement said up to 2,000 homes are believed to have been damaged.    The local governor’s office said the flooding was the worst in Kandahar in at least seven years.
  • 3/4/2019 At least 23 killed in tornadoes in Ala., Ga. by OAN Newsroom
        The south is reeling from the deadliest day of tornadoes in years.    The chaos began Sunday afternoon in eastern Alabama as at least two tornadoes ripped through Lee County.
        One of those twisters was half a mile wide and categorized as an EF3, meaning its wind speed was anywhere between 136 and 165 miles per hour.
        While the extent of the damage has yet to be realized, authorities on the ground said many homes and structures were destroyed.
        Similar damage was seen in Georgia as several tornadoes tore through the state.
    This photo provided by James Lally shows a funnel-shaped cloud on I-10 near Marianna, Fla.,
    Sunday, March 3, 2019. Numerous tornado warnings were posted across parts of Alabama, Georgia, Florida and South Carolina
    on Sunday afternoon as the powerful storm system raced across the region. (James Lally via AP)     High winds also knocked out power for thousands of customers in both Georgia and Alabama, making Sunday night difficult for residents as near freezing temperatures were forecast.
        Meanwhile, emergency crews began search efforts Sunday night with hopes of saving anyone trapped beneath the rubble, but teams were forced to call off their search due to dangerous conditions.
        Authorities fear the death toll could rise as an unknown number of people remain trapped beneath rubble and debris.
  • 3/4/2019 President Trump instructs FEMA to provide disaster relief to Ala. following tornadoes by OAN Newsroom
        President Trump has instructed FEMA to provide disaster relief to Alabama after a pair of deadly tornadoes ripped through the state over the weekend.
        The president took to Twitter Monday to announce he has told FEMA to give “A Plus treatment to the great state of Alabama, and the wonderful people who have been so devastated by the tornadoes.”
        He also praised Alabama Governor Kay Ivey for working closely with FEMA and the White House.
        Trump tweet: “FEMA has been told directly by me to give the A Plus treatment to the Great State of Alabama and the wonderful people who have been so devastated by the Tornadoes. @GovernorKayIvey, one of the best in our Country, has been so informed. She is working closely with FEMA (and me!).”
        At least 23 people, including three children, have been killed and 40 others have been injured since the tornadoes hit the southeast on Sunday.
        “We’ve been talking with family members and residents in the area trying to get a count of how many individuals that were we’re looking for, but, again, our efforts are concentrating on that,” stated Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones.    “We have canine teams coming in from all over the state of Alabama and from the state of Georgia.”
        Search and rescue operation are underway for those still missing.    Officials said the number of “unaccounted for” was in the double digits, but did not give an exact number.
    
  • 3/5/2019 Smaller, faster future unfolds - New designs big deal, but 5G is the real revolution by Bob O’Donnell, Special to USA TODAY
        BARCELONA, Spain – Finally. After decades of research, and years of unfilled promises, this year’s Mobile World Congress Trade Show in Barcelona shows us what the future of smartphones is going to be: foldable and fast.
        The foldable phones – or just foldables, in particular – have been generating a tangible sense of excitement at this year’s show, and for good reason.    They represent the first genuinely new design for mobile phones in over 10 years.
        Thanks to the bendable screens at the heart of their design, these devices enable access to the larger screens we all want, but in a form that can still fit in your pocket.    Think of them as a combination of a small tablet and smartphone, all in a single device.
        In addition, phones that incorporate support for the upcoming speedy 5G networks were all over the show floor this year, and nearly all were powered by Qualcomm’s X50 5G modems.    In the U.S., all the major carriers have announced that they plan to bring 5G support to certain cities in 2019, with wider coverage expected in 2020.
        What’s the big deal?
        All of this matters because the combination of 5G-capable smartphones and networks will enable download speeds that can be up to 10x faster than current 4G networks.
        On the foldable side, the first official offerings are the Samsung Galaxy Fold, unveiled last week at a pre-MWC press event, and the Huawei MateX, which, though impressive, is unlikely to come to the U.S. market anytime soon.    Several other Chinese companies also showed their own foldable designs, including Oppo and TCL, but none were officially announced with prices and shipping dates.
        As tantalizing as the potential capabilities of these foldable devices may be, initial price points for these devices are, well, less tantalizing.    The Samsung Galaxy Fold starts at $1,980 for a version with 4G/LTE – the 5G-capable version will undoubtedly be more – while the MateX’s European prices roughly translate to $2,600.
        Given the challenges that many people had with smartphones that hit $1,000 prices, the thought of $2,000 phones may seem a bit overwhelming.    As a result, the first iterations of these devices will likely have somewhat limited sales.    For status-conscious gadget buyers, however, I have little doubt that shortly after the April 26 U.S. launch date for the Samsung Galaxy Fold, it will be the device to own.
        The thing to remember about foldables is that they represent the next generation of mobile computing devices.    Over time, most of us have come to recognize that smartphones are used for many of the same types of applications and functions that we used to only do on a PC.    Until now, we’ve been limited by the size of the smartphone’s screen.
        Sure, we could carry around a tablet to get access to a bigger screen, but the portability and “pocketability” of smartphones is what makes them so compelling.    By combining the advantage of a larger screen with a smaller device size, foldables offer the best of both worlds.    In fact, I think the advancement is important enough that by 2023 or so, existing smartphones will look and feel like technological dinosaurs – and most people will move to foldable designs.
        Phones won’t all look alike.
        The other great thing about foldable screens is they offer the first chance to produce highly differentiated products in some time.    Not only are the devices which integrate these screens much different than traditional smartphones – where design differences are measured in millimeters of bezel size – there’s going to be a great deal of variation between foldables as well.    Some will have screens that fold in, others will have screens that fold out, some will have multiple different screens, some only one and each will likely feature unique variations on camera placement, hinge design, and more.    Finally, we’ll start seeing phones that don’t all look the same.
        One thing that’s already becoming clear is that, even though most of the focus is on the hardware design, it will be the software that really differentiates the experience of using different foldables.    To that end, it’s important to point out that all the current foldables are Android-based – Apple isn’t likely to offer a foldable iPhone for quite some time.    Even within the Android world, however, there are going to be many different ways to deliver a unique experience across different devices.
        On the Galaxy Fold, for example, Samsung highlighted the ability to open up to three different applications simultaneously, for computer-style multitasking, as well as a feature called App Continuity that promises smooth transitions from apps running on its front screen onto the larger, unfolded screen.
        Given the high price points and, in the case of foldables, radically different designs for some of the new smartphones introduced at MWC, it’s clear that they aren’t going to be for everyone – at least initially.    But at least now we know where the smartphone and mobile computing market is headed and I, for one, am very much looking forward to this very exciting, and very different future.
        USA TODAY columnist Bob O’Donnell is the president and chief analyst of TECHnalysis Research, a market research and consulting firm that provides strategic consulting and market research services to the technology industry and professional financial community.    His clients are major technology firms including Microsoft, HP, Dell, and Intel.    You can follow him on Twitter @bobodtech.
    DJ Koh, president and CEO of Samsung’s IT & Mobile Communications Division, introduces the Galaxy Fold last month in San Francisco. JUSTIN SULLIVAN/GETTY IMAGES Huawei CEO Richard Yu displays the Mate X foldable 5G smartphone in Barcelona. MANU FERNANDEZ/AP
  • 3/5/2019 Vietnam calls for ‘drastic measures’ to fight African swine fever
    Pork is displayed for sale at a market in Hanoi, Vietnam February 19, 2019. REUTERS/Kham     HANOI (Reuters) – Vietnam’s prime minister has called for “drastic measures” to fight the spread of African swine fever in the Southeast Asian country, state media reported on Tuesday.
        The highly contagious disease, which is incurable in pigs but harmless to humans, has spread rapidly across neighboring China since August, and has been found in seven areas in Vietnam, the state-run Vietnam News Service reported.
        “We should combat the epidemic as if we are fighting against the enemy,” Phuc said in a meeting with regional officials on Monday, according to Tuesday’s report, which said Phuc had called for “drastic measures” from the “whole political system” to fight the disease.
        From Feb. 1 to March 3, the fever was found in 202 households in seven cities or provinces in northern Vietnam, including in the capital, Hanoi, Vietnam’s government website reported.
        Over 4,300 pigs have been infected and destroyed because of the virus, the website said, citing data from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Development.
        Vietnam produced 3.82 million tonnes of pork in 2018, equivalent to 72 percent of the country’s entire meat production, up 2.2 percent from 2017, the report said.
        The virus started to spread at some locations around Hanoi during last week’s summit between U.S. President Donald Trump, and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, after the first confirmed cases of the disease in Vietnam were found in three farms in Thai Binh and Hung Yen provinces.
        Pork accounts for three-quarters of total meat consumption in Vietnam, a country of 95 million people where most of its 30 million farm-raised pigs are consumed domestically.
    (Reporting by Mai Nguyen and James Pearson; Editing by Joseph Radford)
  • 3/5/2019 Airlines stall in tackling climate change: investor group by Alister Doyle, Environment Correspondent
    FILE PHOTO: A helicopter and commercial plane flies by over San Diego, California, U.S., January 30, 2018. REUTERS/Mike Blake     OSLO (Reuters) – Airlines are doing too little in the fight against global warming, a study funded by investors with $13 trillion of assets under management said on Tuesday.
        The fast-growing sector accounts for two percent of world greenhouse gas emissions and should do more to manage risks of climate change, the Transition Pathway Initiative (TPI) said in a review of 20 of the world’s biggest listed airlines.
        It rated Delta, Lufthansa, United Airlines and ANA Holdings as the best performers at managing the business risks and opportunities of climate change. But all could do more.,
        “Investors have a clear message to the aviation sector: When it comes to carbon performance they must be in it for the long haul,” said Faith Ward, co-chair of the TPI on behalf of the British Environment Agency Pension Fund.
        “Investors do care … it’s about encouraging disclosure so we can make informed decisions,” she told Reuters.
        TPI, which seeks to assess the performance of businesses in cutting carbon, groups 40 investors with $13 trillion under management, including BNP Paribas and Legal & General Investment Management.    Its research is by the London School of Economics’ Grantham Research Institute.
        More fuel-efficient planes, wider use of biofuels and ensuring that planes fly at full capacity would help to limit emissions.
        TPI separately said easyJet and Alaska Air now had the most efficient fleets among the top 20 listed airlines, judged by their emissions per passenger kilometer flown.
        At the other end of that scale, ANA, Japan Airlines, Korean Air and Singapore Airlines have the highest emissions intensities, it said.
        Lead author Professor Simon Dietz of the Grantham Research Institute said some airlines had adopted broad industry goals to cap net carbon emissions at 2020 levels, or to halve net emissions by 2050 from 2005 levels.
        But that focus on net emissions often meant airlines could buy permits to emit carbon dioxide, rather than make cuts themselves.
        “The issue is that we don’t know how much they are going to reduce their own flight emissions compared to buying offsets,” he told Reuters.
        Dietz also said there were other effects of aviation apart from carbon dioxide that need more research.    Contrails, for instance, may can cause high-level clouds that trap heat.
        Under the 2015 Paris climate agreement, almost 200 governments agreed to cut emissions to help avert more floods, droughts and rising sea levels.    They promised to “enhance public and private sector participation” in cutting emissions.
    (Reporting by Alister Doyle; Editing by Mark Potter)
  • 3/5/2019 Cattle bones and putrid pools test Serbia’s EU hopes by Aleksandar Vasovic
    Cattle skull is seen on a pile of foul smelling cattle bones left behind by a bankrupt
    glue factory at the outskirts of Belgrade, Serbia, March 4, 2019. REUTERS/Marko Djurica     BELGRADE (Reuters) – Ten kilometers north of central Belgrade cattle bones piled in huge heaps rot in the sun and pools of brown sludge bubble and emit a sickening odor in the dilapidated remains of a glue factory and a tannery, abandoned a decade ago.
        The site, that covers around 3 square kilometers (742 acres), is testimony to the challenge Serbia faces to bring its environment to the standards required if it is to join the European Union by 2025, as tentatively planned.
        A national cleanup is estimated by the government to cost around 15 billion euros ($17 billion).     Serbia says it will not meet EU environmental and climate change demands by the target date and has proposed an 11-year transition period from when it joins the bloc.
        The tannery and glue factory by the Vizelj canal went bankrupt some ten years ago.    The site was looted and dismantled by illegal scrap metal traders.    Chemicals were spilled and the heaps of bones used in glue production were left unburied.
        Uncertainty over the site’s ownership and status has complicated its cleanup.
        Environmental activists visited the area and warned authorities about the bones and spilled chemicals weeks ago, said Zoran Jankovic, an activist of local Eko Patrola Pancevacki Rit environmental watchdog.
        “This dump of bones and chemicals is located 10 kilometers from the center of the city and 200 meters from fertile, arable land which feeds the city of Belgrade and is owned by … (United Arab Emirates-based) Al Dahra,” Jankovic said.
        Last October, Serbia sold agricultural company Poljoprivredna Korporacija Beograd (PKB) to Al Dahra Agricultural Company for 105.05 million euros ($118.98 million).
        Jankovic said inspectors from the environment ministry surveyed the site this week and last and sampled chemicals “to see what they are dealing with … and to prepare a plan for removal.”
        In an emailed statement, the Ministry for Environment said its inspectors investigated the site and found a “small quantity of waste of unknown origin and composition.”
        “As soon as the details of this case are established, the appropriate services will react in line with the law,” it added.
        The Al Dahra representatives in Serbia could not be reached for comment.
        Last week, Serbia’s minister for environment Goran Trivan estimated investments of 2 billion euros would be needed for municipal and toxic waste processing, and another 5 billion euros for waste water processing, part of the total 15 billion euros expenditure.
    (Editing by Alexandra Hudson)
  • 3/5/2019 Search and rescue efforts continue in Ala. following last weekend’s deadly tornadoes by OAN Newsroom
        Authorities in Alabama recently gave an update on recovery efforts, following Sunday’s devastating tornadoes that left at least 23 people dead and dozens of others injured.
        During a press conference in Lee County Tuesday, officials identified all 23 victims whose ages ranged from six to 93-years-old. One man lost at least seven family members.
        Lee County Sheriff Jay Jones said the list of unaccounted people is now down to at least seven or eight people.
    Residents and family members sift through the debris of their homes near Lee County Road 38
    in Beauregard, Ala., Monday, March 4, 2019, a day after tornados ravaged the area. (AP Photo/Julie Bennett, File)     Officials have also stressed that they are offering assistance for those affected by the storm, including temporary shelters.
        Authorities said firefighters are continuing to actively search through debris in hopes to transition from a search and rescue operation to recovery status.
  • 3/5/2019 New Delhi is world’s most polluted capital, Beijing eighth
    FILE PHOTO: A man rides a rickshaw on a smoggy morning in New Delhi, India, December 26, 2018. REUTERS/Adnan Abidi     NEW DELHI (Reuters) – New Delhi was the world’s most polluted capital city in 2018, two groups monitoring air pollution said on Tuesday in a study of the amount of fine particulate matter known as PM2.5 in 61 capital cities around the world.
        The Indian capital, home to more than 20 million people, was followed by the Bangladesh capital of Dhaka and Kabul, capital of Afghanistan, according to the study by IQ AirVisual, a Swiss-based group that gathers air-quality data globally, and Greenpeace.
        New Delhi’s toxic air is caused by vehicle and industrial emissions, dust from building sites, smoke from the burning of rubbish and crop residue in nearby fields.
        The city’s average annual concentration of PM2.5 in a cubic meter of air was 113.5 in 2018, the groups said in their report, more than double the level of Beijing, which averaged 50.9 during the year, making it the eighth most polluted in the world.
        PM2.5, or particles of 2.5 micrometers or less in diameter, is so dangerous because it lodges deep in the lungs.
        The World Health Organization sets a daily mean air quality guideline of 25 micrograms of PM2.5 per cubic meter of air.
        China struggled for years to enforce environment rules and crack down on polluting industries, but it has benefited in recent years from vastly improved legislation and greater political will to combat poor air quality.
        “In mainland China, in particular, this has led to significant improvements in year-on-year reductions in PM2.5 levels,” the groups said in their joint study.     India is home to 15 of the 20 most polluted cities in the world, they said.
        “The question which remains to be answered is whether there is enough political will to aggressively fight the health emergency India faces today and move away from polluting fuels and practices,” said Pujarini Sen, spokeswoman for Greenpeace India.
    (Reporting by Mayank Bhardwaj; Editing by Sanjeev Miglani)
  • 3/6/2019 Good Samaritans help rebuild areas hit by recent tornadoes by OAN Newsroom
        The damage done to homes, businesses and other structures in southeast Alabama is truly staggering with large swaths of Lee County wiped off the map by an EF4 tornado.
        “This is the worst natural disaster that has ever occurred in Lee County,” stated Kathy Carson, director of the Lee County Emergency Management Agency.    “Most of us cannot remember anything ever creating this much of loss of life and injuries in our citizens.”
        Good Samaritans from across the country are now looking to help.    59-year-old Glenn Stover said the experience isn’t just religious, it’s a matter of military honor.
        “It’s very emotional for me, just to be able to share God’s love with anyone is a privilege and an honor, but when there are veterans involved like this gentleman who is a veteran…well I just don’t want to be anywhere else right now than here helping these people,” he explained.
    Volunteers work in the tornado damaged area near Beauregard, Ala., on Monday March 4, 2019.
    Friends in eastern Alabama are helping tornado survivors retrieve the scattered pieces of their lives after devastating
    winds destroyed their homes and killed at least 23 people. (Mickey Welsh/Montgomery Advertiser via AP)     Stover and many others are working with a humanitarian organization, known as Samaritan’s Purse, that sends crews to disaster areas to give them assistance.    In some cases, the help is badly needed.
        Their efforts of hard work for a good cause is helping fellow Americans get back up on their feet.
  • 3/8/2019 Eight years on, water woes threaten Fukushima cleanup by Kiyoshi Takenaka
    Storage tanks for radioactive water are seen at Tokyo Electric Power Co's (TEPCO) tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power
    plant in Okuma town, Fukushima prefecture, Japan February 18, 2019. Picture taken February 18, 2019. REUTERS/Issei Kato     OKUMA, Japan (Reuters) – Eight years after the Fukushima nuclear crisis, a fresh obstacle threatens to undermine the massive clean-up: 1 million tons of contaminated water must be stored, possibly for years, at the power plant.
        Last year, Tokyo Electric Power Co said a system meant to purify contaminated water had failed to remove dangerous radioactive contaminants.
        That means most of that water – stored in 1,000 tanks around the plant – will need to be reprocessed before it is released into the ocean, the most likely scenario for disposal.
        Reprocessing could take nearly two years and divert personnel and energy from dismantling the tsunami-wrecked reactors, a project that will take up to 40 years.
        It is unclear how much that would delay decommissioning.    But any delay could be pricey; the government estimated in 2016 that the total cost of plant dismantling, decontamination of affected areas, and compensation, would amount to 21.5 trillion yen ($192.5 billion), roughly 20 percent of the country’s annual budget.
        Tepco is already running out of space to store treated water.    And should another big quake strike, experts say tanks could crack, unleashing tainted liquid and washing highly radioactive debris into the ocean.
        Fishermen struggling to win back the confidence of consumers are vehemently opposed to releasing reprocessed water – deemed largely harmless by Japan’s nuclear watchdog, the Nuclear Regulation Authority (NRA) – into the ocean.
        “That would destroy what we’ve been building over the past eight years,” said Tetsu Nozaki, head of the Fukushima Prefectural Federation of Fisheries Co-operative Associations.    Last year’s catch was just 15 percent of pre-crisis levels, partly because of consumer reluctance to eat fish caught off Fukushima.
    SLOW PROGRESS
        On a visit to the wrecked Fukushima Dai-ichi plant last month, huge cranes hovered over the four reactor buildings that hug the coast.    Workers could be seen atop the No. 3 building getting equipment ready to lift spent fuel rods out of a storage pool, a process that could start next month.
        In most areas around the plant, workers no longer need to wear face masks and full body suits to protect against radiation. Only the reactor buildings or other restricted areas require special equipment.
        Fanning out across the plant’s property are enough tanks to fill 400 Olympic-sized swimming pools.    Machines called Advanced Liquid Processing Systems, or ALPS, had treated the water inside them.
        Tepco said the equipment could remove all radionuclides except tritium, a relatively harmless hydrogen isotope that is hard to separate from water.    Tritium-laced water is released into the environment at nuclear sites around the world.
        But after newspaper reports last year questioned the effectiveness of ALPS-processed water, Tepco acknowledged that strontium-90 and other radioactive elements remained in many of the tanks.
        Tepco said the problems occurred because absorbent materials in the equipment had not been changed frequently enough.
        The utility has promised to re-purify the water if the government decides that releasing it into the ocean is the best solution.    It is the cheapest of five options a government task force considered in 2016; others included evaporation and burial.
        Tepco and the government are now waiting for another panel of experts to issue recommendations.    The head of the panel declined an interview request. No deadline has been set.
        NRA chief Toyoshi Fuketa believes ocean release after dilution is the only feasible way to handle the water problem.    He has warned that postponing the decision indefinitely could derail the decommissioning project.
    STORING INDEFINITELY
        Another option is to store the water for decades in enormous tanks normally used for crude oil.    The tanks have been tested for durability, said Yasuro Kawai, a plant engineer and a member of Citizens’ Commission on Nuclear Energy, a group advocating abandoning nuclear energy.
        Each tank holds 100,000 tons, so 10 such tanks could store the roughly 1 million tons of water processed by ALPS so far, he said.
