Philippines – Page 2 – Desdemona Despair

Global human population, 1700-2022. On 15 November 2022, the world’s population was estimated to reach 8 billion people, having grown by 1 billion since 2010. This is a remarkable milestone given that the human population numbered under 1 billion for millennia until around 1800, and that it took more than 100 years to grow from 1 to 2 billion. By comparison, the increase of the world’s population over the last century has been quite rapid. Despite a gradual slowing in the pace of growth, the global population is projected to surpass 9 billion around 2037 and 10 billion around 2058. Graphic: UN DESA

November 19, 2022

Global human population hits 8 billion – “We are already overstretching what we have: the housing, roads, the hospitals, schools. Everything is overstretched.”

By Dan Ikpoyi and Chinedu Asadu 15 November 2022 LAGOS, Nigeria (AP) – The world’s population will likely hit an estimated 8 billion people on Tuesday, according to a United Nations projection, with much of the growth coming from developing nations in Africa. Among them is Nigeria, where resources are already stretched to the limit. More than […]

Mexican journalists gather around pictures of murdered colleagues as they protest the recent killings of photojournalist Margarito Martinez and journalist Lourdes Maldonado, in Veracruz, Mexico, on 25 January 2022. Photo: Yahir Ceballos / Reuters

November 13, 2022

CPJ’s Global Impunity Index 2022: Vast majority of journalists’ killers go free – Of the 263 journalists murdered in the last decade, 78 percent were assassinated with complete impunity

By Jennifer Dunham1 November 2022 (CPJ) – The vast majority of killers of journalists continue to get away with murder, according to CPJ’s 2022 Global Impunity Index. In nearly 80% of the 263 cases of journalists murdered in retaliation for their work globally over the past decade, the perpetrators have faced no punishment. Somalia remains […]

Philippine Coast Guard (PCG) rescuers evacuate residents from their flooded homes due to a tropical storm, locally named Paeng, in Maguindanao province, Philippines, 28 October 2022. Photo: Philippine Coast Guard / AP News

October 28, 2022

At least 42 dead in floods, landslides in south Philippines – “In one area in Upi only the attic of a school can be seen above the floodwater”

COTABATO, Philippines, 28 October 2022 (AP) – Flash floods and landslides set off by torrential rains swamped a southern Philippine province, killing at least 42 people, leaving 16 others missing and trapping some residents on their roofs, officials said Friday. Most of the victims were swept away by rampaging floodwaters and drowned or were hit […]

Colombian natives and activists during a protest in Bogotá, Colombia, on 23 August 2019. Photo: RAUL ARBOLEDA / AFP / Getty Images

October 21, 2022

Countries where the most people are killed defending the environment

By Angelo Young 15 October 2022 (24/7 Wall St.) – As the world comes to the realization of the profound damages human beings are causing to natural environments worldwide, groups across the globe have long been trying to protect the local land and environment. In some places, these struggles are not always peaceful, and last […]

Maps showing poverty impact hotspots as percentages of countries’ population that could fall into poverty as a result of soaring food and energy prices. Among those countries likely facing high poverty impacts across all poverty lines are Armenia and Uzbekistan in the Caspian Basin; Burkina Faso, Ghana, Kenya, Rwanda and Sudan in Sub-Saharan Africa; Haiti in Latin America; and Pakistan and Sri Lanka in South Asia. In these countries, around 3 percent of the population, on average, could fall into poverty. In Ethiopia, Mali, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tanzania and Yemen, the impacts could be particularly hard at the lowest poverty lines, whereas in Albania, Kyrgyz Republic, Moldova, Mongolia, Tajikistan, and Ukraine, the hits could be hardest at $5.50 a day.7 Clear geographical hotspots, depending on the poverty line, emerge in Sub-Saharan Africa, mainly in the Sahel region, the Balkans and the Caspian Basin. Graphic: UNDP

July 7, 2022

Cost-of-living crisis drives 71 million people into extreme poverty in three months – “This cost-of-living crisis is tipping millions of people into poverty and even starvation at breathtaking speed”

By Marc Jones 7 July 2022 LONDON (Reuters) – The global cost-of-living crisis is pushing an additional 71 million people in the world’s poorest countries into extreme poverty, a new report published by the U.N. Development Programme (UNDP) on Thursday has warned. Achim Steiner, UNDP administrator, said an analysis of 159 developing countries showed that […]