        The commission proposes holding the tritium-laced water, which has a half life of 12.3 years, in tanks for 123 years.    After that, it will be one thousandth as radioactive as it was when it went into storage.
        Although experts caution that tanks would be vulnerable to major quakes, Japan’s trade and industry minister, Hiroshige Seko, said the committee would consider them anyway.
        “Long-term storage … has an upside as radiation levels come down while it is in storage.    But there is a risk of leakage,” Seko told Reuters.    “It is difficult to hold the water indefinitely, so the panel will also look into how it should be disposed of eventually.”
        Space is also a problem, said Akira Ono, Tepco’s chief decommissioning officer.    By 2020, the utility will expand tank storage capacity by 10 percent to 1.37 million tons, and about 95 percent of total capacity will probably be used by the end of that year, he said.
        “Tanks are now being built on flat, elevated spots in stable locations,” Ono said.    But such ideal space is getting scarce, he added.
        Many local residents hope Tepco will just keep storing the water.    If it does get released into the ocean, “everyone would sink into depression,” said fishing trawler captain Koichi Matsumoto.
        Fukushima was once popular with surfers.    But young people in the area do not go surfing any more because they’ve been repeatedly warned about suspected radioactivity in the water, said surf shop owner Yuichiro Kobayashi.
        Releasing treated water from the plant “could end up chasing the next generation of children away from the sea as well,” he said.
        Ono says dealing with contaminated water is one of many complex issues involved in decommissioning.
        A year ago, when he took over leading the effort, it felt like the project had just “entered the trailhead,” he said.    “Now, it feels like we’re really starting to climb.”
    (Reporting by Kiyoshi Takenaka; Editing by Malcolm Foster and Gerry Doyle)
  • 3/8/2019 Humans monkeying with chimps’ ‘culture’ by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Now we’re ruining the lives of our closest animal relatives.
        Human activity is wreaking havoc on chimpanzee “culture,” a study suggests, as people continue to expand into what had been wild areas in central and western Africa.
        So humans aren’t only wiping out chimp populations, they’re also decimating the animals’ unique behavioral traditions.
        Cultural behaviors drop by as much as 88 percent, the study says, for the chimps that live near humans.    Study authors suggest the animals’ behavior diversity should be protected along with the species itself.
        “In one national park, chimps are known for fishing algae.    In another they crack nuts or have certain hunting methods or fish for termites,” said study lead author Hjalmar Kuhl, a primatologist at Germany’s Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology.    Others may throw stones.
        These distinct behaviors are passed on from one generation to the next, according to Science magazine.
        Causes of the disruptions are human activities such as deforestation, habitat degradation, poaching and climate change.    The disruptions affect not only chimp behaviors but also the animals themselves, according to the Wildlife Conservation Society.
        During the 10-year research study, which the society calls the “most complete description of chimpanzee culture to date,” scientists observed 144 chimp groups in 15 countries throughout the entire geographic range of wild chimps in Africa.
        The authors say the findings highlight the need to expand conservation policies.
        Emma Stokes, the society’s central African director, warned, “We risk destroying these forests before even discovering what secrets they hold.”
  • 3/8/2019 UK, Japan scientists study radioactive Fukushima particles
    FILE PHOTO: An employee of Tokyo Electric Power Co's (TEPCO) wearing protective suit and mask
    gives lectures in front of No.3 reactor building at Tokyo Electric Power Co's (TEPCO) tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi
    nuclear power plant in Okuma town, Fukushima prefecture, Japan February 18, 2019. REUTERS/Issei Kato     OXFORD, England (Reuters) – Eight years after the Fukushima nuclear meltdown in Japan, radioactive particles collected from the site are undergoing new forensic investigation in Britain in an effort to understand the exact sequence of events.
        A 9.0 magnitude earthquake struck on March 11, 2011, off the Japanese coast, triggering a tsunami that killed some 18,000 people and the world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl in 1986.    Meltdowns at three of the Fukushima Daiichi plant’s six reactors spewed radiation into the air, soil and ocean, forcing over 100,000 residents to flee.    Many have still not returned.
        The Japan Atomic Energy Agency (JAEA) is currently collaborating with British researchers to learn more about the state of the radioactive particles created by the meltdown.
        Dr Yukihiko Satou from the JAEA oversaw the transportation of particles collected from within the restricted zone, very close to the disaster site, to Britain.
        “The particles were fundamentally extracted from those attached to soil, dust and debris,” Satou told Reuters.
        Encased in protective tape, the samples were brought to the Diamond Light Source, Britain’s national synchrotron, or cyclic particle accelerator, near Oxford.
        Here electrons are accelerated to near light speeds until they emit light 10 billion times brighter than the sun, then directed into laboratories in ‘beamlines’ which allow scientists to study minute specimens in extreme detail.
        Researchers have created a 3D map of a radioactive sample using the synchrotron, allowing them to see the distribution of elements within the sample.
        Understanding the current state of these particles and how they behave in the environment could ultimately determine if and when the area could be declared safe for people to return.
        The head of the team leading the analysis, Tom Scott of Bristol University, said the particles have a structure like a pumice, a very light, porous volcanic rock.
        “Studying… this glassy matrix tells us how available within the environment they are,” he said.
        The British and Japanese governments have awarded funding to the research team to examine larger particles closer to the site of the meltdown at Fukushima to better define radiation risk in the surrounding area.
        The research could have significance beyond nuclear accidents, the team said, because the techniques employed could also be used to image particles in air pollution to better understand the risk they pose to human health.
    (Writing by Matthew Stock,; Editing by Gareth Jones)
  • 3/10/2019 French government working on ‘more ambitious’ energy and climate bill
    FILE PHOTO: French President Emmanuel Macron watches as German Chancellor Angela Merkel departs
    after a meeting at the Elysee Palace in Paris, France, February 27, 2019. REUTERS/Gonzalo Fuentes/File Photo     PARIS (Reuters) – A draft energy and climate law due to be presented to French cabinet ministers on Monday has been postponed so that it can be reworked with more ambitious environmental goals, President Emmanuel Macron’s office said on Sunday.
        The proposals had been criticized by climate change campaigners and a high-level state-backed economic affairs committee for being too vague on some targets, including an aim for France to be “carbon neutral” by 2050.
        Macron has sought to take a lead on the global stage in the fight against climate change, although some of his plans, including an aborted bid to raise fuel taxes, have stirred a backlash among voters at home, sparking a wave of protests.
        He has vowed, however, to press on with green policies, while trying to balance this push with measures to help lower-income households or others who might be affected by extra costs.
        The draft law is meant to provide a broad framework on climate goals, laying the ground for subsequent, more precise commitments, including on how France will cut its reliance on nuclear energy.
        The reworked bill will include a more detailed outline of France’s target for reducing greenhouse gases, the Elysee said.
        The bill will still be on track to go to the lower house of parliament to be examined by lawmakers in June, the president’s office added.
    (Reporting by Simon Carraud and Marine Pennetier; Writing by Sarah White; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
  • 3/11/2019 3/11/2019 As marijuana gains acceptance, opponents point to its dark side by Jayne O’Donnell, Ken Alltucker and Shari Rudavsky, USA TODAY
        In less than 25 years, marijuana has gone from illegal everywhere in the USA to legal for at least some uses in all but four states.    Advocates say the drug can help patients suffering from chronic pain, multiple sclerosis-triggered muscle spasms and the grueling side effects of chemotherapy.    Some states are exploring whether cannabis could help wean people from addiction to opioids.
        Beyond the medical claims, 10 states and the District of Columbia legalized marijuana for recreational use, and more are considering it.    The advocates’ long-repeated argument: It’s safer than alcohol or tobacco.
        As cultural acceptance of cannabis grows, opponents warn of potential downsides.    These critics – doctors, police and auto safety officials, parents – point to stories and studies that link the drug to suicide, schizophreni, and car crashes.    Marijuana might be safer than alcohol or tobacco, they say, but that doesn’t make marijuana safe.
        An increase in impaired driving by people under the influence of drugs including marijuana, for example, is threatening the huge progress made in recent decades to reduce drunken-driving crashes.
        Car crashes rose 6 percent from 2012 to 2017 in four states that legaized marijuana – Nevada, Colorado, Washington and Oregon – more than four comparable states that didn’t, the Highway Loss Data Institute found.
        “It makes me very nervous about highway safety as many more are considering legalizing it for recreational use,” says Matt Moore, senior vice president at the institute, which is funded by the insurance industry.
        Some in medicine warn of possible links between marijuana and psychosis.    They say more study is needed.
        Bucknell University neuroscientist Judy Grisel, author of “Never Enough,” a new book on addiction, warns that the laws have outpaced the science.    “It’s astounding how short our memory is,” she says.    “We always think the next thing is the answer.”
        Others say worries about marijuana are mostly overblown.
        Sue Sisley, a doctor in Phoenix who has studied cannabis, says the reason states are loosening marijuana laws is that lawmakers and the public realize the plant is largely safe.
        Sisley studied veterans who smoked marijuana to treat post-traumatic stress disorder under a $2.1 million grant from the state of Colorado. She calls the drug “relatively benign overall.”
        “The cannabis plant is far safer than prescriptions I write for patients every day here in my clinic,” Sisley says.
        Jolene Forman, senior staff attorney at the Drug Policy Alliance, which advocates for the legalization and regulation of marijuana, says there’s no convincing evidence that marijuana legalization worsens mental health or increases vehicle crashes.    A better measure of traffic safety, she says, is whether more people are arrested for driving under the influence of marijuana.    “We are seeing DUI rates stay steady or even decline in states that have legalized,” Forman says.    “Moreover, marijuana use is not new.    It was widely accessible and socially acceptable in these states before marijuana was legalized there.”
        California became the first state to authorize the medical use of marijuana in 1996.    States have been easing their own laws ever since.
        All but four – Idaho, Kansas, Nebraska and South Dakota – allow marijuana for medical or recreational use or permit public use of low-THC cannabidiol formulations, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
        Several Democratic presidential candidates have said they would seek legalization.    Last week, Sen. Cory Booker, DN. J., introduced the Marijuana Justice Act, which would legalize marijuana nationwide and expunge convictions of people convicted of marijuana offenses.    Sens. Kamala Harris, D- Calif.; Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.; Kirsten Gillibrand, DN. Y.; and Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., are cosponsors.
    [Yes they want everybody to be stoned so they will not realize what their socialist policies are doing to you as Californians have already been duped by it.].
        Psychiatrist Andrew Saxon opposes legalizing marijuana for medical use because he says evidence that it works is scant.    Saxon, a professor in the University of Washington Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, chairs the American Psychiatric Association’s Council on Addiction Psychiatry.    “I just don’t think it’s a good idea,” he says.    “It’s not like any other medication I might prescribe that I can tell you exactly how much to take, how to take it and decrease the dosage and increase.”
        Saxon does support legalization for recreational use, but “not because I think it’s a good thing.” People are going to use it whether it’s legal or not, he says, so it’s better to have it regulated and for “some of the profits to go back to the states.”     Some states have turned to marijuana in hopes of finding an answer to the opioid epidemic.    New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Illinois allow marijuana as a substitute for addictive painkillers such as OxyContin or as a way for people to wean themselves from opioid addiction.
        Some say that’s another example of state laws outpacing science.
        “The evidence is just not there yet,” says Ziva Cooper, research director of the UCLA Cannabis Research Initiative.    “What we have are anecdotal reports.”
        Scientists and doctors are concerned about the potency of modern-day cannabis products.
        In the 1990s, Cooper says, marijuana plants typically contained about 3 percent THC, the psychoactive component that makes users feel “high.”
        Today, Cooper says, marijuana sold at medical marijuana dispensaries can be as much as 25 percent THC. Other products, such as wax, vaping pens and dabs of concentrated marijuana, can be packed with still higher levels.
    Links to schizophrenia?
        The Colorado state committee that oversees legalization reported in February that for the first time, more adults of all ages are using marijuana, using it more often and ingesting it in more ways, including edibles.
        Eating food that contains marijuana gives users a far stronger dose of THC.
        The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine concluded in 2017 that schizophrenia and other psychoses are correlated with, but not necessarily caused by, heavy marijuana use. Cooper, who was part of the National Academies’ research team, says the comprehensive review of studies concluded frequent users face more risk, but it’s “premature” to say heavy use causes schizophrenia and psychosis.    “We don’t know what’s coming first,” Cooper says.    “Is it that people who are heavy users are more likely to develop schizophrenia and psychotic disorders?    Or is it that heavy users might be quote-unquote self-medicating?”
        Further underscoring the complicated relationship between cannabis use and mental health, Cooper says, is evidence that cannabis users with a history of psychotic disorders had better cognitive performance.    “There is an association there that shows cannabis might be protective to some degree,” she says. Alex Berenson, author of the new book “Tell Your Children: The Truth About Marijuana, Mental Illness, and Violence,” says there’s plenty of evidence that high-strength cannabis causes psychosis.
        He says the evidence has only gotten stronger since he finished his book.
        “The stories are now so much worse than that kids failed out of school or went on to use other drugs,” Berenson says.    “A lot of suburban families who never thought this would be a problem” are starting to share their stories.
        Berenson met last month with Florida state legislators.    He says groups and legislators in about a dozen other states have asked him to speak.
        Maria McFarland Sanchez-Moreno, executive director of the Drug Policy Alliance, says Berenson’s claim that marijuana “frequently causes” psychosis is “over the top.”    Most scientists, she says, avoid saying marijuana causes psychosis.    “The fact is that the overwhelming majority of people who use marijuana do not develop a mental disorder as the simple result of using it,” she said in an online discussion hosted by the Marshall Project.
        Lori Robinson started Moms Strong in 2016. Her son, Shane, 25, died by suicide in 2012.    He had been hospitalized twice with psychosis.    Lori Robinson says doctors denied his mental illness could be linked to his heavy cannabis use.    “This is all about money,” she says.    “And unfortunately, our kids are the ones who have been sold down the river.”
    In parents’ hands
        Six months ago, Heidi and Dave Curtis never would have advocated for the legalization of medical marijuana.
        But after seeing how it helped their youngest daughter, the Indiana couple want their voices added to the chorus calling for legalization in their state.
        The Indiana General Assembly has not advanced any of the handful of bills on marijuana proposed this session.
        Even if a bill were to pass, it would not help Charly Curtis.    The 6-year-old, who had a rare genetic condition that causes severe autism and seizures, died in her sleep last month.
        As the seizures grew more frequent and more severe, her parents began to give her small doses of THC.
        The day Charly first took a peanutsized piece of a brownie with THC, they say, she had no seizure.    For the first time in her life, they say, she went to her room and sat quietly flipping through books.
        The Curtises gave Charly THC drops twice a day.    The decision wasn’t easy.    Heidi had always been against drugs, and she feared the consequences of doing what she knew was illegal.
        Now that Charly is gone, her family wonders what might have happened if they’d given her THC earlier.    In the short time she was on the drug, they say, she had fewer seizures and her behavior improved dramatically.
        All Heidi Curtis says she wants is the chance for parents in similar situations to be able to use medical marijuana to help their children.    “This is not a be-all and end-all miracle drug,” she says.    “We as parents should have that opportunity to make the decision here.”
        Medical experts do not endorse the use of THC to control seizures for patients of any age.    Anup Patel, section chief of neurology at Nationwide Children’s Hospital in Columbus, Ohio, and medical cannabis editor for the Epilepsy Foundation of America, says that based on limited animal data and case reports, THC is thought to have a neutral effect on seizures or, if anything, promotes the episodes. CBD, which is derived from cannabis, has been thoroughly researched.    CBD does not produce the same high as THC because it binds to a different part of the brain. Last year, the Food and Drug Administration approved Epidiolex, the first drug with purified CDB oil, to treat seizures.    Patel, who helped conduct trials of the drug, says scientists found that about 40 percent of patients saw at least a 50 percent reduction in seizures.
    The cognitive factor
        Researchers at Duke University gave subjects IQ tests at age 13, before any of them had smoked marijuana, and again at age 38.    They reported in 2012 that those who started using cannabis in adolescence and continued for years afterward showed an average decline in IQ of 8 points.    Quitting cannabis apparently didn’t reverse the loss.
        The researchers who conducted the review by the National Academies found that learning, memory and attention are impaired immediately after cannabis use.    But they concluded that the evidence that use impairs academic achievement is limited.
        If you are interested in connecting with people online who have overcome or are struggling with issues mentioned in this story, join USA TODAY’s “I Survived It” Facebook support group.
        “Unfortunately, our kids are the ones who have been sold down the river.” Lori Robinson Moms Strong.
    [Psychosis is a symptom, not an illness, a mental or physical illness, substance abuse, or extreme stress or trauma can cause it, psychotic disorders, like schizophrenia, are mental illnesses that involve psychosis that usually happens for the first time in the late teen years or early adulthood.].
    Lori Robinson’s son, Shane, committed suicide in 2012. She says doctors didn’t believe
    her son’s problems were related to cannabis use. 2009 FAMILY PHOTO JEFF RUBLE/USA TODAY NETWORK, AND GETTY IMAGES
  • 3/11/2019 China hog prices hit 14-month high as African swine fever slashes output by Hallie Gu and Dominique Patton
    FILE PHOTO: Pigs are seen at a family farm in Fuyang, Anhui province, China December 5, 2018. REUTERS/Stringer/File Photo     BEIJING (Reuters) – Chinese hog prices marched to their highest in 14 months on Monday and look set to keep rising after weeks of gains, analysts and producers said, as the worst disease outbreak to hit the country’s vast pig herd in years chops supply.
        Live hog prices in major consumption and production areas rose 7 percent on average on Monday compared with last Friday to 15.09 yuan ($2.24) per kilogram, according to data provided by consultancy China-America Commodity Data Analytics.    Even though demand is typically weak at this time of year, prices across the country surged almost 20 percent since early March.
        The surge comes with a months-long outbreak of African swine fever having spread to 111 confirmed cases in 28 provinces and regions across the country.    There is no cure and no vaccine for the disease that is highly contagious and fatal to pigs, though it does not affect humans.    About 1 million pigs have been culled so far in an effort to try to control the spread.
        “The main reason (for rising prices) is there are fewer pigs,” said Yao Guiling, analyst with China-America Commodity Data Analytics.    Some farmers are also reluctant to sell now, she said, anticipating further tightening of supplies and higher profits in coming weeks.
        “Pig production capacity has been falling in the past two years, then in the second half of last year, African swine fever outbreaks further affected restocking, pushing up prices,” Yao said.
    (For a graphic on ‘China’s pig prices soar to 14-month high’ click https://tmsnrt.rs/2CdU9RE)
        Some have also abandoned farming, after government measures to tackle the disease pushed prices too low and made trade impossible.
        China’s pig herd fell 13 percent in January compared with the same month a year earlier, while the number of breeding sows was down 15 percent from the previous year, according to data from the Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs.
        But analysts and traders said farms that can keep out the disease could be in line for bumper profits in coming months.
        “Our goal is to survive.    If we survive, life afterwards will be good,” said a manager at a major pig producer located in one of the regions that has reported an African swine fever outbreak.
        He declined to be named as he was not authorized to talk to the media.
    (For a graphic on ‘African swine fever puts China’s pig industry in peril’ click https://tmsnrt.rs/2BjgFIp)
        Shares in leading pig farming companies also continued to rise on Monday, as investors bet on tightening pork supplies and strong government support for leading producers.
        Top farmer Wens Foodstuff Group Co., Ltd. rose 4 percent, while rapidly growing.
    
  • 3/11/2019 Without vaccine, hundreds of children die in Madagascar measles outbreak by Lova Rabary
    Malagasy fisherman Dada holds a photo of three cousins who died of measles
    one week apart in Fort Dauphin, Madagascar February 28, 2019.     ANTANANARIVO (Reuters) – Two months ago, giggles floated through the home of fisherman Dada as his four-year-old son played ball outside with his two younger cousins on one of Madagascar’s famed sun soaked beaches.
        A few weeks later, all three children were dead, victims of the worst measles outbreak on the Indian Ocean island in decades.
        Measles cases are on the rise globally, including in wealthy nations such as the United States and Germany, where some parents shun life-saving vaccines due to false theories suggesting links between childhood immunizations and autism.
        In Madagascar, one of the world’s poorest countries, parents are desperate to vaccinate their children, many trudging for miles to get to clinics for shots.    But there are not enough vaccines, the health ministry says, and many people are too poor to afford them.
        Fisherman Dada – like many Malagasy, he only uses one name – had taken his son Limberaza to be vaccinated once already in their home in the southern district of Fort Dauphin.
        But a second-dose booster shot cost $15 at a clinic – and the whole family survives on less than $2 a day – so he took the boy to a back-street doctor instead.
        “I could not afford to take him to the hospital,” Dada said quietly as his young wife silently held Limberaza’s two-year-old brother.
        In January, Limberaza began to cough. A rash followed.    After a week, he died, his body afire with fever.
        By then Dada’s niece, three-year-old Martina, was also sick.    Her weeping mother Martine stroked her face as her fever spiked.
        She died eight days later.
        That evening, his other sister Pela’s three-year-old son Mario died as she clutched his hands.
        “They were so full of life,” Dada said, his voice breaking.
        The three cousins are among the almost 1,000 people, mostly children, who have died from measles in Madagascar since October.
        Their deaths show the grim reality for those left unprotected from one of the world’s most contagious diseases.    The virus, which can cause blindness, pneumonia, brain swelling and death, is able to survive for up to two hours in the air after a cough or sneeze, where it can easily infect people nearby.
        Even though there is a highly effective vaccine, globally, around 110,000 people died from measles in 2017, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).    Most, like Limberaza and his cousins, were children under the age of five.
    SHOTS FOR LIFE
        During 2000 to 2017, the WHO estimates that widespread use of measles vaccinations prevented 21.1 million deaths – making the shots one of what the United Nations’ health agency calls the “best buys in public health.”
        Yet misinformation is knocking confidence in the safety of vaccinations and has jeopardized progress against measles – allowing the disease to gain a hold again in places where it was considered almost beaten.
        Europe last year saw its highest level of measles cases in a decade, and in January, the WHO named “vaccine hesitancy” – the reluctance or refusal to vaccinate – as one of the top ten global health threats for 2019.
        In Madagascar, poverty is a bigger risk.    While wealthy tourists flock to its rainforests to spot wide-eyed lemurs and business people bargain for its luminous sapphires and fragrant vanilla, nearly half of Madagascar’s children are malnourished, the highest rate in Africa.
        The former French colony has been battered by decades of coups and instability.    Foreign aid plummeted after a 2009 coup sparked bitter political street fighting.    Corrupt leaders ignored the crumbling healthcare system despite frequent outbreaks of plague, hemorrhagic fevers and deadly viruses.
        Measles is endemic on the island but the last vaccination drive was in 2004.    Nearly two-thirds of children have not been vaccinated, according to the WHO and coverage needs to be around 95 percent to prevent the virus spreading in communities.
        The country is $3 million short of the $7 million needed for enough measles vaccines to cover its population, the WHO said last month.
        There are other hurdles.    The vaccines must be kept cold, but less than 15 percent of people in Madagascar have electricity.    Roads are mostly mud in the tropical country; journeys are arduous and expensive.
        At least 922 people – mostly children – have died of measles in Madagascar since October, the WHO says, despite an emergency program that has vaccinated 2.2 million of the 26 million population so far.
        Some of those, like Limberaza, had previously been vaccinated but had only received one shot, and still needed a second booster jab.    Madagascar hopes to roll out a free routine two-dose vaccination program this year.    Currently, the first shot is free but the booster is not.
    OBSTACLE COURSE
        Despite the difficulties, some parents walk miles seeking shots, said Jean Benoît Mahnes, deputy representative for the United Nations Children’s Fund in Madagascar. But they often arrive to find the clinic closed, or a doctor with no vaccine, or a vaccine that has expired.
        “Vaccinating a child can be a real obstacle course here,” he said.
        Lydia Rahariseheno, 33, said she had to walk an hour and a half to a clinic along a road plagued by robbers to get her three children vaccinated.    She has only managed to get one shot so far because the doctor is often not there.
        The health system’s failures mean poverty-stricken parents often take sick children to traditional healers who prescribe a herb, tingotingo, which is boiled and given to them to drink.
        The children are only brought to a hospital when their condition deteriorates, said Manitra Rakotoarivony, director of health promotion at the Ministry of Public Health.
        Limberaza’s father hoped a second, cheaper shot would protect him – but it didn’t.    His cousins Mario and Martine weren’t vaccinated at all.
        Now the family is desperate to protect their remaining children.
        “We did not expect the failure to vaccinate him would kill him,” wept Pela, Mario’s mother.    “My other child, for sure, I am going to take him to get vaccinated.”
    (Additional reporting by Kate Kelland in London; writing by Katharine Houreld; editing by Carmel Crimmins) [EAT MOR CHIKIN OR ELSE GET STAMPEDED]
  • 3/11/2019 Austria plans hikers code of conduct after tourist trampled by cows
    FILE PHOTO: A group of Simmental cattle graze on a farm near Seckau, Austria, July 29, 2017. REUTERS/Leonhard Foeger/File Photo     VIENNA (Reuters) – Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said on Monday the country would introduce a legally binding “code of conduct” for hikers who visit its picturesque mountain pastures in response to the death of a German tourist who was trampled by cows.
        The incident which took place in Tyrol in 2014 has made national headlines and a court last month ordered the farmer who owned the cattle to pay hundreds of thousands of euros in damages to the 45-year-old victim’s family.
        That has caused outrage among farmers and consternation among the public, partly because the victim was walking her dog on a leash attached to her waist.    Cows can charge to protect their calves when they see dogs, and hikers are advised to release their dogs in such cases, which she did not do.
        “We will lay out clearly in the code of conduct what is expected of people who use mountain pastures,” Kurz told a news conference.
        Kurz did not provide specifics but did suggest that dogs would be an important part of the new code, adding that problem cases have “almost exclusively” involved dogs.
        The code is part of a package of measures being worked on, including changing the law covering such incidents.
        “We expect that if people stick to this code of conduct, there will be no incidents.    If someone does not stick to the code of conduct, then they will lose the chance to claim damages,” Kurz said.
    (Reporting by Francois Murphy; editing by Jason Neely)
  • 3/11/2019 Swedish student Greta’s climate ‘school strike’ goes global by Ilze Filks
    Swedish 16-year-old environmental activist Greta Thunberg attends a protest next to Sweden's parliament in Stockholm,
    Sweden March 8, 2019. Picture taken March 8, 2019. The sign reads "School strike for the climate." REUTERS/Ilze Filks     STOCKHOLM (Reuters) – Students around the world are expected to skip school on March 15 in order to demonstrate against climate change, taking their cue from Swedish schoolgirl Greta Thunberg whose weekly “school strike for climate” has won a global following.
        The then 15-year-old Thunberg began riding her bicycle to parliament last August, taking up a place on the cobblestones in front of Stockholm’s Parliament House with her “school strike for climate” hand-painted sign.
        Thousands of students around the world have since copied her and youth organizations are calling for an unprecedented strike on Friday in which students in more than 40 countries are expected to participate.
        “I think this movement is very important.    It not only makes people aware, and makes people talk about it more, but also to show the people in power that this is the most important thing there is,” Thunberg told Reuters in an interview.
        Thunberg has almost 250,000 followers on Twitter where her movement carries the hashtags #FridaysForFuture and #SchoolStrike4Climate.
        A TEDx talk she delivered on climate change now carried on TED’s main website has garnered more than 1.2 million views and last month; Thunberg joined protests in Belgium, where she won a European Union pledge to spend billions of euros to combat climate change.
        “I think the most fun thing is to watch all the pictures around the world of hundreds of thousands of children school striking for the climate,” Thunberg told Reuters.
        She has also had an impact on her parents, author and actor Svante Thunberg and opera singer Malena Ernman.
        Inspired by their daughter’s concern for the environment, the pair have stopped flying and have adopted vegan diets as part of their efforts to live more environmentally sustainable lives, Svante Thunberg told a conference in Katowice, Poland, in December.
        Specifically, Thunberg said she wants Sweden to adhere to the Paris Agreement, part of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
        “I’ve said that I will continue to strike every Friday until Sweden is in line with the Paris Agreement,” she said.    “That may take a couple of years and I’ll just have to try to be patient.”
    (Reporting by Ilze Filks; editing by Jason Neely)
  • 3/11/2019 World must prepare for inevitable next flu pandemic, WHO says by Kate Kelland.
    FILE PHOTO: A logo is pictured on the World Health Organization (WHO) headquarters
    in Geneva, Switzerland, November 22, 2017. REUTERS/Denis Balibouse     LONDON (Reuters) – The world will inevitably face another pandemic of flu and needs to prepare for the potential devastation that could cause, and not underestimate the risks, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday.
        Outlining a global plan to fight the viral disease and get ahead of a potential global outbreak, the WHO said the next influenza pandemic “is a matter of when, not if.”
        “The threat of pandemic influenza is ever-present,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, the WHO’s director-general, said in a statement.    “We must be vigilant and prepared – the cost of a major influenza outbreak will far outweigh the price of prevention.”
        The world’s last flu pandemic was caused by the H1N1 virus, which spread around the world in 2009 and 2010.    Studies of that pandemic found that at least one in five people worldwide were infected in the first year, and the death rate was 0.02 percent.
        Global health experts and the WHO warn there is a risk that a more deadly flu virus will one day jump from animals to people, mutate and infect many hundreds of thousands of people.
        Flu viruses are multiple and ever-changing, and they infect around a billion people every year around the world in seasonal outbreaks.    Of those infections, around 3 to 5 million are severe cases, leading to between 290,000 and 650,000 seasonal flu-related respiratory deaths.
        Vaccines can help prevent some cases, and the WHO recommends annual vaccination – especially for people working in health care and for vulnerable people such as the old, the very young and people with underlying illness.
        The WHO plan – which it described as its most comprehensive to date – includes measures to try to protect populations as much as possible from annual outbreaks of seasonal flu, as well as prepare for a pandemic.
        Its two main goals, the WHO said, are to improve worldwide capacities for surveillance and response – by urging all governments to develop a national flu plan, and to develop better tools to prevent, detect, control and treat flu, such as more effective vaccines and antiviral drugs.
    (Reporting by Kate Kelland, editing by Gareth Jones)
  • 3/11/2019 Health officials: Yemen now in third cholera pandemic since 2017 by OAN Newsroom
        According to health officials, Yemen’s capital is on the brink of a new cholera outbreak as sewer systems continue to fail.    Reports Sunday said sewers began overflowing around mid-February in the city of Sanaa, risking an even worse health crisis than the one already underway.
        Sewer pipes made of asbestos in the early 1980’s have begun collapsing as they are well past their lifespan.    Health officials say the people are staring down yet another cholera pandemic.
        “We are now in the third pandemic of cholera outbreaks,” stated Dr. Yousif al Haidari, Yemen Ministry of Health spokesman.    “Today we are talking about 82,000 cases since the beginning of 2019 till now — 112 of them have died.”
        According to the World Health Organization, Yemen is suffering the worst cholera outbreak in the world as more than 413,000 suspected cases have been reported in the last year.     Since 2017, the nation has reported more than a million suspected cases with more than 2,500 associated deaths.
  • 3/11/2019 Eleven dead as Brazil’s largest city flooded
    Men wait for the water level to drop in a flooded street after heavy rains in Vila Prudente
    neighbourhood in Sao Paulo, Brazil March 11, 2019. REUTERS/Amanda Perobelli     SAO PAULO (Reuters) – Intense floods in Latin America’s business hub Sao Paulo killed at least 11 people, turned roads into rivers and tossed cars atop buildings and into trees, with authorities bracing for more rain Monday evening.
        Five people drowned.    The others, including at least one infant, were buried alive in mudslides, according to the Sao Paulo state security secretariat.
        Nearly 110 millimeters – over 4 inches – of rain fell from Sunday afternoon to Monday afternoon, 70 percent of the amount expected for the entire month of March, authorities said.
        That caused chaos in Sao Paulo’s already clogged traffic, as commuter trains were partially shut down, and buses and cars were stuck in gridlocked streets.
        Rain is forecast for at least another two days.
        The Mercedes Benz truck and bus factory in Sao Bernardo do Campo was flooded and activity partially suspended, according to the local metalworkers’ union. The German automaker is the largest manufacturer of trucks and buses in Brazil, having sold 21,153 vehicles last year.
        Mercedes Benz did not reply to requests for comment.
    (Reporting by Eduardo Simoes, Alberto; Alerigi Jr. and Leonardo Benassato; Editing by Phil Berlowitz)
  • 3/12/2019 Fresh iceberg ruptures in Chile’s Patagonia raise alarm by Fabian Cambero
    Two new icebergs are seen after breaking off from the Grey glacier in Aysen, Chile's Patagonia, March 9, 2019. Picture
    taken March 9, 2019. Ricardo Jana/Courtesy of Chilean Antarctic Institute (INACH)/Handout via REUTERS     SANTIAGO (Reuters) – Two new icebergs have broken off the Grey Glacier in Chile’s Patagonia in recent weeks, amid fears that such ruptures are becoming more frequent, scientists told Reuters.
        The breaks, which occurred on Feb. 20 and March 7, came after a larger block of ice the size of three soccer fields, (380 meters (1,247 feet) by 350 meters, separated from the glacier, which sits in a glacial lake in Torres del Paine National Park in southern Chile, in November 2017.
        The most significant rupture to the glacier before that was recorded in the early 1990s.    Scientists link the increased frequency of breaks to rising temperatures.
        “There is a greater frequency in the occurrence of break-off in this east side of the glacier and more data is required to assess its stability,” said Ricardo Jana, researcher and member of the climate change area of the Chilean Antarctic Institute (INACH).
        In recent days, “temperature rises above the normal average and intense rainfall were registered together with an increase in water level in the lake, factors that could explain the separation,” he added.
        Researchers from universities in Germany and Brazil, together with experts from INACH and other local entities, have been studying the Grey Glacier since 2015 under an international cooperation program.
        In December of this year, Chile will host the United Nations climate change summit, COP 25.
    (Reporting by Fabián Andrés Cambero; writing by Aislinn Laing; Editing by Steve Orlofsky)
  • 3/14/2019 Researchers say strong solar storm would be ‘a threat to modern society’ by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        It’s happened before, and it could happen again.
        Roughly 2,700 years ago, an unusually powerful solar storm swept past Earth, scientists announced in a new study.    Though it had little to no effect on people that long ago in a pre-industrial and pre-technological world, such an event today would cause widespread power outages along with potentially disastrous communication and navigation failures.
        The solar storm in 660 B.C. was about 10 times stronger than any known event in the past 70 years, study lead author Raimund Muscheler said.
        A solar storm of that strength would be “a threat to modern society in terms of communication and navigation systems, space technologies and commercial aircraft operations,” the study says.
        Scientists studied ancient ice in Greenland to uncover clues about solar storms.    Looking at an ice core that dated as far back as 100,000 years, researchers found radioactive isotopes that indicated a powerful solar storm 2,700 years ago.
        “If that solar storm had occurred today, it could have had severe effects on our high-tech society,” said Muscheler, a geologist at Lund University in Sweden.
        Two examples of recent severe solar storms that caused extensive power outages took place in Quebec, Canada, in 1989 and Malmo, Sweden, in 2003.
        Solar storms are made up of high-energy particles unleashed from the sun by explosions on the star’s surface.    Such storms are part of what’s known as space weather, when energy that blasts off from the sun interacts with the Earth’s atmosphere and geomagnetic field. Separate but related space phenomena are known as geomagnetic storms.
        The only visible effect on Earth from space weather is typically the aurora borealis, or northern lights, across Canada and the northern USA.
        Scientists said the discovery is the third known record of a massive solar storm in historical times.    That indicates that although the storms are rare, they are a naturally recurring effect of solar activity.
        “That’s why we must increase society’s protection against solar storms,” Muscheler said.    “Our research suggests that the risks are currently underestimated. We need to be better prepared.”
        The study was published Monday in the peer-reviewed journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
    An especially potent solar storm could cause widespread power outages and navigation failures. NASA/SDO/EPA 3/14/2019 GMO salmon could hit stores as early as 2020 by Zlati Meyer, USA TODAY
        Genetically engineered salmon is swimming your way.
        The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is now allowing the fish, whose DNA has been altered to speed up growth, and its eggs into the U.S.
        The announcement means that AquaBounty Technologies may import AquAdvantage Salmon eggs to its facility near Albany, Indiana, where the fish grow faster than traditional Atlantic salmon.
        AquAdvantage Salmon could hit store shelves by 2020, said the company.    It declined to discuss prices.
        “We will sell our salmon at market prices, so it is too far away to know what that will be.    We will not sell at a discount,” AquaBounty said.
        AquAdvantage Salmon, or what critics deride as Frankenfish, is the only genetically engineered animal for food use that has FDA approval, the agency said.    The FDA first determined that the fish was safe for human consumption in 2015.    “The FDA is committed to supporting innovation and ensuring safety in the biotechnology space, including the use of (intentional genomic alterations) in animals,” FDA Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said in a statement.    “We’re interested in the promise that newer technologies can have for bringing innovative products, such as these, to market while also helping to ensure they are safe and effective.”
        In its research four years ago, the FDA also determined that genetic engineering is safe for the fish and that the product would have no significant effect on the environment.
        Fueled by more availability as a result of fish farming and an increased focus on healthful eating, fish consumption overall worldwide is on the rise, experts say.
        “Approximately 350,000 tons of Atlantic salmon are consumed in the United States with more than 95 percent of it imported,”
        AquaBounty said in a statement.    The FDA’s actions “will allow for production and sale to begin here in the U.S., bringing opportunity for investment in rural America, creating American jobs, while also reducing dependence on seafood imports.”
        Salmon is big business in the U.S., according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
        It’s the country’s highestvalue commercial species at $688 million, compared with $610 million for crabs, $594 million for lobsters and $531 million for shrimp.
        NOAA also found that in the U.S., the estimated per capita consumption of fish and shellfish was 16.0 pounds in 2017, up from 14.9 pounds in 2016 – the highest consumption level since 2009.
        AquAdvantage Salmon grows faster than traditional Atlantic salmon, using the growth hormone gene from Chinook salmon and some DNA from a fish called the ocean pout, according to the FDA.
        That enables the fish to reach sellable size more quickly than how Mother Nature does it.
        “i>I think the GMO salmon are safe to eat, but are they cheaper and do they taste better than other farmed salmon?    Otherwise, why bother?” said Marion Nestle, professor emerita of nutrition, food studies and public health at New York University.
        “I hope the GMO salmon are being raised inland with no possibility of their escaping into the oceans.    It’s best to keep wild salmon populations away from them.”
        The International Salmon Farmers Association said there’s “probably nothing” wrong with genetically engineered salmon but fears how the public will perceive the fish – and what that will do to the industry as a whole.
        “It will destroy the reputation of the salmon.    This is not good PR for the salmon business.    It’s considered Frankenstein fish,” said president Trond Davidsen.
        “If you’re being rational, that’s not the case, but that’s the image that’s already been produced.”
        Maynard, Massachusettsbased AquaBounty Technologies was founded in 1991, according to its website.
    AquaBounty Technologies plans to farm genetically engineered AquAdvantage Salmon
    at its facility near Albany, Indiana. AQUABOUNTY TECHNOLOGIES Fish consumption overall has been on the rise worldwide. ALEXRATHS/GETTY IMAGES
  • 3/14/2019 World Bank, AfDB commit $47 billion to African climate finance by John Ndiso
    French President Emmanuel Macron sits among delegates at the United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA)
    in Gigiri within Nairobi, Kenya March 14, 2019. REUTERS/Thomas Mukoya     NAIROBI (Reuters) – The World Bank and the African Development Bank will together commit more than $47 billion by 2025 to help African countries tackle the effects of climate change, the banks said on Thursday.
        Many countries on the continent, especially those on the coast, are among the most vulnerable to the effects of climate change such as rising sea levels and coral reef deterioration.
        Others are prone to more frequent droughts, desertification and floods.     AfDB said the funds would be used to increase investment in renewable energy projects like solar power plants.
        “The share of our portfolio that was in renewable energy generation between 2013 and 2015 was 59 percent but from 2015 to 2018 we moved from that to 95 percent,” AfDB president Akinwumi Adesina told Reuters on the sidelines of a U.N. environment meeting.
        The World Bank said some of the beneficiaries of its funding would include projects in Ethiopia, Rwanda and Kenya. (Reporting by John Ndiso; Editing by George Obulutsa and Mark Potter)
  • 3/15/2019 Olympics: Tokyo 2020 unveils robots to help wheelchair users, workers by Jack Tarrant
    Toyota's Human Support Robot (HSR) delivers a basket to a woman in a wheelchair at a demonstration
    of Tokyo 2020 Robot Project for Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games in Tokyo, Japan, March 15, 2019. REUTERS/Kim Kyung-hoon     TOKYO (Reuters) – Tokyo 2020 Olympics and Paralympics organizers launched their ambitious Robot Project on Friday, unveiling two of the robots designed to assist supporters, workers and athletes at the Games.
        The two products, Toyota’s Human Support Robot (HSR) and the Power Assist Suit from Panasonic, were demonstrated to the public for the first time in Tokyo.
        The HSR, a small white robot with built-in facial features, will assist wheelchair users at the Olympics, which begin in July 2020.
        The robots can carry food and other goods, guide viewers to their seats and provide event information.
        “We will support people at the Olympics and at the stadium in wheelchair accessible areas,” said Minoru Yamauchi, who is in charge of Toyota’s 2020 robots program.
        “In terms of service, we will be offering stress-free entry and viewing and the robot can also carry bags and other luggage items for the customers.”
        There will be 16 HSR robots at Tokyo 2020 venues and Toyota hope to have similar products available for general sale by the early 2030s.
        Panasonic also presented their offering, a battery-powered exoskeleton that assists with picking up heavy objects.
        People are strapped into the Power Assist Suits, which enable users to repetitively lift and carry objects without putting a strain on their back.
        They will be used by workers at Olympic and Paralympic venues, as well as the athletes’ village.
        Tokyo 2020 organizers have long maintained next year’s summer showpiece will be the most innovative ever and more robots are expected to be announced later.
        “At Pyeongchang there are examples of robots being used at the Games but I don’t think it was to this sort of practical level,” said Tokyo 2020 Vice Director General Maasaki Komiya.
        “So, let me reiterate, we want to give the impression that robots are actually usable and they can become part of our daily lives.”
        “At past Games I do not believe that we really saw robots as part of the Games.”
        The Olympics begin on July 24, 2020 with the Paralympics commencing a month later.
    (Reporting by Jack Tarrant; Editing by Amlan Chakraborty)
  • 3/15/2019 World must keep lethal weapons under human control, Germany says
    FILE PHOTO: German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas arrives for the weekly German cabinet meeting
    at the Chancellery in Berlin, Germany, March 13, 2019. REUTERS/Annegret Hilse     BERLIN (Reuters) – Germany’s foreign minister on Friday called for urgent efforts to ensure that humans remained in control of lethal weapons, as a step toward banning “killer robots.”
        Heiko Maas told an arms control conference in Berlin that rules were needed to limit the development and use of weapons that could kill without human involvement.