Gallup Worldwide Negative Experience Index, 2006-2021. Globally, unhappiness has been rising for a decade. In 2021, negative emotions — the aggregate of the stress, sadness, anger, worry, and physical pain that people feel every day — reached a new record in the history of Gallup’s tracking. As 2021 served up a steady diet of uncertainty, the world became a slightly sadder, more worried, and more stressed-out place than it was the year before, which helped push Gallup’s Negative Experience Index to yet another new high of 33 in 2021. Graphic: Gallup

June 29, 2022

Gallup Global Emotions Report 2022: World unhappier, more stressed out than ever – “2 billion people are so unhappy with where they live, they wouldn’t recommend it to anyone they know”

By Julie Ray 28 June 2022 WASHINGTON, D.C. (Gallup) – Emotionally, the second year of the pandemic was an even tougher year for the world than the first one, according to Gallup’s latest annual global update on the negative and positive experiences that people are having each day. As 2021 served up a steady diet of uncertainty, […]

The ashes of burnt grain can be seen in a grain silo in the town of Sivers’k, Donbas in May 2022. Photo: Alex Chan / SOPA Images / Sipa USA / Reuters

June 3, 2022

Russia’s war on global food security – Russia’s blockade of Ukraine grain exports may cause starvation of 47 million people – “It will result in famine and destabilization and mass migration around the world”

By Anders Åslund 1 June 2022 (Atlantic Council) – Russian President Vladimir Putin’s war on Ukraine is also a war on global food security. In February 2022, Russia blockaded all of Ukraine’s Black Sea ports, through which all its bulk exports were being shipped. The ports remain closed, with no opening in sight. David Beasley, […]

Map showing spatial extent of heavy labor losses due to humid heat. Per capita heavy labor lost (a)–(c) and population-weighted heavy labor lost (d)–(f) for the Lancet Countdown method ('LCHCC', (a), (d)) and the laboratory exposure response to heat ('Laboratory', (b), (e)). Panels on right show the zonal median (c) and zonal sums (f) of heavy labor losses. Maps in the top row show mean h person−1 yr−1 lost due to background heat and humidity combined with internal heat generation in individuals conducting heavy labor. Maps in the bottom row display 'population-weighted' labor loss, which is defined as the product of the mean per-capita hours lost overlaid and the ILO heavy labor sector proportion of the working-age population (ages 15+) for 163 countries for which the data are available. Shading around zonal median (top right) and zonal sum (bottom right) lines outlines the range of zonal values for individual years. Graphic: Parsons, et al., 2022 / Environmental Research Letters

May 30, 2022

India’s savage heat exacts heaviest toll on outdoor workers – Humid heat causes 650 billion hours of annual lost labor globally, up at least 9 percent over four decades – “This is not just exhaustion or discomfort. It is actually killing people.”

By Anjana Pasricha 23 May 2022 NEW DELHI (VOA News) – Pradeep Kumar can earn nearly eight dollars a day selling the traditional Indian drink with cumin and lemon that he makes at his cart in a popular market in New Delhi — supposed to cool the body, the beverage has been much in demand […]

SDG Indicator 16.1.1 Detected victims of intentional homicide, by sex (women) vs. SDG Indicator 1.5.1 Number of people affected by disaster. Research shows that violence against women and girls increases in the aftermath of disasters. At the extreme end of the scale, this takes the form of intentional homicides. Data: United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs analysis based on Global Sustainable Development Goal Indicators Database (UN DESA, 2021). Graphic: UNDRR

May 8, 2022

Humanity entering “spiral of self-destruction”, UN warns – “By deliberately ignoring risk and failing to integrate it in decision making, the world is effectively bankrolling its own destruction”

26 April 2022 (France 24) – Humanity is suffering from a “broken perception of risk”, spurring us into activities and behaviours that cause climate change and a surging number of disasters around the globe, the UN warned Tuesday. In a fresh report, the UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction, or UNDRR, found that between 350 and […]

Aerial view of a landslide caused by tropical storm Megi, which hit the village of Kantagnos in Baybay town, Leyte province, Philippines, on 13 April 2022. Photo: Bobbie Alota / AFP / Getty Images

April 17, 2022

Storm Megi death toll rises as hundreds of thousands displaced in Philippines, nearly 2 million residents affected

By Akanksha Sharma 14 April 2022 (CNN) – The death toll in the Philippines from tropical storm Megi has risen to 76 while hundreds of thousands of others remain displaced, authorities in the country said Wednesday. Many of the deaths came in landslides and floods caused when the storm made landfall on Sunday, battering the eastern […]