        Critics fear that the increasingly autonomous drones, missile defense systems and tanks made possible by new technology and artificial intelligence could turn rogue in a cyber-attack or as a result of programming errors.
        The United Nations and the European Union have called for a global ban on such weapons, but discussions so far have not yielded a clear commitment to conclude a treaty.
        “Killer robots that make life-or-death decisions on the basis of anonymous data sets, and completely beyond human control, are already a shockingly real prospect today,” Maas said.    “Fundamentally, it’s about whether we control the technology or it controls us.”
        Germany, Sweden and the Netherlands signed a declaration at the conference vowing to work to prevent weapons proliferation.
        “We want to want to codify the principle of human control over all deadly weapons systems internationally, and thereby take a big step toward a global ban on fully autonomous weapons,” Maas told the conference.
        He said he hoped progress could be made in talks under the Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons (CCW) this year.    The next CCW talks on lethal autonomous weapons take place this month in Geneva.
        Human Rights Watch’s Mary Wareham, coordinator of the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots, urged Germany to push for negotiations on a global treaty, rather than a non-binding declaration.
        “Measures that fall short of a new ban treaty will be insufficient to deal with the multiple challenges raised by killer robots,” she said in a statement.
        In a new Ipsos survey, 61 percent of respondents in 26 countries opposed the use of lethal autonomous weapons. (Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Kevin Liffey)
    [You know how it is if we do not build them the other side will.    We already have airplanes that fly themselves even with a pilot still crash, so we are on our way to the TERMINATORS.].
    
  • 3/15/2019 ‘Worse than Voldemort’: Global students’ strike targets climate change by Tom Westbrook and Alex Fraser
    Thousands of school students from across Sydney attend the global #ClimateStrike rally at Town Hall in Sydney, Australia March 15,
    2019. AAP Image/Mick Tsikas/via REUTERS ATTENTION EDITORS - THIS IMAGE WAS PROVIDED BY A THIRD PARTY. NO RESALES. NO ARCHIVE.
    AUSTRALIA OUT. NEW ZEALAND OUT. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN NEW ZEALAND. NO COMMERCIAL OR EDITORIAL SALES IN AUSTRALIA.     SYDNEY/LONDON (Reuters) – Tens of thousands of school students around the world walked out of classes on Friday in a global strike to protest against government inaction on climate change.
        “Climate change is worse than Voldemortz,” read a handmade sign carried by one student in Wellington, referring to the evil wizard in the hugely popular Harry Potter books and films.
        “The oceans are rising, so are we,” read another in Sydney.
        Student protests in Wellington, Sydney and Melbourne drew tens of thousands of people.    In Europe, students packed streets and squares in Paris, Madrid, Rome, Brussels and other cities for “Fridays for Future” protests.
        Demonstrations also took place across the United States.    In Washington, some 1,500 students rallied in front of the Capitol chanting “climate action now!” and waving homemade placards with slogans such as “Our planet, our future.”
        The worldwide student strike movement started in August 2018, when 16-year-old Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg began protesting outside her parliament on school days. She has since been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
        On Friday, she spoke at a Stockholm demonstration.    Other rallies were held in 100 towns around Sweden.
        “We have only been born into this world, we are going to have to live with this crisis our whole lives.    So will our children and grandchildren and coming generations,” Thunberg said.    “We are not going to accept this. We are striking because we want a future and we are going to carry on.”
        Thousands marched through central London with banners reading “The future is in our hands” and “We’re missing lessons to teach you one.”
        “Education is important but climate change is more important,” 14-year old Molly Powell said.
    “CLIMATE CATASTROPHE”
        Scientists say fossil fuel use releases greenhouse gases that trap heat and lift global temperatures, bringing more floods, droughts, heatwaves and rising sea levels.
        The 2015 Paris climate conference pledge to keep the increase in global average temperatures to below 2 degrees Celsius (35 F) above pre-industrial levels requires a radical cutback in use of coal and fossil fuels.
        More than 220 rallies were held in Germany. In Dusseldorf, some 2,000 school children paraded with a carnival float depicting a giant effigy of Thunberg with “Do something about the climate catastrophe at last” written on her raised arms.
        They stopped around the city, home to the headquarters of many of Germany’s largest manufacturers, reading out calls for change.    “The clock is ticking and time is against us!” they shouted.    “We are the last generation that can fix this.”
        About 60 students protested at government house in Bangkok, holding cardboard signs to campaign against plastic.
        Thailand is one of the world’s worst marine plastic polluters.
        “As youths who will inherit the land, we gather here to demand that the government work with us to solve these problems,” said 17-year-old Thiti Usanakul, of student-led group Grin Green International.
        The group was later invited to meet officials at the Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment in two weeks.
        There were also demonstrations in South Korea, India and South Africa.    In Singapore, where strict laws regulate public assembly, young people planned a virtual campaign on social media.
        New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern supported the strikes, saying teenagers should not wait for voting age to use their voices.
        That contrasted with politicians in Australia and Britain, who rebuked them for missing lessons.
        “For action on issues that they think is important, they should do that after school or on weekends,” said Dan Tehan, Australia’s education minister.
        Wellington parent Alex, who marched beside his 11-year-old son, disagreed: “It’s a much better day of education.     This is the greatest issue of our time.”
    (Reporting by Charlotte Greenfield in Wellington, Tom Westbrook in Sydney, Sonali Paul in Melbourne and Alex Fraser in London; Additional reporting by Jane Chung and Yijin Kim in SEOUL, Aradhana Aravindan in SINGAPORE, Patpicha Tanakasempipat in BANGKOK, Thomas Escritt in BERLIN, Simon Johnson and Phil O’Connor in STOCKHOLM, Bart Biesemans in BRUSSELS, Caterina Demony in Lisbon, Marie-Louise Gumuchian in LONDON, Roberto Mignucci in ROME, and Lee Van Der Voo in WASHINGTON; Editing by Mark Heinrich, Gareth; Jones and Rosalba O’Brien)
  • 3/14/2019 Virtual pedestrians pave way to safer roads for driverless cars by Esha Vaish
    A Volvo Car equipped with self-driving highway software is parked at the autonomous vehicle testing facility
    AstaZero on the outskirts of Boras, near Gothenburg, Sweden February 22, 2019. REUTERS/Esha Vaish     GOTHENBURG (Reuters) – A “virtual human” suddenly steps out at a blind bend, but the engineer in the Volvo car’s driving seat on the test track doesn’t flinch, leaving it to software to take evasive action.
        Private test tracks like the one owned by Sweden’s AstaZero are playing an increasing role as manufacturers like Volvo put self-driving cars through their paces following high-profile setbacks on public roads, auto executives say.
        Automakers and technology companies are locked in a race to bring these vehicles into commercial use by 2022, but their efforts on public roads stumbled last year when an Uber test car hit and killed a pedestrian.
        The accident raised public questions about the technology’s safety and made road testing permission tougher to secure, with Uber resuming trials in a severely reduced capacity in December and authorities placing restrictions on its program.
        “Everybody has revised the protocols a little bit after that kind of crash because we cannot have that again,” Dennis Nobelius, head of Volvo Cars’ Zenuity driverless software joint venture, told Reuters.
        “The industry … has really been made to do one more loop … not only (to) make the end product safe enough but also make the testing secure,” Nobelius said from the backseat of the autonomous Volvo car at AstaZero’s track.
        Public road testing has become more challenging for driverless vehicles as software which controls brake and steering is trialled, unlike previously when people controlled breaking and steering and software the other functions.
    TRUCK TESTING
        Trucks which drive themselves are even tougher to test than cars because of their size and weight and truckmakers say they are running tests at enclosed sites like warehouses, harbors and mines where human access can be restricted for safety.
        Scania is trialling an autonomous truck at customer Rio Tinto’s Australian mines while an identical truck at its Swedish base runs more tests through simulation.
        “In this kind of environment we’re able to test more or less what we need for public roads later on,” Lars-Gunnar Hedström, Scania’s engineering director at connected and autonomous systems, told Reuters.
        “We have the possibility to be out on customer sites and run real operations much earlier, which is a big difference.”
        The AstaZero track, which counts Scania and rival AB Volvo as customers, says it has also secured partnerships with domestic universities and testing grounds in the United States, South Korea and Singapore that give it data about traffic, city planning and human behavior.
        This data, CEO Peter Janevik says, is essential because people’s behavior in traffic differs across countries.
        Zenuity uses AstaZero’s virtual recreation to test cars using data from Malaysia, aiming to deliver software which is safe anywhere in the world.
        With firms also testing upgrades and running joint trials as alliances grow, AstaZero’s facility is fully booked for this year, said Janevik.
        Start-up Einride uses one of the tracks to check whether a person in Barcelona can use Ericsson’s 5G network to remotely steer its driverless electric truck, which gives a warning and stops when it encounters a moose or other roadblock.
        The idea is eventually to allow customers like DB Schenker, which has already begun using Einride’s truck on Swedish roads, to be able to monitor a fleet of such trucks from a control room and a person there to be able to switch any truck that encounters an obstacle to remote control and navigate it safely.
        “Autonomous technology has the potential to… reduce the number of accidents.    That’s something we need to work with jointly in this industry,” Robert Falck, CEO of Einride said.
    (Reporting by Esha Vaish in Gothenburg, additional reporting by Laurence Frost in Paris and Paul Lienert in Detroit, editing by Alexander Smith)
  • 3/17/2019 Cyclone hits Mozambique, Malawi, Zimbabwe, killing 150
        HARARE, Zimbabwe – Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi were hit by a vicious cyclone that killed nearly 150 people, left hundreds more missing and stranded tens of thousands who were cut off from roads and telephones in mainly poor, rural areas.    Cyclone Idai affected more than 1.5 million people in the three southern African countries, according to the U.N. and government officials.    Hardest hit was Mozambique’s central port city of Beira, where the airport is closed, electricity was out and many homes were destroyed.
  • 3/17/2019 "Inconvenient Facts: The Science That Al Gore Doesn't Want You to Know" a book by Brian Holsopple and Gregory Wrightstone.
        'Well researched, clearly written, beautifully presented and, above all, fact-packed books such as Inconvenient Facts are absolutely essential to the very survival of democracy, to the restoration of true science, and to the ultimate triumph of objective truth.''-Christopher Monckton, Viscount of Brenchley.
        You have been inundated with reports from media, governments, think tanks and ''experts'' saying that our climate is changing for the worse and it is our fault.    Increases in droughts, heat waves, tornadoes and poison ivy - to name a few - are all blamed on our ''sins of emissions'' from burning fossil fuels and increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.    Yet, you don't quite buy into this human-caused climate apocalypse.    You aren't sure about the details because you don't have all the facts and likely aren't a scientist.    Inconvenient Facts was specifically created for you.
        Gregory Wrightstone is a geologist with more than 35 years of experience researching and studying various aspects of the Earth's processes.    He earned a bachelor's degree from Waynesburg University and a master's from West Virginia University, both in the field of geology.
        He has written and presented extensively on many aspects of geology including how paleogeography and paleoclimate control geologic processes.    His findings have allowed him to speak at many venues around the world including Ireland, England, China and most recently India.
        Gregory is a strong proponent of the scientific process and believes that policy decisions should be driven by science, facts and data, not a political agenda.
        Gregory Wrightstone is a man of true science, firmly in the tradition of (Arab natural philosopher) al-Haytham... His mission is to distinguish what is from what is not in the climate debate. He has splendidly succeeded.
        Christopher Monckton, Viscount of Brenchley.
  • 3/18/2019 Death toll in floods in Indonesia’s Papua rises to nearly 80
    People stand as they look at damaged houses after a flash flood in Sentani, Papua, Indonesia, March 17, 2019
    in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/Gusti Tanati/ via REUTERS     JAKARTA (Reuters) – Authorities in Indonesia raised the death toll from floods and landslides in the easternmost province of Papua to nearly 80 on Monday as President Joko Widodo called for the urgent evacuation of victims from devastated communities.
        The deadly floods and landslide struck at the weekend after torrential rain fell across the Cyclops mountain range, much of which has been stripped of tree cover by villagers chopping fire wood and farmers cultivating plantations.
        The death toll shot up to nearly 80 from 58 on Sunday as rescuers found more victims as they struggled to clear mud, rocks and shattered trees from the area near the provincial capital of Jayapura, including a 70 km stretch of road.
        With 43 people missing, Widodo urged rescuers to step up their efforts.
        “What is most important is handling the evacuation,” he said in a statement posted on Instagram.
        More than 4,000 people have been displaced and are sheltering in tents, schools, and public buildings.
        Disaster authorities have warned provincial officials of the danger of flash floods due to deforestation, said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, spokesman of the national disaster mitigation agency.
        The central government sent supplies of seedlings last year, hoping to help restore some forest cover, he said.
    (Reporting by Jessica Damiana; Writing by Kanupriya Kapoor)
  • 3/18/2019 At least 89 dead in Zimbabwe as Cyclone Idai leaves trail of destruction
    Flooding caused by Cyclone Idai is seen in Chipinge, Zimbabwe, March 16, 2019 in this still image taken
    from social media video obtained March 17, 2019. Tony Saywood via REUTERS     HARARE (Reuters) – At least 89 people have died in Zimbabwe after Cyclone Idai tore across the eastern and southern parts of the country, a government official said on Monday, creating a humanitarian crisis in a nation grappling with economic woes and a drought.
        The scale of destruction is only becoming apparent as rescuers reach the most affected areas, near the border with Mozambique.
        Chimanimani district has been cut off from the rest of the country by torrential rains and winds of up to 170 km per hour that swept away roads, homes and bridges and knocked out power and communication lines.
        “The number of confirmed deaths throughout the country is now 89,” Nick Mangwana, the secretary for ministry of information told Reuters via a text message.
        Local officials say the body count is expected to rise.
        The United Nations says more than 100 people have died in weeks of heavy rain and flooding in Mozambique and Malawi, where villages were left underwater.
        Rescuers are struggling to reach people in Chimanimani, many of whom have been sleeping in the mountains since Friday, after their homes were flattened by rock falls and mudslides or washed away by torrential rains.    Many families cannot bury the dead due to the floods.
        The government has declared a state of disaster in areas affected by the storm, the worst to hit the country since Cyclone Eline devastated eastern and southern Zimbabwe in 2000.
        The country of 15 million people is already suffering a severe drought that has wilted crops.    A United Nations humanitarian agency says 5.3 million people will require food aid.
    (Reporting by MacDonald Dzirutwe; Editing by Catherine Evans)
  • 3/18/2019 Death toll in Mozambique cyclone, floods could surpass 1,000: president
    Flooding caused by Cyclone Idai is seen in Chipinge, Zimbabwe, March 16, 2019 in this still image taken from social media video obtained March 17, 2019. Tony Saywood via REUTERS     MAPUTO/HARARE (Reuters) – The number of people killed in a powerful storm and preceding floods in Mozambique could exceed 1,000, the president said on Monday, putting the potential death toll greatly more than current figures.
        Only 84 deaths have been confirmed so far in Mozambique as a result of Cyclone Idai, which has also left a trail of death and destruction across Zimbabwe and Malawi, with vast areas of land flooded, roads destroyed and communication wiped out.
        Speaking on Radio Mocambique, President Filipe Nyusi said he had flown over the affected region, where two rivers had overflowed.    Villages had disappeared, he said, and bodies were floating in the water.
        “Everything indicates that we can register more than one thousand deaths,” he said.
        The cyclone has also killed 89 people in Zimbabwe, an official said on Monday, while the death toll in Malawi from heavy rains and flooding stood at 56 as of last week.    No new numbers had been released following the cyclone’s arrival in the country.
        Caroline Haga, a senior International Federation of the Red Cross official who is in Beira, said the situation could be far worse in the surrounding areas, which remained completely cut off by road and where houses were not as sturdy.
        Nyusi flew over areas that were otherwise accessible, and some of which had been hit by flooding before Cyclone Idai.
    RESCUE EFFORT
        In Beira, Mozambique’s fourth-largest city and home to 500,000 people, a large dam had burst, further complicating rescue efforts.
        Large swathes of land were completely submerged, and in some streets people waded through knee-high water around piles of mangled metal and other debris.
        In the early hours of Monday morning, rescuers launched dinghies onto chest-high waters, navigating through reeds and trees – where some people perched on branches to escape the water – to rescue those trapped by the flooding.
        Meanwhile, rescuers were struggling to reach people in Zimbabwe’s Chimanimani district, cut off from the rest of the country by torrential rains and winds of up to 170 km per hour that swept away roads, homes and bridges and knocked out power and communication lines.
        Zimbabwean information ministry official Nick Mangwana told Reuters the number of confirmed deaths throughout the country was now 89.    The body count is expected to rise.
        Many people had been sleeping in the mountains since Friday, after their homes were flattened by rock falls and mudslides or washed away by torrential rains.
        The Harare government has declared a state of disaster in areas affected by the storm.    Zimbabwe, a country of 15 million people, was already suffering a severe drought that has wilted crops.
    SOUTHEASTERN AFRICA GATEWAY
        Beira, which sits at the mouth of the Pungwe River, is also home to Mozambique’s second-largest port, serving as gateway for imports to landlocked countries in southeast Africa.
        The director of a company that jointly manages the port, Cornelder, based in the Netherlands, said the port had been closed since last Wednesday but would hopefully resume operations on Tuesday.br>     Two cranes would be working and the company had two large generators and enough fuel for now, though damage to access routes and roads further inland was more likely to cause a problem, said the director, who asked not to be named.
        The fuel pipeline running from Beira to Zimbabwe was believed to be intact, the person said, though communication was still very patchy and therefore the situation at the port remained uncertain.
        In February 2000, Cyclone Eline hit Mozambique when it was already devastated by its worst floods in three decades.    It killed 350 people and made 650,000 homeless across southern Africa, also hitting Zimbabwe.
    (Reporting by MacDonald Dzirutwe in Zimbabwe and Manuel Mucari in Mozambique; Additional reporting by Emma Rumney in Johannesburg; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
  • 3/19/2019 Cyclone hit millions across Africa in record disaster: U.N.
    A general view shows destruction after Cyclone Idai in Beira, Mozambique, March 16-17, 2019 in this still image
    taken from a social media video on March 19, 2019. Care International/Josh Estey via REUTERS     MAPUTO/HARARE (Reuters) – Cyclone winds and floods that swept across southeastern Africa affected more than 2.6 million people and could rank as one of the worst weather-related disasters recorded in the southern hemisphere, U.N. officials said on Tuesday.
        Rescue crews are still struggling to reach victims five days after Cyclone Idai raced in at speeds of up to 170 kph (105 mph) from the Indian Ocean into Mozambique, then its inland neighbors Zimbabwe and Malawi.
        Aid groups said many survivors were trapped in remote areas, surrounded by wrecked roads, flattened buildings and submerged villages, while the Red Cross said at least 400,000 people had been made homeless in central Mozambique alone.
        “This is the worst humanitarian crisis in Mozambique’s history,” said Jamie LeSueur, who is leading rescue efforts in Beira for the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies.
        The organization said large areas to the west of the port city of Beira were severely flooded, and in places close to the Buzi and Pungwe rivers flood waters are meters deep, completely submerging homes, telephone poles and trees.
        “The scale of suffering and loss is still not clear, and we expect that the number of people affected as well as the number of people who have lost their lives may rise,” LeSueur said.
        The official death count in Mozambique stands at 84 – but its president Filipe Nyusi said on Monday he had flown over some of the worst-hit zones, seen bodies floating in rivers and now estimated more than 1,000 people may have died.
        The cyclone hit land near Beira on Thursday and moved inland throughout the weekend, leaving heavy rains in its trail on Tuesday.
        Studies of satellite images suggested 1.7 million people were in the path of the cyclone in Mozambique and another 920,000 affected in Malawi, Herve Verhoosel, senior spokesman at the U.N World Food Programme said.    It gave no figures for Zimbabwe.
        In Maputo, Mozambique’s capital, people were worried about relatives they had not heard from.
        Telma fa Gloria, a street vendor, told Reuters she had not heard from her mother, who she usually speaks to every day, or her siblings, for days. Her mother’s neighborhood was in one of the worst-hit areas.
        “I’m stitched up, with nothing to do,” she said, adding she was thinking of going to Beira to find out what had happened.
        “I don’t have the strength to get the news I don’t want to hear, and I don’t wish anyone to hear.”
    WORST FEARS
        Heavy rains preceded the cyclone, compounding the problems.
        “If the worst fears are realized … then we can say that it is one of the worst weather-related disasters, tropical-cyclone-related disasters in the southern hemisphere,” said Clare Nullis of the U.N. World Meteorological Organization.
        Droughts are classed as climate-related not weather-related.
        In Beira, a low-lying coastal city of 500,000 people, Nullis said the water had nowhere to drain.
        “This is not going to go away quickly,” she said.
        Mark Ellul, a 31-year-old British doctor from Manchester who was working at the Beira hospital when the storm hit the city on Thursday, was trapped in a hotel room.    He said the hospital suffered significant damage.
        “It was pretty terrifying during the storm, extremely noisy, frightening and you can hear the flying debris outside,” Ellul said.
        “It felt like the windows were going to break, like the storm was going to come into the room.”
        Beira is also home to Mozambique’s second largest port, which serves as a gateway to landlocked countries in the region.
        The control room of a pipeline that runs from Beira to Zimbabwe and supplies the majority of that country’s fuel has been damaged, Zimbabwe’s Energy Minister Jorum Gumbo told state-owned Herald newspaper on Tuesday.
        “We, however, have enough stocks in the country and I am told the repairs at Beira may take a week,” he was quoted as saying.
    AID ON THE WAY
        The European Union announced on Tuesday an initial emergency aid package of 3.5 million euros ($3.97 million) to Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe for logistical support to reach affected people, emergency shelters, hygiene, sanitation and health care.
        Britain has pledged up to 6 million pounds ($7.96 million) in aid.
        Citizens in Zimbabwe are mobilizing donations, including cash, food and clothes to help thousands of families whose homes were wrecked by the cyclone.
        President Emmerson Mnangagwa, who visited Chimanimani on Tuesday, told reporters that Tanzania and the United Arab Emirates were also sending donations while neighbors, including South Africa, Botswana and Angola, would also help.
    (Reporting Manuel Mucari in Maputo and Macdonald Dzirutwe in Harare; Additional reporting by Tom Miles in Geneva, Catarina Demony in Lisbon and Mfuneko Toyana and Emma Rumney in Johannesburg; Editing by Andrew Heavens and Ed Osmond)
  • 3/20/2019 Mozambique starts three days of mourning after cyclone kills hundreds
    A general view of the damage after a cyclone swept through Beira, Mozambique in this aerial drone
    video taken March 18, 2019. IFRC/Red Cross Climate Centre via REUTERS     MAPUTO/HARARE (Reuters) – Mozambique started three days of national mourning on Wednesday after a powerful cyclone and flooding killed hundreds of people and left a trail of destruction across swathes of southeast Africa.
        Cyclone Idai hit Mozambique’s port city of Beira with winds of up to 170 kph (105 mph) on Thursday last week, then moved inland to Zimbabwe and Malawi, flattening buildings and putting the lives of millions of people at risk.
        Drone footage showed residents of a shantytown at the port still picking through wreckage days after the storm hit and trying to drag plastic sheeting over their ruined homes.
        The film, released by the Red Cross, showed the settlement pockmarked with empty plots where the winds had blown whole buildings from their foundations.
        “Great floods have sowed mourning and devastation in various areas of Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi,” Pope Francis said on Wednesday.    “I express my pain and closeness to those dear people.”
        Mozambique’s President Filipe Nyusi said a day earlier that the cyclone had killed more than 200 people in his country but rescuers were still discovering more bodies.
        In neighboring Zimbabwe the official death count stands at 98 but is likely to grow as hundreds are still missing.
        In the worst-hit eastern parts of Zimbabwe, grieving families rushed to bury their dead because the cyclone has knocked out power supplies and stopped mortuaries from functioning.
        Malawi has not released details of any casualties from the storm, which weakened as it moved further inland over the weekend, leaving heavy rains in its wake.
    DISEASE, SHORTAGES
        Aid groups said they were struggling to reach many survivors trapped in remote areas of Mozambique, surrounded by wrecked roads and submerged villages.
        “Challenges remain in terms of the search and rescue of thousands of people, including children,” UNICEF said.    It estimated that 260,000 children were at risk there.
        Beira, a low-lying coastal city of 500,000 people, is home to Mozambique’s second-largest port and serves as a gateway to landlocked countries in the region.    There were food and fuel shortages in parts of central Mozambique because Beira is cut off by road, local media reported.
        Zimbabwe’s Grain Millers Association said 100 trucks carrying wheat destined for Zimbabwe were stuck in Beira.
        Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa is due to visit the worst-affected areas on Wednesday.    Both Mozambique and     Zimbabwe have declared states of emergency in some areas.
        The floods also brought the threat of waterborne diseases, said aid group Doctors Without Borders.
        “People are using well water with no chlorination, and that water is unlikely to be clean and safe to drink … Pneumonia and other respiratory diseases are going to be a problem,” Gert Verdonck, an emergency coordinator with the charity said from Beira.
        The European Union announced on Tuesday an initial emergency aid package of 3.5 million euros ($3.97 million) to Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe for emergency shelters, hygiene, sanitation and health care.    Britain and the United Arab Emirates have also pledged aid.
    (Reporting by Manuel Mucari in Maputo and MacDonald Dzirutwe in Harare; Additional reporting by Frank Phiri in Blantyre, Catarina Demony in Lisbon and Philip Pullella in Rome; Writing by Alexander Winning; Editing by Andrew Heavens)
  • 3/20/2019 Nebraska cities declare flooding emergencies - Millions in 14 states affected as waters rage by John Bacon and Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        In Nebraska on Tuesday, 74 cities, 65 counties and four tribal areas declared states of emergency as swaths of the Midwest battled rivers swollen by days of heavy rains and spring snowmelt.
        Three deaths have been blamed on the flooding in Nebraska, but the waters were raging in more than a dozen states.    More than 8 million people in 14 states live where a flood warning has been in effect in recent days, the National Weather Service said.
        About 200 miles of levees were compromised in Nebraska, Iowa, Missouri and Kansas, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers said.    Thousands of people have been driven from their homes by the fast-rising waters.
        In North Dakota, Fargo Mayor Tim Mahoney declared a state of emergency despite what he described as tremendous strides in permanent flood protection in recent years.
        “This is a very serious flood forecast, and we will meet it with a serious response,” he said.    “It is critically important for everyone to know that we will need the public’s assistance.    We cannot be complacent.”
        In Illinois, Freeport City Manager Lowell Crow said the town of 25,000 residents west of Rockford could see an all-time record flood along the Pecatonica River.    City officials were bracing for flooding in the downtown area, he said.
        In Missouri, 130 people were urged to leave their Atchison County homes near strained levees, three of which had already been overtopped by water.    Missouri State Highway Patrol crews were on standby for rescues.    “The next four to five days are going to be pretty rough,” said Rhonda Wiley, the county emergency management and 911 director.
        The Missouri River was expected to crest Thursday in St. Joseph, Missouri, at its third-highest level on record, the National Weather Service said.    Military C-130 planes have been evacuated from nearby Rosecrans Air National Guard base.
        In Iowa, water stood 10 feet high near Pacific Junction, where only the top halves of gas stations, homes and storage units were visible.    Mills County Emergency Management Director Larry Hurst said the flooding might be worse than some of the most extreme historical events — in 1952, 1993 and 2011.
        “This is actually different even than the flood of ’52,” he said.    “There’s water on this entire basin.”
        Water continued to gush through a levee break near the Plattsmouth Toll Bridge, where the Platte and Missouri rivers converge.    The mystery, he said, is the timeline for the water to recede.
        “To tell you the truth, I don’t know,” he said.    “I don’t think anybody knows.”
        Glenwood Mayor Ron Kohn said his city of 5,000 was in pretty good shape.    But to the west, where the aging levee broke under rapidly rising waters last week, farms were swamped.
        “That’s all going to be gone until next year, I’m sure,” Kohn said.    “Rice is about all they could grow out there now.”
    Gabe Schmidt, owner of Liquid Trucking, top right, travels by airboat to survey damage from Platte River flooding in Plattsmouth, Neb. NATI HARNIK/AP
  • 3/20/2019 Piles of pigs: Swine fever outbreaks go unreported in rural China by Dominique Patton
    Police officers and workers in protective suits are seen at a checkpoint on a road leading to a
    farm owned by Hebei Dawu Group where African swine fever was detected, in Xushui district of
    Baoding, Hebei province, China February 26, 2019. Picture taken February 26, 2019. REUTERS/Hallie Gu     SEOUL BAODING, China (Reuters) – When pigs on the Xinda Husbandry Co. Ltd breeding farm in northern China began dying in growing numbers in early January, it looked increasingly likely that the farm had been struck by the much feared African swine fever, an incurable disease that has spread rapidly across the country since last year.
        But after taking samples from some pigs, local officials in the Xushui district of Baoding city, about an hour’s drive from Beijing, said their tests came back negative, said Sun Dawu, chairman of Hebei Dawu Agriculture Group, the farm owner.
        As hundreds of pigs began dying daily on the 20,000-head farm, the company obtained a test kit that showed some positive results for the virus.    But after further lobbying by Xinda, officials just offered the company subsidies for farm buildings and other investments, said Sun.
        Sun’s account of events and pictures taken by farm staff of dead pigs lying in rows and a pile outside the farm could not be independently verified.
        Xushui district said in a faxed response to Reuters on Tuesday that it was opening an investigation into the case, adding that it had found some “discrepancies” with the reported version of events.
        “If there is illegal behavior, relevant departments will handle it according to the law,” added the statement from the local government’s investigative committee.
        Farmers and other industry insiders told Reuters that China’s African swine fever epidemic is far more extensive than official reports suggest, making the disease harder to contain, potentially causing pork shortages and increasing the likelihood that it will spread beyond China’s borders.
        “Our full expectation is that the number of cases is under-reported,” said Paul Sundberg, executive director at the Swine Health Information Center in Ames, Iowa, which is funded by American pork producers.
        “And if there’s so much of that virus in the environment in China, then we are at increased risk of importing it.”
        China does not permit the commercial sale of African swine fever test kits, though many are now available.    Official confirmation must come from a state-approved laboratory.
        “Public confirmation of disease is the government’s job,” Sun told Reuters at his company headquarters in Xushui in late February.
        Frustrated by the lack of action and mounting losses from the disease, Sun eventually published details of the suspected outbreak on China’s Twitter-like platform Weibo on Feb. 22.
        Two days later, it became the first African swine fever case in Hebei province, one of the north’s top pig producing regions, to be reported by China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs, about seven weeks after the company says it had alerted local authorities.
        By then, more than 15,000 pigs on the Xinda farm had already died, said Sun, and the company even sold on thousands of pigs – potentially spreading the disease further.
        Sun said officials did not explain why their first test had been negative, though he suggested it may have been because they took samples from live pigs on the farm and did not test the dead ones.
        China’s Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs did not reply to a faxed request for comment on the case.
        SEOUL The agriculture ministry has warned against covering up outbreaks of the disease, and in January highlighted two large farms that had tried to conceal outbreaks.
    UNCONFIRMED OUTBREAKS
        Detailed accounts of unconfirmed outbreaks shared with Reuters by two other farm company managers suggest Sun’s experience is not unique.
        In one case in northern China last year, local officials declined to even carry out a test.    In another case in Shandong province, official test results came back negative, despite clinical symptoms that strongly pointed to African swine fever and a positive test result obtained by the company itself.
        Neither manager was willing to be named because of the sensitivity of the issue.
        Once an outbreak of African swine fever (ASF) is confirmed, all pigs on the farm, as well as any within a 3-km (1.8-mile) radius, must be culled and disposed of, according to Chinese law, and farmers should be paid 1,200 yuan ($180) per pig culled.
        For some cash-strapped county governments, avoiding compensation payments could be an incentive not to report disease, said a senior official with a major pig producer.
        When the disease hit one of the company’s 6,000-head sow farms in the northeast in November, local authorities did nothing, the official said.
        “It was never tested by the government.    We couldn’t do the test because we didn’t have the capability.    But there’s no question it was ASF, based on the symptoms and lesions,” he told Reuters, declining to be identified because of company policy.
        A county official in northeastern Liaoning province told Reuters in January that the local government had poured so much money and resources into preventing and controlling African swine fever that it risked bankrupting the county.
        But wealthy Shandong province, northern China’s biggest producer of hogs, has only confirmed one case of the disease, on Feb. 20.
        Insiders at one company said four of its farms in the province had suffered swine fever infections, however, suggesting more unconfirmed outbreaks may have occurred.
        After the company’s first outbreak in early January the local government tested and the results came back negative, said an executive, who declined to be identified because of the sensitivity of the issue.
        SEOUL Shandong province’s animal husbandry bureau did not respond to a fax seeking comment on unreported cases.
    ‘SPATIAL RANDOMNESS’
        There is no cure or vaccine for African swine fever and it kills about 90 percent of infected pigs.
        Analysts forecast pig production in China, which eats about half of the world’s pork, will fall more than during the 2006 ‘blue ear’ epidemic, one of the worst disease outbreaks in recent years, with some expecting a decline of around 30 percent in 2019.
        That would send meat prices soaring and trigger huge demand for imports.
        The agriculture ministry said last week the pig herd in February had dropped 16.6 percent year-on-year, and sow stocks were down more than 19 percent.
        China also has a patchy record of reporting disease. Details of the blue ear outbreak, which infected more than 2 million hogs, did not emerge until months after the damage had already been done, and the number of pigs that died is still disputed.
        Like blue ear, African swine fever does not harm people. But it is classified a reportable disease by the Paris-based World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), a global body that promotes transparency, and member country China is obliged to report each outbreak.
        “You need to move faster than the virus, it’s a very simple equation of how to control disease,” said Trevor Drew, director of the Australian Animal Health Laboratory at the national research agency, the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organization.    “If you don’t know where the virus is, you can’t stop it.”
        Since August 2018, Beijing has reported 112 outbreaks in 28 provinces and regions.    The increase has slowed considerably in 2019 and the agriculture ministry said earlier this month the situation was “gradually improving.”
        But some suspect the disease is worse than the official data suggest.
        “I am very much hoping that I am wrong, but if I consider the epidemiological characteristics of this virus disease, I would have to be extremely skeptical,” said Dirk Pfeiffer, a professor of veterinary epidemiology at the City University of Hong Kong.
        He pointed to the “spatial randomness” of the reported outbreaks, unusual for an infectious disease, which normally develops in clusters.
        SEOUL The high rate of detection of the virus in food products carried from China to Japan, South Korea, Taiwan and Australia, as well as domestically, also indicated a much higher presence of the virus in Chinese pigs than reported, said Pfeiffer and others.
    LARGE FARMS, LARGE LOSSES
        With extremely high density of pigs, raised largely on low-biosecurity farms, tackling disease is widely recognized as a major challenge for China.
        But the disease has hit both small farms and large producers, say industry insiders, despite better hygiene and training at factory farms.
        “The large producers have not been spared,” said a manager with a company that supplies several of China’s top pig producers.    “Everyone is trying really hard on biosecurity, but they’re still getting outbreaks, and they’re frustrated and losing hope.”
        He said he knew of eight large breeding farms that had experienced outbreaks, including two on very large, 10,000-head sow farms.    None were officially reported.
        He declined to be named or to reveal the names of the producers because of client confidentiality.
        Beijing has not officially reported any swine fever on the farms of large listed producers, whose shares are trading at record levels as investors bet the big producers will benefit from tighter supplies.
        Qin Yinglin, chairman of China’s No.2 producer, Muyuan Foods Co Ltd, which raised 11 million pigs for slaughter last year, said most large companies were likely to be infected.
        “If you checked carefully, testing one-by-one, then for sure everyone has it,” he told Reuters in an interview.     “This is a high probability event.”
        He said it was “not yet known” if his firm had been hit.
    (For a graphic on ‘African swine fever in China’ click https://tmsnrt.rs/2QMhmzL)
    (Reporting by Dominique Patton and Beijing Newsroom; Editing by Tony Munroe and Alex Richardson)
  • 3/20/2019 Pork for pollution? South Koreans fight smog with grease by Jane Chung
    An employee roasts pork at a Korean BBQ restaurant in Seoul, South Korea, March 13, 2019.
    Picture taken on March 13, 2019. REUTERS/Jane Chung     SEOUL (Reuters) – Whenever dust particles hang thick in the air in South Korea, sales of pork rise.
        This quirky correlation in Asia’s fourth-largest economy, where air pollution outstrips industrialized peers, stems from an old belief attributed to coal miners, that the slippery pork oil helped cleanse dirt from their throats.
        For middle school student Han Dong-jae, eating greasy barbecued pork belly on a smoggy day is a life lesson imbibed from his mother.
        “I eat more pork when fine dust is dense like today,” said the 15-year-old as he dug in over a sizzling grill at a barbecue restaurant in Seoul with his mother after school.
        “I think it’s somewhat helpful, because pork meat has oil and the oil soothes my throat.”
        Scientists say there is no rationale for the belief, but pork sales jumped about a fifth on the year from Feb. 28 to March 5, when pollutants blanketed most areas, data from major retailers E-Mart and Lotte Mart showed.
    SOCIAL DISASTER
    .     South Korea faces a battle against unhealthy air, a combination of domestic emissions from coal-fired power plants and cars, and pollutants wafted in from China and North Korea.
        Its air quality was the worst among its industrialized peers in 2017, data from the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) grouping of wealthy nations showed.
        South Korea registers 25.1 micrograms per cubic meter of fine particulate matter smaller than 2.5 micrometers on average each year, just over double the OECD figure of 12.5, but far lower than the world average of 44.2.
        The pollution has affected South Korean policy and businesses, driving up shares of companies that make air purifiers and masks.
        Legislation this month included a measure designating the problem a “social disaster,” which could unlock emergency funds.
        Cho Seog-yeon, an environmental engineering professor at Inha University, called for more study of the exact damage wrought by high levels of concentrated pollutants, adding, “We don’t know now where the damage is done (by air pollution).”
        People battle the air pollution by wearing masks and staying indoors.    But in a country where 28 percent of all households have a pet, furry companions are a priority too.
        Sales of pet masks surged more than five times in early March, said Suh Hyuk-jin, director of pet products maker Dear Dog.
        Cho Eun-hye, who lives in the northwestern city of Incheon, bought a mask for her 18-month-old brown Korean Jindo dog, Hari, who needs to be walked two times a day.
        “It’s inconvenient, but I think we have to keep living with that,” said the 36-year-old office worker.
    (Reporting by Jane Chung; Editing by Karishma Singh and Clarence Fernandez)
  • 3/20/2019 Indonesia’s Papua set for mass burial as flood death toll tops 100
    People stand as they look at damaged houses after a flash flood in Sentani, Papua, Indonesia,
    March 17, 2019 in this photo taken by Antara Foto. Antara Foto/Gusti Tanati/ via REUTERS     JAKARTA (Reuters) – Indonesia’s easternmost province of Papua is planning to hold mass burials for the victims of flash floods, as the death toll from the disaster rose to 104 on Wednesday with nearly 10,000 people displaced, the disaster mitigation agency said.
        The floods and landslides injured 160 people, 85 of them seriously, while 79 people were missing, said Sutopo Purwo Nugroho, a spokesman for the agency.
        After consulting families and churches, a mass funeral for the victims would be held on Thursday, he said.
        The floods and landslide struck at the weekend near the provincial capital of Jayapura after torrential rain fell across the Cyclops mountain range, much of which has been stripped of trees by villagers chopping fire wood and farmers cultivating plantations.
        Disaster authorities had warned provincial officials of the danger of flash floods due to deforestation.
        Fourteen excavators had been deployed to help clear blocked roads, while temporary bridges were also being built in some areas after access had been cut.
        The nearly 10,000 displaced people were scattered across 18 relief shelters and they would be moved to six camps to help streamline aid distribution, the spokesman said.
    (Reporting by Ed Davies; Editing by Robert Birsel)
  • 3/20/2019 Temple University Mumps Outbreak: Number of people suspected to be infected reaches 67 by OAN Newsroom
        Health officials in Philadelphia said 13 additional people have contracted the mumps at Temple University, sending the count from the outbreak to a new high.    The total number of cases now stands at 67.
        The outbreak prompted Temple University to change its immunization policy for incoming students.    The new policy requires them to receive two doses of the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccine before entering school.
    File – A health care worker prepares syringes, including a vaccine for measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR),
    for a child’s inoculations at the International Community Health Services in Seattle. (AP Photo/Elaine Thompson, File)     Some students expressed their frustration with the spread of the infection on campus.     “I feel like its crazy, because this could have been avoided by simply having a vaccine,” said Temple University student Ashley Alex.    “And these are preventable diseases, and I think I saw someone with the mumps walking around.”     The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said the vaccine significantly decreases the risk of contracting the virus.
        Since the vaccine’s effectiveness can diminish over time, however, a booster shot may be necessary to keep up the body’s defenses against the virus.    Health officials said this may be why the number of cases at the university is rising.
    [Diseases that have been eradicated in the U.S. are recurring because of illegal alien immigration coming into this country without being checked for diseases, because of the Democrats laws they have passed in the last 10 years.    I hope it comes back on them and affects their life somehow so they will get the message of their creation.
        Mumps a contagious viral infection that tends to affect children and causes swelling of the salivary glands but can also affect other organs.    Mar 8, 2019 - Outbreaks.    The largest outbreak occurred in a close-knit community in northwest Arkansas that resulted in nearly 3,000 cases.    Two large outbreaks from Iowa and Illinois each involved several hundred university students.    About half of outbreaks involved greater than 10 cases.
        Measles a highly contagious virus that starts with fever, runny nose, cough, red eyes, and sore throat, followed by a rash that spreads all over the body.    From January 1 to March 14, 2019, 268 individual cases of measles have been confirmed in 15 states.    The states that have reported cases to CDC are Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Texas, and Washington.    Four of those are southern border states and the rest were where they influxed to.
        Rubella also known as German measles or three-day measles, is an infection caused by the rubella virus. This disease is often mild with half of people not realizing that they are infected.    A rash may start around two weeks after exposure and last for three days.
        The MMR vaccine is a vaccine against measles, mumps, and rubella (German measles).    The first dose is generally given to children around 9 to 15 months of age, with a second dose at 15 months to 6 years of age, with at least 4 weeks between the doses.]
  • 3/20/2019 Calif. firefighters cut down on brush, vegetation to reduce wildfire danger by OAN Newsroom
        California is taking a cue from President Trump as the state begins massive efforts to clear out trees and other vegetation before fire season starts.
        Firefighters are laying the ground work as they prepare to be joined by a hundred National Guard service members next month, who have been pulled from the southern border to help.
        The troops will receive training in forest management before they are sent out to clear dead trees, brush, and debris to create fuel breaks.
    FILE – In this Jan. 17, 20014 file photo, firefighters clear brush as they battle the Colby Fire
    near Azusa, Calif. California is calling in the National Guard for the first time to help protect communities from
    wildfires like the one that destroyed much of the city of Paradise last fall. (AP Photo/Jae C. Hong, File)     Fire officials said this will slow the spread of future fires by limiting the amount of dry kindling, which is on the ground.
        “What we’re doing is we’re treating the ridge line by reducing the impact a fire might have if it started below us or on the other side of the ridge from us here,” explained Cal Fire Battalion.    “It buys us time to be able to get people up here to fight the fire, it buys the residents that live up here an opportunity to get out.”
        The National Guard members will be split into five different groups after training to assist in fire prevention efforts across the state.     Following last year’s fire in Paradise that killed 85 people, President Trump blamed “gross mismanagement” of the state’s forests for the deaths he claimed were preventable.
    [Too little too late for those who died because of poor policies of the dominate Democrat in California, as they could have spent money on that instead of illegal aliens.]
  • 3/20/2019 Controversial budget cuts could deplete black lung medical treatment fund by 2020 by OAN Newsroom
        With a rise in black lung cases, Congress is under pressure to restore full funding to a program supporting coal miners.    Roughly 25,000 retired miners depend on the Black Lung Disability Trust Fund that was established in 1978, with that number increasing in recent years.
        Doctors working with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) are also seeing younger miners diagnosed with the disease, especially in big coal country states like Kentucky.
        “We’re looking at men in their 30s and their 40s on oxygen, being evaluated for lung transplant, which was unheard of even when I was worked in the mines or my father worked in the mines,” stated Dr. Brandon Crumm.    “We never saw or heard of anything like that and we were around it every single day.”
    Dr. Brandon Crum points to the X-ray of a black lung patient at his office in Pikeville, Ky., on Thursday, Jan. 24, 2019.
    Crum has seen a wave of younger miners with black lung disease at his clinic since 2015. (AP Photo/Dylan Lovan)     Black lung restricts lung function due to scaring left behind from years of inhaling coal and silica dust.    It affects about one-in-five workers who spent an average of 25 years in the Central Appalachian mines.
        Virginia native and ex-miner John Robinson is one of those five people.    His monthly bills total around $4,000 for critical machinery just to help him breathe.
        “I use oxygen, three-percent of oxygen, and a CPAP every night and then during the day,” he explained.    “If I get out here and get myself messed up, get short of wind, I have to come in the house and use my oxygen.”
        A federal watchdog decried cutting taxes on coal companies over concerns it would hurt the miners disability fund.
        Back in January, they warned the trust is at risk of depletion by 2020 if Congress failed to extend or increase taxes on coal production.    However, the industry disagrees and has argued the program’s financial struggles are a result of government mismanagement and fraud.
        The Disability Fund provides monthly payments and treatments to black lung sufferers, and is largely financed by taxes on coal production.
        Lawmakers on Capitol Hill are said to be in talks to enact legislation to restore the coal tax over the next decade.    However, Washington’s treatment of the nation’s miners leaves Robinson with harsh words of criticism.
        “They’re pretty important, coal miners are, but they just ain’t being done right,” he stated.    “They’re being robbed, they really are being robbed.”
    Retired coal miner John Robinson displays his mining helmet at his home in Coeburn, Va., on
    Thursday, Jan. 24, 2019. Robinson was 47 when he was diagnosed with black lung disease, part of a new generation of
    black lung sufferers who are contracting the deadly disease at younger ages. (AP Photo/Dylan Lovan) [Here we go again which Congress is getting rid of it?]
  • 3/20/2019 Rescue teams race to save hundreds trapped by Mozambique cyclone by Emma Rumney
    A general view of the damage after a cyclone swept through Beira, Mozambique in this aerial
    drone video taken March 18, 2019. IFRC/Red Cross Climate Centre via REUTERS     BEIRA, Mozambique (Reuters) – Aid workers rushed to save people trapped by floods around the Mozambican port city of Beira on Wednesday, after a powerful cyclone killed hundreds and left a trail of destruction across swathes of southeast Africa.
        Some survivors were still clinging onto trees or roofs, waiting for rescue teams almost a week after the storm first struck.    Roads around Mozambique’s port city of Beira were swamped and it was raining heavily, complicating rescue efforts and meaning aid had to be flown in by helicopter or plane.
        Cyclone Idai lashed Beira with winds of up to 170 kph (105 mph) last Thursday, then moved inland to Zimbabwe and Malawi, flattening buildings and putting the lives of millions at risk.
        At least 200 people have died in Mozambique and 98 in Zimbabwe, but the death toll is likely to rise as rescuers are still finding bodies.
        Mozambique, whose tiny $13 billion economy is still recovering from a currency collapse and debt default, has declared a national state of emergency as it faces catastrophic flooding in Idai’s wake.
        The worst-hit areas were close to the Buzi river west of Beira, said Caroline Haga, an official with the International Federation of the Red Cross.    Two rivers, including the Buzi, burst their banks after the storm dumped rain on Zimbabwe and Malawi at the weekend, sending torrents of water into Mozambique and creating a “second emergency.”
        Aid agencies changed tack from dealing with a situation mostly involving damage to property and infrastructure caused by the cyclone to facing something much more serious.
        “The flooding is completely different in that this is now a matter of life or death,” Haga said.
        Rescuers dropped high-energy biscuits, water purification tablets and other supplies to people surrounded by nothing but water and reddish-brown mud on Wednesday, she said.     The floods have also brought the threat of waterborne and respiratory diseases, including pneumonia.
        Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi, who declared three days of national mourning starting on Wednesday, has said the eventual death toll from the cyclone and ensuing floods could rise to more than 1,000.
        Travis Trower, principal of Rescue South Africa, said many people remained trapped on islands of land around Beira but that the “acute rescue phase” – pulling people from rooftops and trees – was largely complete.
        Trower described scenes where mothers passed him their children from trees and crowds of people swarmed around rescue helicopters when they were able to land.
        On Tuesday, rescuers saved 167 people around Beira with the help of South African Air Force helicopters.
        Portuguese Foreign Minister Augusto Santos Silva said the families of 30 Portuguese citizens in Beira had not been able to contact their loved ones, raising concerns about their safety.    He said several dozen Portuguese had lost their homes.
        Around 2,500 Portuguese citizens work in Beira, according to the government.
    ‘MOURNING AND DEVASTATION’
        In eastern Zimbabwe, grieving families rushed to bury their dead because the cyclone had knocked out power supplies and put mortuaries out of action.
        Zimbabwean President Emmerson Mnangagwa said on a visit to the town of Chimanimani that his government would ensure houses were built with stronger materials in future.    Many in rural Zimbabwe cannot afford cement to build their houses, leaving them vulnerable to torrential rain and wind.
        Malawi has not released details of casualties from the storm, which weakened as it moved further inland. More than 50 people died in floods the week before the cyclone hit.
        Beira, a low-lying city of 500,000 people, is home to Mozambique’s second-largest port and serves as a gateway to landlocked countries in the region.
        Drone footage showed residents of a shantytown there picking through wreckage and trying to drag plastic sheeting over their ruined homes.    The film, released by the Red Cross, showed the settlement pockmarked with empty plots where whole buildings had been blown off their foundations.
        “Great floods have sowed mourning and devastation in various areas of Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi,” Pope Francis said on Wednesday.    “I express my pain and closeness to those dear people.”
        Aid groups have struggled to reach survivors trapped in more remote areas of Mozambique where some villages are submerged.
        The United Nations children’s fund, UNICEF, estimated that 260,000 children were at risk from the devastation, and the World Food Programme said it was trying to reach 500,000 people with immediate food assistance.
        The cyclone also knocked out Mozambican electricity exports to South Africa, exacerbating power cuts that are straining businesses in Africa’s most industrialized economy.
        The EU, Britain and United Arab Emirates have donated millions of dollars of aid each to Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe for emergency shelters, hygiene, sanitation and healthcare.    Portugal is sending 35 soldiers and a team from the country’s National Republican Guard, its foreign minister said.
        U.S. energy firm ExxonMobil, which is working on developing giant gas deposits off northern Mozambique, said it would donate $300,000 to relief efforts.
        Those gas deposits – in an area largely out of the way of the cyclone – could revolutionize the Mozambican economy by turning it into a major exporter of liquefied natural gas (LNG).
        Mozambique’s economy slowed sharply when commodity prices fell in 2014 and was dealt another blow in 2016, when the government admitted to $1.4 billion of previously undisclosed loans.    The disclosure prompted the International Monetary Fund and foreign donors to cut off support.
    (Additional reporting by Manuel Mucari in Maputo, MacDonald Dzirutwe in Harare, Frank Phiri in Blantyre, Catarina Demony in Lisbon, Philip Pullella in Rome, Tom Miles in Geneva and Catarina Demony in Lisbon; Writing by Alexander Winning; Editing by Kevin Liffey and Frances Kerry)
  • 3/21/2019 There is death all over’: Cyclone Idai toll rises above 300
        CHIMANIMANI, Zimbabwe – Mozambique began three days of national mourning Wednesday for more than 200 victims of Cyclone Idai, while the death toll in neighboring Zimbabwe rose to more than 100 from one of the most destructive storms to strike southern Africa in decades.    Torrential rains were expected to continue into Thursday and floodwaters were still rising, according to aid groups trying to get food to survivors.    It will be days before Mozambique’s inundated plains drain toward the Indian Ocean.
  • 3/21/2019 Aid workers widen search for Mozambique cyclone survivors, death toll mounts by Emma Rumney
    Members of the rescue team wear masks as they prepare to offload a body retrieved from areas flooded in
    the aftermath of Cyclone Idai in Chimanimani, Zimbabwe, March 21, 2019. REUTERS/Philimon Bulawayo     BEIRA, Mozambique (Reuters) – Rescue workers widened their search in Mozambique and Zimbabwe on Thursday for survivors of devastating floods following a cyclone that ripped through southern Africa a week ago, killing hundreds and destroying buildings and farmland.
        The death toll in Mozambique has risen to 217 and around 15,000 people, many of them very ill, still need to be rescued, Land and Environment Minister Celso Correia said, though rescue workers continue to find bodies and the toll could rise sharply.
        In neighboring Zimbabwe, the death toll jumped to 139. The United Nations World Food Programme (WFP), which is coordinating food drops across the region, said 200,000 people in Zimbabwe would need urgent food aid for three months.
        In Malawi, 56 people have been confirmed dead so far.
        A key priority now is pushing into remaining areas affected by the flooding that have not yet been explored in search of people needing rescue, said Connor Hartnady, leader of a South African rescue task force.
        Helicopters ferried people, many plucked from roofs and tree-tops where they had fled to evade the turbid waters and reddish-brown mud, to the port city of Beira, the main headquarters for the huge rescue operation.
        One helicopter returned with four children and two women, rescued from a small football stadium in an otherwise submerged village.    One young child, with a broken leg, was alone, and hung limp from exhaustion as rescuers laid him on the grass before moving him into an ambulance.
        An elderly lady sat, dazed, nearby with two of her grandchildren.    All three were unharmed, but the children had lost their mother.
        With flood waters starting to recede, the priority now is to deliver food and other supplies to people rather than take people out of the affected areas, although that is also still happening, Environment Minister Correia said.
        Some 3,000 people have so far been rescued in Mozambique, which declared a state of emergency on Monday.
    RACE AGAINST TIME
        “Our biggest fight is against the clock,” Correia told a news conference, adding that authorities were using all means possible to save lives and were working 24 hours per day.
        Cyclone Idai lashed Beira with winds of up to 170 km per hour (105 miles per hour) a week ago, then moved inland to Zimbabwe and Malawi, flattening buildings and putting the lives of millions at risk.
        The WFP stepped up airdrops of high-energy biscuits to isolated pockets of people stranded by the floodwaters and delivered food parcels to displaced families sheltering in schools and other public buildings in the town of Dondo, 45 km (30 miles) northeast of Beira.
        Beira, a low-lying city of 500,000 people, is home to Mozambique’s second-largest port and serves as a gateway to landlocked countries in the region.
        South African team leader Hartnady said another priority on Thursday was moving people from a basketball stadium near the Buzi river – one of the worst affected areas – to a village on higher ground, northwest of Beira, where aid organizations are setting up a temporary camp with a capacity of up to 600.
        Mozambican President Filipe Nyusi, who declared three days of national mourning starting on Wednesday, has said the eventual death toll from the cyclone and ensuing floods could rise to more than 1,000.
        Mozambique’s tiny $13 billion economy is still recovering from a currency collapse and debt default.
    (Additional reporting by Nqobile Dludla in Johannesburg, Macdonald Dzirutwe in Harare, Philimon Bulawayo in Chimanimani, Zimbabwe; Writing by Gareth Jones; Editing by Raissa Kasolowsky)
  • 3/21/2019 China’s nationwide pollution readings rise 5 percent in January-February
    People are seen in a traditional alleyway, or Hutong, on a polluted day in central Beijing, China March 2, 2019. REUTERS/Jason Lee     SHANGHAI (Reuters) – China’s average concentrations of lung-damaging particles known as PM2.5 rose by 5.2 percent in the first two months of the year, the environment ministry said on Thursday, casting doubt over the country’s ability to meet winter targets.
        The nation’s average PM2.5 readings came in at 61 micrograms per cubic meter for January and February, according to a Ministry of Ecology and Environment survey of 337 cities, with only 83 reaching the national standard of 35 micrograms.
        Levels of PM2.5 at 28 cities in the key pollution control region of Beijing-Tianjin-Hebei soared 24 percent over the two-month period from the same time a year ago to an average of 108 micrograms, more than 10 times 10 micrograms recommended as safe by the World Health Organization.
        Meanwhile, PM2.5 levels in the 11 cities of the Fenwei Plain, another major smog control zone, surged by 26.6 percent over the period, hitting an average of 119 micrograms.
        China forced smog-prone northern cities to implement special emissions restrictions from October 2018 to March 2019 in order to offset rising levels of coal combustion from state heating systems during the winter.
        But Reuters calculations based on official data showed that PM2.5 readings in the 39 key northern cities still rose 13 percent over the October-February period.
        The 39 cities are under pressure to make year-on-year PM2.5 cuts of around 3 percent from October to March, but Reuters calculations show that only three – Changzhi and Luliang in Shanxi province, and Jining in Shandong – were on course to meet their targets at the end of last month.
        The government has previously blamed unfavorable weather conditions for the poor air quality over the period, saying that “a weak El Nino effect” and a subsequent increase in temperature and humidity has made it harder to disperse emissions.
        The ministry has promised to crack down on regions that fail to meet targets, regardless of weather conditions, but it remains unclear what punishments they will face.
        The provinces of Hebei and Shanxi, where eight of China’s smoggiest cities were located in 2018, have established a “punishment and reward system” in which the worst-performing districts pay fines to regions that have performed the best.
        On Wednesday, Hebei published a list of 14 districts that failed to meet 2018 targets, including major industrial zones in Tangshan, China’s biggest steel-producing city.
        Communist Party bosses from each of the 14 districts were summoned to the provincial environmental protection bureau to receive public criticism, the provincial government said in a notice.
    (Reporting by David Stanway; Editing by Tom Hogue and Richard Pullin)
  • 3/21/2019 Germany urged to champion global treaty to ban ‘killer robots
    Activists from the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots, a coalition of non-governmental organisations opposing lethal autonomous
    weapons or so-called 'killer robots', stage a protest at Brandenburg Gate in Berlin, Germany, March, 21, 2019. REUTERS/Annegret Hilse     BERLIN (Reuters) – Nobel Peace Prize laureate Jody Williams and other activists warned on Thursday that fully autonomous weapons could be deployed in just 3-4 years and urged Germany to lead an international campaign for a ban on so-called “killer robots.”
        Williams, who won the Nobel in 1997 for leading efforts to ban landmines, told reporters Germany should take bold steps to ensure that humans remained in control of lethal weapons.    “You cannot lead from the rear,” she said.
        Critics fear that the increasingly autonomous drones, missile defense systems and tanks made possible by new artificial intelligence could turn rogue in a cyber-attack or as a result of programming errors.
        German Foreign Minister Heiko Maas called last week for action to ensure human control of lethal weapons, but is pushing a non-binding declaration rather than a global ban, given opposition by the United States, Russia and China.
        The United Nations and European Union have called for a global ban, but discussions so far have not yielded a clear commitment to conclude a treaty.
        Activists from over 100 non-governmental groups gathered in Berlin this week to pressure Maas and the German government to take more decisive action after twice endorsing a ban on fully autonomous weapons in their 2013 and 2018 coalition accords.
        They rallied at Berlin’s Brandenburg Gate, with a life-sized robot telling onlookers: “Not all robots will be friendly.    Stop killer robots now.”     “If Germany showed leadership and got behind it, we’d soon have the rest of Europe behind it,” said Noel Sharkey, a leading roboticist and co-founder of the Campaign to Stop Killer Robots.
        He said it was only a matter of years before fully autonomous weapons could be deployed in battle given rapid advances in artificial intelligence and other technologies.
    (Reporting by Andrea Shalal; Editing by Mark Heinrich)
    [IF YOU GET RID OF ME, I WILL BE BACK SAID THE TERMINATOR.].
  • 3/22/2019 Death toll from cyclone surpasses 500 in southern Africa
        CHIMANIMANI, Zimbabwe – A week after Cyclone Idai lashed southern Africa, flooding still raged Thursday as torrential rains caused a dam to overflow in Zimbabwe, threatening riverside populations.    The confirmed death toll in Zimbabwe, neighboring Mozambique and Malawi surpassed 500, with hundreds more feared dead in towns and villages that were completely submerged.    Aid agencies and several governments continued to step up their deployments, with helicopters in short supply for hundreds of thousands of people.
  • 3/22/2019 China urges subsidies to help disease-hit pig farms restock
    FILE PHOTO: A pig is seen on a farm at a village in Changtu county, Liaoning province,
    China January 17, 2019. REUTERS/Ryan Woo/File Photo     BEIJING (Reuters) – China has urged rural governments to offer temporary subsidies to pig breeding farms and large-scale producers to help stabilize hog production, as fears grow about the impact of a severe disease outbreak on pork supplies.
        Factory prices for pork, by far the country’s most popular meat, have jumped sharply in recent weeks, while official figures show the size of the country’s pig herd has slumped by nearly 17 percent on a year ago.
        While the world’s biggest pork consumer has reported 114 outbreaks of highly contagious African swine fever since the disease was first detected last August, many in the industry believe it is worse than officially reported.
        The agriculture ministry on Friday urged provincial agriculture departments to release temporary subsidies for breeding farms “as soon as possible” to help them resume production.
        In a suite of measures, it also called on local authorities to issue timely compensation for infected farms, and to help them improve infrastructure to boost their biosecurity, such as adding high-temperature pressure disinfection equipment.
        It also urged more support for producers seeking to scale up and more land for large farms, and warned banks not to suspend or limit loans to the industry.
    FINANCIAL STRAIN
        The steps come after ministry figures showed the number of live pigs fell 16.6 percent at the end of February from a year earlier, and the number of sows fell 19.1 per cent.
        Average lean pork factory prices in 16 provinces rose 36.9 percent year on year in the week to March 15, according to data compiled by the ministry and external consulting firm Zhuochuang.
        Despite the new measures, many large farms are unwilling to restock farms that have had outbreaks of disease, fearing fresh outbreaks, two industry insiders told Reuters.
        The disease kills around 90 percent of infected pigs and there is no cure or vaccine.    It is not harmful to humans.
        The breadth of the outbreak has also strained provincial budgets.    In many cases, authorities are not issuing compensation to farms impacted by the disease, said Yao Guiling, an analyst with China-America Commodity Data Analytics Co Ltd.
        Rabobank expects China’s hog production to fall by more than 20 percent in 2019, which threatens to send prices soaring.
        Supplies from abroad will have only a limited impact on reducing shortages in China, said Yao.
        “There’s quite a gap between the volume [from overseas] and our annual production of more than 50 million tonnes, so pork prices could rise quite severely,” she said, estimating available global supplies at around 2 million tonnes.
    (Reporting by Dominique Patton; editing by Richard Pullin)
  • 3/22/2019 Mozambican President: Death toll from Cyclone Idai could reach 1K by OAN Newsroom
        The president of Mozambique is predicting the death toll could rise to over 1,000 in the wake of a powerful cyclone.
        His estimate was echoed Friday by the Red Cross as officials announced over 550 bodies have been recovered so far, with thousands more still in need of rescue.
        Dozens of villages remain submerged with flood water have been made worse by torrential rain showers stretching all the way into neighboring Zimbabwe.
        Damage to the country’s infrastructure has made boats and air support critical for rescuing survivors as well as for delivering humanitarian aid.
    A helicopter carries various food stuffs and supplies in Nyamatanda about 50 kilometres from Beira, in Mozambique,
    Thursday March, 21, 2019. Some hundreds are dead, many more still missing and thousands at risk from massive flooding across
    the region including Mozambique, Malawi and Zimbabwe caused by Cyclone Idai.(AP Photo/Tsvangirayi Mukwazhi)     “I estimate five to 10,000 people need immediate evacuation.    There isn’t much helicopters…you need those helicopters that can carry large capacity.    We’ve got enough search and rescue personnel that can go out and medical doctors to provide treatment, in the interim.” — Ahmed Bahm, head rescuer – Gift of the Givers Foundation.
        Shipments of humanitarian aid have begun arriving in the region from several European nations.
        Zimbabwe has designated this weekend as an official mourning period for the 259 lives lost in their country alone.
  • 3/22/2019 Cholera cases reported as hunger, disease stalk African cyclone survivors by Emma Rumney
    Survivors of Cyclone Idai, listen to a volunteer from Mozambique Red Cross, after arriving to an evacuation centre in
    Beira, Mozambique, March 21, 2019. Denis Onyodi/Red Cross Red Crescent Climate Centre/Handout via REUTERS     BEIRA, Mozambique (Reuters) – Cholera cases were reported on Friday in the Mozambican city of Beira, adding a risk of deadly illnesses for hundreds of thousands of people who are scrambling for shelter, food and water after catastrophic flooding in southern Africa.
        “There is growing concern among aid groups on the ground of potential disease outbreaks,” the International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said.
        “Already, some cholera cases have been reported in Beira along with an increasing number of malaria infections among people trapped by the flooding,” it said in a statement.
        Cyclone Idai battered Beira, a port city of 500,000 people, with strong winds and torrential rains last week, before moving inland to neighboring Zimbabwe, where it flattened homes and flooded communities, and Malawi.
        The storm killed 242 people in Mozambique and 259 in Zimbabwe, and numbers were expected to rise, relief agencies said.    In Malawi, 56 people died in heavy rains before the onset of Idai.
        Cholera is spread by faeces in sewage-contaminated water or food, and outbreaks can develop quickly in a humanitarian crisis where sanitation systems are disrupted.    It can kill within hours if left untreated.
        As survivors gathered in informal camps and health officials warned of the danger of cholera and other diseases, UNICEF Executive Director Henrietta Fore said the situation on the ground was critical with no electricity or running water.
        “Hundreds of thousands of children need immediate help,” she said, estimating 1.7 million people were affected by the storm.
        Around 45 km (28 miles) west of Beira, in the village of Guara Guara, the government set up a makeshift camp for people rescued nearby, with little water and no toilets.
        As for many such camps, progress was slow as aid had to be delivered by helicopter.
        “The help is coming, but it’s coming very slowly,” said Esther Zinge, 60, from near the town of Buzi, adding that what did arrive had to be given to children first.
        “The conditions are terrible, and more people keep coming.”
        On a beach in Beira, where the Red Cross estimated 90 percent of the city was damaged or destroyed, survivors clutching infants and bags disembarked from rescue boats beside a ship marooned on the sand and began receiving Red Cross help.
        United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said he was saddened by the “heart-wrenching images of human suffering” and urged the world to step up support for the relief effort.
    “CONDITIONS TERRIBLE”
        In Zimbabwe’s Coppa Rusitu Valley, a township in Chimanimani near the Mozambican border, hundreds of homes were flattened by large rocks and mudslide from a nearby mountain, burying some residents, who never stood a chance as the cyclone unleashed its fury at night when most were sleeping.
        Relatives and rescuers were digging through the debris, hoping to find bodies, but some of the rocks were so big they need blasting, a Reuters witness said.    Most people lost relatives, workmates or friends in the township, which also housed government workers, including police.
        President Emmerson Mnangagwa said on Thursday night he had come face to face with horrific accounts of people grieving the loss of family and friends in Chimanimani.
        Some survivors have taken refuge at churches and centers offering temporary shelter as they deal with the trauma of their losses while private citizens, international aid agencies and the government rushed humanitarian aid to affected areas.
        Zimbabwean Energy Minister Joram Gumbo said the pipeline bringing fuel from Beira had not been affected by the cyclone but the docking terminals at Beira port had been damaged.
        He said Zimbabwe had 62 days supply of petrol and 32 days for diesel, which is in short supply and has led to long queues in the capital.    In the city of Mutare, near Mozambique, diesel shortages were worse, according to a Reuters witness.
    FEW HELICOPTERS
        In Beira, Saviano Abreu of the U.N. humanitarian arm OCHA said the main problem with getting aid to relief camps outside of Beira was that they could be reached only by helicopter, since floods had cut off roads, and helicopters were scarce.
        Large parts of Beira lacked running water, but everyone affected was getting 20 liters of water for washing, cooking and drinking.
        Briefing his team late on Thursday night, Connor Hartnady, rescue operations task force leader for Rescue South Africa, said Beira residents were getting fed up with shortages.
        “There have been three security incidents today, all food related,” he told his team, without giving further details.
        Commenting on Beira, U.N. humanitarian spokesman Jens Laerke said if people were desperate to get aid, that should be treated as part of the community response and not as a security matter.
        “These are desperate people,” Laerke said.    “I don’t think anybody would blame a desperate mother or father who have children who do not have clean water to drink or food to eat who grab it from wherever they find it in a shop.”
        The storm’s rains caused the Buzi and Pungwe rivers, whose mouths are in the Beira area, to burst their banks.
        Roads into Beira were cut off by the storm and wide swathes of the Indian Ocean port city lacked power.
    (Reporting by Emma Rumney; Additional reporting by MacDonald Dzirutwe in Harare, Philimon Bulawayo in Chimanimani, Zimbabwe, Tom Miles in Geneva, Michelle Nichols in New York; Writing by William Maclean and Frances Kerry; Editing by Tiisetso Motsoeneng, Raissa Kasolowsky and Mark Heinrich)
  • 3/22/2019 Shortages of everything, and worries about relatives, for Mozambique flood survivors by Emma Rumney
    People take shelter after Cyclone Idai in a secondary school in Guara Guara outside
    Beira, Mozambique, March 22, 2019. REUTERS/Emma Rumney     GUARA GUARA, Mozambique (Reuters) – At a camp near the city of Beira for people rescued from Mozambique’s catastrophic flooding, residents were dealing on Friday with worries about their future and shortages of pretty much everything – water, food and medicines.
        Also, painfully, some of them lacked information about how their relatives were faring.
        Aid organizations such as the World Food Programme and Red Cross are delivering food, water, shelter and other basic supplies to the camp at Guara Guara, which was set up by the government, and scores of others like it in the flood zone around Beira.
        But with roads cut off, progress is slow.    Camps like the one at Guara Guara, 45 km (30 miles) west of Beira, can be reached only by helicopter.    There are a limited number of craft available and they are in huge demand.
        Fernando Marevere, a local village chief, said the main concern for new arrivals at Guara Guara was food and medicines, which were both in short supply.
        Eight large tents were sent to the camp on Wednesday, but on Friday most people were outside in the blazing sun, or huddling into small patches of shade cast by the branches of sparse trees.
        People also took shelter in the village’s secondary school – whose roof was still intact – sitting or slumped, head down, at its wooden desks.    A number of elderly women were curled up on their side on the dirt floor.
        Fresh water was in low supply and there were no toilets.    The camp’s residents, numbering in the hundreds, washed in a stream nearby.
        Medical tents were small and cramped.
        A young boy bawled as doctors worked on a deep cut on his foot, as a family friend held him still and shielded his face from the gore.
        Augusto Jose, a pharmacy technician who had come from Beira to help, told Reuters the main concern was malaria, and how to diagnose it with so few tests at hand.
        Esther Zinge, 60, from near the town of Buzi, had not eaten anything yet on Friday.    She had missed breakfast while waiting in line with her husband for the doctor, because he was unwell.
        “The help is coming, but it’s coming very slowly,” she said, adding that what did arrive had to be given to children first.
        “We had to ask a local hospital for soya milk so we can stretch out the food.    All we’ve had so far is biscuits,” she said.    “The conditions are terrible, and more people keep coming.”
        Cyclone Idai pummeled the port city of Beira and its low-lying surrounds last week with ferocious winds and tore inland, dumping torrential rains and causing massive flooding in swathes of Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi.
        The storm killed 242 people in Mozambique and 259 in Zimbabwe, and numbers were expected to rise, relief agencies said.    In Malawi, 56 died in heavy rains before the onset of Idai.
    ‘MISSING FAMILIES’
        Left with nothing, many people at Guara Guara were concerned for their future or the health of their small children.    But the biggest fear, a number of people said, was for relatives and friends they had not heard from since the waters started rising.
        There is no electricity, phones or internet at the camp.
        “I could escape, but my nephew didn’t because he was not able to walk.    He was sick and now I don’t know where he is,” said Zinge.
        Louisa Ndena, 60, was sitting on the ground in a white aid tent surrounded by family members and toddlers.
        “Besides our missing families, the thing we are most worried about is disease,” she said, explaining that there are no toilets, and if the village’s residents would not let them use theirs, they use bushes for privacy.
        The International Committee of the Red Cross said on Friday its relief efforts included sending teams to the region to help families without access to telephones or the internet find their missing relatives.
        “The agony of not knowing what happened to your loved ones in a disaster like Cyclone Idea is indescribable,” said Diane Araujo, an ICRC delegate deploying to Beira.
        At Guara Guara, Albino Jose Albino, 18, was alone in the camp aside from friends, without an idea about what happened to his mother or seven siblings.
        He too complained about a lack of food, water and shelter, but was more angry that he had no way to register his family as missing.
        “They are not giving us details about our families, our lost families,” he said.    “Someone should be responsible for this.”
    (Additional reporting by Tom Miles in Geneva; Writing by Frances Kerry; Editing by Toby Chopra)
  • 3/23/2019 Mozambique cyclone death toll jumps to more than 400
    Survivors move to high ground at Peacock growth point in Chimanimani, near the
    Mozambique border, Zimbabwe, March 22, 2019. REUTERS/Philimon Bulawayo     BEIRA (Reuters) – The death toll in Mozambique after a cyclone tore through southern Africa and triggered devastating floods has jumped to 417, Land and Environment Minister Celso Correia said on Saturday, adding that the situation remained critical.
        Cyclone Idai lashed the Mozambican port city of Beira with winds of up to 170 km per hour (105 miles per hour) last week, then moved inland to Zimbabwe and Malawi, flattening buildings and putting the lives of millions at risk.
        “The situation is getting better, still critical, but it’s getting better,” Correia said, adding that it was becoming easier to work on the ground.
        “But unfortunately the number of dead is increasing, we have now 417 people who have lost their lives.”
        The storm’s rains caused the Buzi and Pungwe rivers to burst their banks.
        United Nations Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) said on Saturday that the Buzi and Zambezi rivers were at risk of breaking their banks again.
        “We’re going to have to wait until the flood waters recede until we know the full expanse of the toll on the people of Mozambique,” OCHA coordinator Sebastian Rhodes Stampa said.
        The storm has also killed 259 in Zimbabwe, and the number was expected to rise, relief agencies said.    In Malawi, 56 people died in heavy rains before the onset of Idai.
        The International Federation of the Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) said on Friday that cases of cholera have been reported in Beira, a port city of 500,000 people.
        Both Correia and Rhodes Stampa said that cholera and other water-borne diseases were not yet a problem, though floodwaters were dirty and the risk of disease spreading was high.
        Cholera is spread by faeces in sewage contaminating water or food, and outbreaks can develop quickly in a humanitarian crisis where sanitation systems are disrupted.    It can kill within hours if left untreated.
    (Reporting by Emma Rumney; Writing by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo; Editing by Louise Heavens)
  • 3/23/2019 Death toll from southern Africa cyclone, floods exceeds 700 by Emma Rumney and Stephen Eisenhammer
    Survivors move to high ground at Peacock growth point in Chimanimani, near the
    Mozambique border, Zimbabwe, March 22, 2019. REUTERS/Philimon Bulawayo     BEIRA, Mozambique (Reuters) – Mozambique reported scores more deaths on Saturday from a cyclone and floods around southern Africa that have killed at least 732 people and left thousands in desperate need of help, many on rooftops and trees.
        Cyclone Idai lashed the Mozambican port city of Beira with winds of up to 170 km per hour (105 miles per hour) last week, then moved inland to Zimbabwe and Malawi, swamping populations and devastating homes.
        Mozambique’s death toll rose to 417 from 242, Land and Environment Minister Celso Correia said.
        “The situation is getting better, still critical, but it’s getting better,” he told reporters at the airport in Beira that has become a center for aid operations.
        The storm has also killed 259 in Zimbabwe, while in Malawi 56 people died in heavy rains ahead of the cyclone.
        In all three countries, survivors have been digging through rubble to search for victims, and scrambling for shelter, food and water, while governments and aid agencies rush in help.
        “All our food got wet, we didn’t know where to go with the children.    We don’t have anything,” said Mimi Manuel, a 26-year-old mother of four who lost her home and was sitting on the floor of a makeshift shelter in a primary school in Beira.
        At the refuge, families cooked with wood from trees ripped up by the storm, as toddlers played around battered school desks. Manuel wore a necklace with the word “Hope.”
    DESTROYED HOUSES
        “When it all started, people started screaming,” another survivor Dina Fiegado, 18, said, describing how sheet rooves blew off and rough walls collapsed in the sea-edge community of Praia Nova, where residents said about 50 people died.
        “Some people tried to escape, some people tried to stay at home.”
        The Mozambican minister said some 1,500 people were in need of immediate rescue from rooftops and trees.    Helicopters and boats have been carrying people to safety.
        The United Nations’ humanitarian office warned that more flooding may come as heavy rains inland poured into the low-lying Beira area and nearby dams filled up threatening to burst the Buzi and Pungwe rivers again.
        “We’re going to have to wait until the flood waters recede until we know the full expanse of the toll on the people of Mozambique,” said U.N. Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) coordinator Sebastian Rhodes Stampa.
        Some cholera cases have been reported.
        Left with nothing, many survivors were fretting for their future, while others mourned losses.
        At Beira’s central morgue, 56-year old Mika Masseera, grieved for his severely weakened mother, Sumbo Mufucho, 73, who died in hospital following a rescue after she had clung to a tree for two days surrounded by floodwaters.
    (Writing by Olivia Kumwenda-Mtambo and Andrew Cawthorne; Editing by Angus MacSwan)
  • 3/25/2019 Floods kill at least 18 in southern Iran, provinces on alert by Parisa Hafezi
    Damaged vehicles are seen after a flash flooding In Shiraz, Iran, March 25, 2019. Tasnim News Agency/Handout via REUTERS     DUBAI (Reuters) – At least 18 people were killed and around 100 others were injured in flash floods in Iran’s southern Fars province, the semi-official Tasnim news agency reported on Monday, with more rain forecast following days of devastating floods in the north.
        Some 26 provinces out of 31 now have flood warnings due to torrential rain in a country more accustomed to drought.    State TV said villages near rivers and dams in several provinces had been evacuated for fear of the rising water.
        Authorities have warned about possibility of floods in the capital Tehran as well as in the oil-rich southern province of Khuzestan in the next 48 hours.
        Pragmatist President Hassan Rouhani’s hardline rivals have criticized his government for doing too little, too late to help.
        The hardline judiciary said on Sunday the government’s handling of the disaster was being investigated, the judiciary’s Mizan news agency reported.
        “i>Any shortcomings regarding the handling of the floods, failure to provide relief and aid to the survivors will be investigated,” it quoted judiciary chief Ebrahim Raisi as saying. Hardline cleric Raisi lost the 2017 presidential election, when Rouhani was re-elected.
        The semi-official Fars news agency reported on Monday that Rouhani has returned to Tehran from Iran’s Qeshm Island in the Gulf, where he had been spending the Iranian new year holiday.
        He had been criticized by Iranians on social media for being in the south when flooding was hitting the north of the country.
        His energy minister, Reza Ardakanian, said climate change had caused the floods.    “Climate change is forcing itself on our country.    These floods in Iran are the result of climate change worldwide,” Tasnim quoted him as saying.
        In a rare move, Iran’s top authority, Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, called on the armed forces to help the flood-hit northern provinces, where Iran’s English-language Press TV said five people had been killed.
        Reflecting a long-running struggle between the president and his rivals, Iran’s hardline media have accused the government of reacting too slowly to the floods, while highlighting aid work by the Revolutionary Guards – a rival power center in Iran’s faction-ridden political establishment.
        The spread of flooding to the south follows days of floods since March 19 that affected more than 56,000 people living in 270 villages and small towns in the northern provinces of Golestan and Mazandaran, on the Caspian Sea, TV reported.
        In Shiraz, in the south, Tasnim quoted the head of Iran’s emergency medical services, Pirhossein Kolivand, as saying 18 people had been killing, including four children.    Some 94 were injured in the city in Fars province.
        Iranian media showed pictures and footage of crumpled cars piled up deep in mud and water after floods swept through Shiraz.    Iran’s Students News Agency ISNA said high water had damaged thousands of houses in Shiraz and other towns.
        “We all are going to die. Pray for us.    We are all going to die.    Mother, we all are going to die,” said a woman in a bus caught in the floods in Shiraz, according to a video on Twitter.
        Fars Governor Enayatollah Rahimi told state TV the flooding was under control and rescue and aid workers had been dispatched to the flood-hit areas.
        Kolivand later said one other person was also killed in Sarpol-e Zahab in the western province of Kermanshah and one other person in the western province of Lorestan was killed.
    (Writing by Parisa Hafezi; Editing by Alison Williams)
  • 3/26/2019 Meteor ‘fireball’ is one of largest ever seen by Brett Molina, USA TODAY
        NASA released images of a meteor exploding over the Bering Sea in December in what was the largest such event recorded since 2013.
        The images of the “fireball,” a term used by NASA to describe “exceptionally bright meteors that are spectacular enough to to be seen over a very wide area,” were captured Dec. 18 using instruments on the Terra satellite, the agency said.
        The Multi-angle Imaging Spectro-Radiometer captured an image sequence of the meteor a few minutes after the event, and the Moderate Resolution Imaging SpectroRadiometer captured a color image of remnants of the meteor’s passage, NASA said.
        Last week, NASA revealed that the explosion unleashed energy equivalent to 173 kilotons of TNT, more than 10 times the energy generated by the atomic bomb dropped on Hiroshima in 1945.
        “An event like this might occur two to three times a century,” Lindley Johnson, a planetary defense officer at NASA, told USA TODAY last week.
        NASA said that because of the altitude of the meteor and the remote area, the event did not pose a threat to anyone on the ground.
        The last similar “fireball” event was in 2013, when a meteor exploded in Russia’s Chelyabinsk region and was captured on video by security and dashboard cameras.    Johnson said that meteor generated energy equal to 440 kilotons of TNT.
    The meteor that exploded over the Bering Sea in December unleashed energy equivalent to 173 kilotons of TNT, NASA says. NASA/JPL
  • 3/27/2019 Mozambique confirms first cholera cases in wake of cyclone by Emma Rumney
    People queue for food in a camp for those displaced in the aftermath of Cyclone Idai in
    Beira, Mozambique, March 26, 2019. Picture taken March 26, 2019. REUTERS/Mike Hutchings     BEIRA, Mozambique (Reuters) – Mozambique said on Wednesday five cases of cholera had been confirmed around the badly damaged port city of Beira after a powerful cyclone killed more than 700 people across a swathe of southern Africa.
        Cyclone Idai smashed into Mozambique around midnight on March 14 before tearing through neighboring Zimbabwe and Malawi, displacing hundreds of thousands of people and wrecking an area of 3,000 sq km (1,200 sq miles).
        The relief focus has increasingly turned to preventing or containing what many believe will be inevitable outbreaks of diseases like malaria and cholera.
        “We did the lab tests and can confirm that these five people tested positive for cholera,” Ussein Isse, a senior Mozambican health official, told reporters.    “It will spread.    When you have one case, you have to expect more cases in the community.”
        Health workers were also battling 2,700 cases of acute watery diarrhea – which could be a symptom of cholera – Isse said, adding the government had organized a treatment center for cholera in Beira hospital.
        The World Health Organization is dispatching 900,000 doses of oral cholera vaccine to affected areas from a global stockpile.    The shipment is expected to be sent later this week.
        The death toll in Mozambique from Cyclone Idai has risen to 468, a Mozambican disaster management official said.    That takes the total number of deaths in Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi above 700 people, with many more missing.
    (Reporting by Emma Rumney; Writing by Alexander Winning; Editing by Louise Heavens and Janet Lawrence)
  • 3/27/2019 New Zealand bridge washed away in severe storm
    A bridge over the Waiho River breaks and washes away due to a swelling river, near Franz Josef, New Zealand in
    this still frame taken from social media video dated March 26, 2019. JACOB SCHONBERGER/via REUTERS     (Reuters) – A motorway bridge over a New Zealand river was washed away in a severe rain storm on Tuesday, prompting the authorities to declare a state of emergency.
        The storm battered the west coast of New Zealand’s South Island, forcing 300 km(186 miles) of road to be closed due to flooding, according to media reports.
        Footage shown on local television and distributed on social media showed part of the Waiho Bridge, near the town of Franz Josef, breaking off in torrential river flooding and swaying loose in the rushing water, with the remaining sections soon collapsing.
        In a short video posted on Facebook, Westland Mayor Bruce Smith declared a state of emergency and said the storm was expected to continue for another day.
        “I have concerns about people’s lives in Franz Josef,” Smith said in the message, adding another bridge was also damaged.
        There were no reports of injuries.
        About 50 people, mostly tourists, were staying at a makeshift emergency centre in a local hall to see out the storm, media reported.
        The Meteorological Service of New Zealand said in a statement the storm was “a significant event even by West Coast standards.”
        It added that the New Zealand Transport Agency was advising residents of the South Island’s west coast to avoid all but essential travel.
        The Waiho Bridge has been raised three times since 2002 after flooding left sediment that lifted the river’s floor, media reported.
    (Reporting by Byron Kaye in SYDNEY; Editing by Kim Coghill)
  • 3/27/2019 As I have shown in a previous article that diseases that have been eradicated in the U.S. are recurring because of illegal alien immigration coming into this country without being checked for diseases, because of the Democrats laws they have passed in the last 10 years.    I hope it comes back on them and affects their life somehow so they will get the message of their creation.
    
    • Mumps a contagious viral infection that tends to affect children and causes swelling of the salivary glands but can also affect other organs. Mar 8, 2019 - Outbreaks. The largest outbreak occurred in a close-knit community in northwest Arkansas that resulted in nearly 3,000 cases.    Two large outbreaks from Iowa and Illinois each involved several hundred university students. About half of outbreaks involved greater than 10 cases.
    • Measles a highly contagious virus that starts with fever, runny nose, cough, red eyes, and sore throat, followed by a rash that spreads all over the body. From January 1 to March 14, 2019, 268 individual cases of measles have been confirmed in 15 states.    The states that have reported cases to CDC are Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Texas, and Washington.
    • Rubella also known as German measles or three-day measles, is an infection caused by the rubella virus.    This disease is often mild with half of people not realizing that they are infected. A rash may start around two weeks after exposure and last for three days.
    • The MMR vaccine is a vaccine against measles, mumps, and rubella (German measles).    The first dose is generally given to children around 9 to 15 months of age, with a second dose at 15 months to 6 years of age, with at least 4 weeks between the doses.
        The image below just came out to show you where measles is showing up and as you can see it definitely shows migration from the southwestern states without secure borders is its starting point and I hope that every Democrats children come down with it just to let them know what happens when you ignore a crisis.    God works in mysterious ways just as he did with Ten Plagues before the Exodus, and gives me hope for a "RAPTURE."
        Measles Cases in 2019 from January 1 to March 21, 2019, is 314 individual cases of measles have been confirmed in 15 states.    The states that have reported cases to CDC are Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Georgia, Illinois, Kentucky, Michigan, Missouri, New Hampshire, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Texas, and Washington.
    [AS YOU CAN SEE IN THE ABOVE IMAGE IS NEW MEXICO HAS NO MEASLES TO PROVE MY POINT IN THAT THEY BUILT A WALL SO THAT NO ILLEGAL ALIENS COULD ENTER AND SPREAD THE DISEASES MENTIONED ABOVE AND AS YOU CAN SEE BY THE FOLLOWING ARTICLES IT PROVES THAT POINT AND THEY HAVE TRAVELED ABOVE CALIFORNIA AND GIVEN IT TO OREGON AND WASHINGTON.    PLUS MANY WENT TO THE NEW YORK/CHICAGO AREA SINCE THEY WANT THEM AND THEIR DRUG GANGS AND IT IS SPREADING THERE.].
        Seen at https://www.koat.com/article/border-wall-replacement-along-new-mexicos-border-with-mexico-is-finished/25311792
    11/26/2018 Border wall replacement along New Mexico’s border with Mexico is finished by Christinia Pae, reporter
        While migrant caravan arrivals have not largely been expected at New Mexico's border with Mexico, a border wall improvement project there has been completed.
        "We said we were going to build it, and we built it. And now we're moving on," Chief Border Patrol Agent Aaron A. Hull said.
        In a September news conference, officials with U.S. Border Patrol's El Paso Sector said the 18-to 30-foot-tall bollard-style fencing in Santa Teresa was finished months earlier than projected.
        "We determined that construction of a new barrier would help us reduce illegal entries and make more effective use of our agents and other resources," Hull said.
        It cost approximately $73 million to build the column-style wall that stretches for 20 miles west of the U.S. Customs and Border Protection port of entry in Santa Teresa.    The wall replaces older fencing and vehicle barriers there.
        Meantime, CBP is alerting travelers going through ports of entry in Santa Teresa, El Paso and Tornillo to expect longer wait times due to CBP officers transferring to California and Arizona to support operations there.
        The Pentagon has assigned more than 5,000 troops along the Southwest border in anticipation of the migrant arrivals.
        CBP officials said there have been site assessments along the El Paso Sector, which includes Santa Teresa, but no additional troops have deployed along New Mexico's border.
        The 118 New Mexico National Guard soldiers deployed in the area earlier this year are still there to support Border Patrol operations.
        "It's more important than ever that Congress pass comprehensive immigration reform and fix this broken system," a spokesman for Gov. Susana Martinez said.     State Land Commissioner Aubrey Dunn has claimed the border wall in Santa Teresa was built on state trust land.
        His office plans to auction about 7 acres of land there that includes the border wall.
        Also found at https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/the-new-wall-in-new-mexico-is-real-and-its-20-miles-long I found the following article as dated below if you would like to view it.
    2/20/2019 The new 'wall' in New Mexico is real, and it's 20 miles long by Eddie Scarry
    
  • 3/29/2019 Five states fighting measles outbreaks by Doug Stanglin, USA TODAY
        The number of cases of measles this year in the United States is nearing the total for all of last year, with five states reporting outbreaks in 2019, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
        An outbreak, defined as three or more cases, has been reported in New York State, New York City, Washington, Texas, Illinois and California.
        The 314 cases nationwide as of March 21 is inching closer to the 372 for all of last year.
        In Rockland County, just north of New York, where 155 cases have been confirmed as of Wednesday, County Executive Ed Day declared a state of emergency this week, banning any unvaccinated person under 18 from being in a public place.    Violations are punishable by a $500 fine or six months in jail.
        The ban, which will be in effect for 30 days, prompted a backlash from a small group of anti-vaccination advocates who protested Thursday at the Palisades Center mall in West Nyack in what they dubbed on Facebook a “Rockland County – Unvaccinated Civil Disobedience.”
        “This is about healthy people being quarantined and barred from public places,” said Rita Palma, one of the protesters.    “People have a right to choose for their own children and make their own decisions.”
        Rockland County says the outbreak can be traced to September, with the arrival of an international traveler with a suspected case.
        Infectious disease experts described such broad bans of minors from public places as a potentially unprecedented government action in combating a measles outbreak.
        “It’s not something that I’ve seen before in my professional experience,” said Dr. Jeffrey Duchin, a top public health officer in Seattle.    “What that says to me is that the local public health people feel that they have an extraordinary outbreak on their hands.”
        The CDC blames the outbreaks across the country on two factors: An increase in the number of travelers who bring measles back from abroad, notably Israel and Ukraine, and what it calls the “further spread of measles in U.S. communities with pockets of unvaccinated people.”
    People choosing not to vaccinate have become a global health threat, the World Health Organization says. CHAIDEER MAHYUDDIN/AFP/GETTY IMAGES [DID YOU NOTICE ABOVE THAT THE FAKE NEWS FROM CDC TRIED TO BLAME IT ON THOSE COMING FROM ISRAEL AND UKRAINE INSTEAD OF THE ILLEGAL ALIENS FROM THE SOUTHERN BORDER AS SEEN ABOVE.]
  • 3/28/2019 Asia’s mega-cities need clean energy drive to cope with environmental threats by Henning Gloystein
    People walk on a bridge in front of the financial district of Pudong, which is covered in smog,
    during a polluted day in Shanghai, China November 28, 2018. REUTERS/Aly Song     SINGAPORE (Reuters) – Avoiding threats from climate change and pollution will require Asia’s booming cities to become much more efficient in their use of energy resources, delegates at a city development conference said on Thursday.
        Asia is home to 15 out of the world’s 20 biggest cities, and the United Nations estimates another 2.5 billion people will live in cities by 2050, by far the most in Asia.
        This growth caused serious pollution problems and will challenge transport networks, food supply chains, and energy supplies, the delegates said.
        “Cities occupy 2 to 3 percent of our planet’s surface, yet they consume 70 percent of all energy,” said Soren Kvorning, President for Asia Pacific at Danfoss, a Danish engineering firm with a strong focus on Asia.     “The longer we wait, the higher the cost will be,” he said, adding there were three key improvement areas: building efficiency, cold chains for food supplies and a transition away from fossil fuels in transport.
        Transportation is the biggest contributor to air pollution, which as per the World Health Organization estimates kills 4.2 million people every year.
        “We can no longer stand by and watch.    Electric cars and buses are an attractive option, and cities can also go fully electric in ports,” Kvorning said.     In most cities, buildings are the biggest energy consumers, making investment into better energy efficiency important.
        “Efficiency measures all come back with a return on investment within 2 to 4 years, at current technologies,” he said.
        To improve efficiency, Ang Kian Seng, Director for Environmental Sustainability at Singapore’s Building and Construction Authority, said the government had last year launched a “super low energy program” to cut emissions as far as possible.
        “We will set the highest efficiency standards for these top echelon buildings, and then move the mass population towards that standard,” he said.
        In food supply, Kvorning said a third of all food produced was lost because of lacking cold chains. He estimated current cooling technologies could save 40 percent of the lost food.
        One of the biggest problems is the scope of the problems, the delegates said, with Asian cities – several of which have populations of over 20 million – struggling to provide enough housing, electricity, food and infrastructure.
        “When you’re trying to put out fire, you don’t tend to think about integrated solutions.    That’s a problem,” said Lauren Sorkin, Asia Pacific Director at 100 Resilient Cities, an consultancy.
        Still, change is happening, delegates said, with most major Asian cities now having sustainability plans, with credit readily available.
        “There is more capital available for sustainable solutions than there are projects.    We will see quite a lot of change soon,” said Nicolas Parrot, Asia Pacific Head of Transportation Investment at French bank BNP Paribas.
    (Reporting by Henning Gloystein; additional reporting by Gavin Maguire; Editing by Gopakumar Warrier)
    
    3/28/2019 Fukushima contaminants found as far north as Alaska’s Bering Strait by Yereth Rosen
    FILE PHOTO - The reactor units No.1 to 4 are seen over storage tanks for radioactive water at
    Tokyo Electric Power Co's (TEPCO) tsunami-crippled Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant in Okuma town,
    Fukushima prefecture, Japan February 18, 2019. Picture taken February 18, 2019. REUTERS/Issei Kato     ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) – Radioactive contamination from Japan’s Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant hit by a tsunami in 2011 has drifted as far north as waters off a remote Alaska island in the Bering Strait, scientists said on Wednesday.
        Analysis of seawater collected last year near St. Lawrence Island revealed a slight elevation in levels of radioactive cesium-137 attributable to the Fukushima disaster, the University of Alaska Fairbanks Sea Grant program said.
        “This is the northern edge of the plume,” said Gay Sheffield, a Sea Grant marine advisory agent based in the Bering Sea town of Nome, Alaska.
        The newly detected Fukushima radiation was minute.    The level of cesium-137, a byproduct of nuclear fission, in seawater was just four-tenths as high as traces of the isotope naturally found in the Pacific Ocean.
        Those levels are far too low to pose a health concern, an important point for people living on the Bering Sea coast who subsist on food caught in the ocean, Sheffield said.
        Cesium-137 levels some 3,000-times higher than those found in the Bering Sea are considered safe for human consumption under U.S. Environmental Protection Agency drinking water standards, officials said.
        A 9.0-magnitude quake and tsunami in March 2011 triggered meltdowns at three of the Fukushima Daiichi plant’s six reactors, spewing radiation into the air, soil and ocean and forcing 160,000 residents to flee.
        It was the world’s worst nuclear disaster since Chernobyl 25 years earlier.
    LONG-TERM STUDY
        The results reported on Wednesday came from a long-term but small-scale testing program.
        Water was sampled for several years by Eddie Ungott, a resident of Gambell village on the northwestern tip of St. Lawrence Island.    The island, though part of the state of Alaska, is physically closer to Russia than to the Alaska mainland, and residents are mostly Siberian Yupik with relatives in Russia.
        Fukushima-linked radionuclides have been found as far away as Pacific waters off the U.S. West Coast, British Columbia and in the Gulf of Alaska.
        Until the most recent St. Lawrence Island sample was tested by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution, the only other known sign of Fukushima radiation in the Bering Sea was detected in 2014 by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
        NOAA scientists found trace amounts of Fukushima-linked radionuclides in muscle tissue of fur seals on Alaska’s St. Paul Island in the southern Bering Sea.    There was no testing of the water there, Sheffield said.
        The people of St. Lawrence Island, who live well to the north of St. Paul Island, had expected Fukushima radionuclides to arrive eventually, she said.
        “They fully anticipated getting it. They didn’t know when,” she said.    “The way the currents work does bring the water up from the south.”
    (Reporting by Yereth Rosen in Anchorage; Editing by Steve Gorman and Darren Schuettler)
  • 3/28/2019 Coal king as global carbon emissions rise by Doyle Rice, USA TODAY
        Humanity’s hunger for energy, and its reliance on fossil fuels, shows few signs of letting up.
        In fact, as the world’s economy boomed last year, power plants fueled by coal emitted their highest level of carbon dioxide on record, a new report said.
        “As a result of higher energy consumption, carbon dioxide emissions rose 1.7 percent last year and hit a new record,” according to the report, which was released Monday by the International Energy Agency.
        The report is the latest assessment of global energy consumption and energy- related carbon dioxide emissions for 2018, the IEA said.
        Coal remains the planet’s top source for electricity.    While many countries are slowly phasing out coal in favor of other fossil fuels such as natural gas, coal use rose, thanks to a fleet of relatively new plants in Asia.
        China, India and the U.S. account for 85 percent of the increase in emissions, the report said.    The total amount of global emissions in 2018 was 33.1 billion tons, the highest on record.
  • 3/29/2019 Cholera cases jump to 138 in Mozambique’s Beira after cyclone by Stephen Eisenhammer
    A motorcyclist rides through pools of water in the aftermath of Cyclone Idai in Beira, Mozambique, March 28, 2019. REUTERS/Mike Hutchings     BEIRA, Mozambique (Reuters) – The number of confirmed cases of cholera in the cyclone-hit Mozambican port city of Beira jumped from five to 138 on Friday, as government and aid agencies battled to contain the spread of disease among the tens of thousands of victims of the storm.
        Cyclone Idai smashed into Beira on March 14, causing catastrophic flooding and killing more than 700 people across three countries in southeast Africa.
        Many badly affected areas in Mozambique and Zimbabwe are still inaccessible by road, complicating relief efforts and exacerbating the threat of infection.
        Although there have been no confirmed cholera deaths in medical centers in Mozambique yet, at least two people died outside hospitals with symptoms including dehydration and diarrhea, the country’s environment minister Celso Correia said.
        A Reuters reporter saw the body of a dead child being brought out of an emergency clinic in Beira on Wednesday.    The child had suffered acute diarrhea, which can be a symptom of cholera.
        “We expected this, we were prepared for this, we’ve doctors in place,” Correia told reporters.
        The government said for the first time that there had been confirmed cholera cases on Wednesday.
        Mozambique’s National Disaster Management Institute said the local death toll from the tropical storm had increased to 493 people, from 468 previously.
        That takes the total death toll across Mozambique, Zimbabwe and Malawi to 738 people, with many more still missing.
        “Stranded communities are relying on heavily polluted water.    This, combined with widespread flooding and poor sanitation, creates fertile grounds for disease outbreaks, including cholera,” the International Committee of the Red Cross said in a statement.
    .     In Geneva, the World Health Organization’s Tarik Jasarevic said 900,000 doses of oral cholera vaccine were expected to arrive on Monday.
        Cholera is endemic to Mozambique, which has had regular outbreaks over the past five years.    About 2,000 people were infected in the last outbreak, which ended in February 2018, according to the WHO.
        But the scale of the damage to Beira’s water and sanitation infrastructure, coupled with its dense population, have raised fears that another epidemic would be difficult to put down.
    (Reporting by Stephen Eisenhammer in Beira and Stephanie Nebehay in Geneva; Writing Alexander Winning; Editing by Alison Williams)
  • 3/29/2019 Congo registers record 15 new Ebola cases in one day
    A woman waits next to an ambulance carrying a suspected Ebola patient at an Ebola transit centre in town of Katwa
    near the Eastern Congolese town of Butembo in the Democratic Republic of Congo, March 25, 2019. Picture taken March 25 2019. REUTERS/Baz Ratner     GOMA, Democratic Republic of Congo (Reuters) – Democratic Republic of Congo on Friday recorded 15 new confirmed cases of Ebola, the biggest one-day rise since the current outbreak was declared last August, the health ministry said.
        Coming a day after 14 new cases were confirmed, the number means the outbreak is on track to register one of its highest weekly case totals, despite health officials saying as recently as two weeks ago that it was largely contained and could be stopped by September.
        Health workers have brought new tools to the fight against the latest epidemic of the hemorrhagic fever, including a vaccine and several treatments, but community mistrust of first responders and militia violence have set back the campaign.
        Five Ebola centers have been attacked since last month, sometimes by armed assailants.    The violence led French medical charity Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF) to suspend its activities at the epicenter of the outbreak last month.
        The current outbreak of the virus, which causes severe vomiting, diarrhea and bleeding, is the second largest in history behind the 2013-16 West African epidemic that killed more than 11,000 people.
        Congo’s health ministry said that as of Friday the outbreak was believed to have killed 660 people and infected 399 more.
    (Reporting By Fiston Mahamba; Writing by Aaron Ross; Editing by Gareth Jones)
  • 3/30/2019 Afghanistan floods kill 17, worsen already desperate situation by Storay Karimy and Orooj Hakimi
    A woman stands next to her house destroyed by flood in Enjil district of Herat province, Afghanistan March 29, 2019. REUTERS/Jalil Ahmad     HERAT, Afghanistan/KABUL (Reuters) – Heavy rains caused flash floods in western Afghanistan that killed at least 17 people, destroying homes and sweeping through makeshift shelters that housed displaced families, a government official said on Saturday.
        Two days of flooding that started on Thursday killed 12 people in Jawzjan and two in Badghis, provinces that border Turkmenistan, said Hasibullah Shir Khani, a spokesman for Afghanistan’s National Disaster Management Authority.
        Two others were killed in Herat and another in Sar-e Pul province, he said.
    More than 500 houses were destroyed.
        The floods worsen an already desperate situation. Hundreds of thousands of people are displaced in western Afghanistan from last year’s severe drought. Floods in early March caused further destruction and put this year’s wheat harvest at risk.
        Children waded through muddy, knee-deep floodwaters that flowed through tent camps for displaced people after the rain stopped.
        Officials in/ Herat, which borders Iran, put the death toll higher than the national government.    Dr. Abdul Hakim Tamana, head of public health for the province, said eight people were killed and nine injured.
        Floods have destroyed hundreds of homes, some historic sites, thousands of acres of farmland, bridges and highways, said Jilani Farhad, a spokesman for Herat province.
        Aid organization World Vision said in a statement it appeared tens of thousands of Afghans were affected.    Some Badghis residents were calling it the worst storm in 20 years, it said.
        Iran has also been flooded by torrential rains, overwhelming emergency services in some areas.
    (Reporting by Storay Karimy in HERAT and Orooj Hakimi in KABUL; Writing by Rod Nickel; Editing by Paul Tait)
  • 3/30/2019 Study: Fungus killing off frog populations by Ashley May, USA TODAY
        A rapidly spreading fungus is threatening frogs everywhere, causing mass amphibian die-offs, according to a new study.     The study published online Friday in the peer-reviewed journal Science calls the loss from chytridiomycosis “catastrophic,” saying the disease has “caused death and species extinction at a global scale.”    At least 501 amphibian species have died over the past 50 years, including 90 that are presumed extinct, the study said.
        Chytridiomycosis is caused by two fungal species that likely originated in Asia. When contracted, it can eat away at skin.    It has been known for decades to kill frogs, but recently its spread has caused global alarm.    Study authors said the outbreak is contributing to “Earth’s sixth mass extinction.”    Deaths have been most extreme in wet climates of the Americas and Australia, peaking in the 1980s.
        Wendy Palen, a Simon Fraser University biologist who co-wrote a commentary on the study, called the fungus associated with the disease “the most deadly pathogen known to science,” The New York Times reported.
  • 3/30/2019 Iran calls emergency in flood-threatened southwest province
    FILE PHOTO: An aerial view of flooding in Golestan province, Iran March 27, 2019. Official Iranian President website/Handout via REUTERS     DUBAI (Reuters) – Iran said on Saturday it faced an emergency in a southwestern province threatened by flooding and worked to evacuate dozens of villages as forecasters predicted more of the heavy rains that have killed at least 45 people this week, state media reported.
        Some 56 villages lying near the Dez and Karkheh rivers in the oil-rich southwestern province of Khuzestan may have to be evacuated as officials released water from two major dams along the rivers due to forecasts for more rain, the provincial governor, Gholamreza Shariati, told state television.
        “Some residents are resisting (evacuation calls) because of their livestock…and because they’ve experienced similar circumstances in the past,” Shariati said, adding Interior Minister Abdolreza Rahmani Fazli had agreed to call an emergency in Khuzestan.
        Energy Minister Reza Ardakanian, who is in charge of water resources, said authorities were working round-the-clock to “control floodwaters and to minimize possible damage.”
        “It’s estimated that in the next five days about three billion cubic meters of water will flow into dam reservoirs in Khuzestan due to rainfall … 1.8 billion of which (is above capacity and) will have to be released,” he told state television.
        The semi-official news agency ISNA quoted Shariati as saying floods could also threaten the provincial capital Ahvaz if the rain is at the highest end of forecasts.
        In the neighboring province of Lorestan, at least eight villages and parts of the town of Dorud were being evacuated, the semi-official news agency Fars reported.
        Officials have said the government would compensate residents for flood damage.
        At least 45 people were killed this week in flash floods in northern and southern Iran after the heaviest rains recorded in Iran in at least a decade, the state news agency IRNA quoted Health Minister Saeid Namaki as saying.
        Western and southwestern parts of the country are expected to bear the brunt of the storms in the days ahead.
        Police renewed calls for people to avoid unnecessary journeys even though Iran is celebrating the Nowruz new year holiday, a time when many families travel.
        Iran has implemented measures to prevent rain and flooding affecting its main crude oil export terminal on Kharg Island in the Gulf, the head of the Iranian Oil Terminals Company told the semi-official news agency Mehr on Saturday.
        National Iranian Gas Company said earlier its pipeline network had not been affected by the bad weather.
    (Reporting by Dubai newsroom; Editing by Helen Popper, Edmund Blair and Marie-Louise Gumuchian)
  
  

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