Adolescents are dying of AIDS at an alarming rate, UN agency warns – ‘AIDS is the Number One cause of death for adolescents in Africa, Number Two globally’

18 July 2016 (UN) – An average of 29 adolescents between the ages of 15 and 19 are infected with HIV every hour, according to the United Nations Children’s Fund, which is calling for a redoubling of prevention and treatment efforts. After all of the saved and improved lives thanks to prevention, treatment and care; […]

Another Amazon oil spill puts Peruvian communities at risk – ‘We don’t drink river water any more. It gives us diarrhea and stomachaches’

By Barbara Fraser and Milton López Tarabochia26 June 2016 (mongabay.com) – A new oil spill from the pipeline that carries crude oil from the northern Peruvian Amazon across the Andes Mountains to the Pacific coast has raised fears of yet more pollution of the water and fish on which indigenous villages and riverside communities depend. […]

Africa has a tomato problem: Miner grubs are wiping out crops and have ‘the potential to effectively eliminate tomato from the agricultural cycle’

By Matthew Hill and Mustapha Muhammad9 June 2016 (Bloomberg News) – Yusuf Ibrahim, a tomato farmer in Kano, Nigeria, has lost almost 90 percent of his crop this year to Tuta absoluta. That prices for the fruit are 15 times higher than before the outbreak of the pest is little consolation; he can’t afford to […]

777 days later, Congress hasn’t lifted a finger for Flint, Michigan

By Katie Herzog10 June 2016 (Grist) – It’s been 777 days since Michigan switched Flint’s water supply from Detroit to Flint River and residents began complaining that it looked, tasted, and smelled wrong; 478 days since a Flint resident informed the Environmental Protection Agency that her water contained high levels of lead; and 157 days […]

The Unnecessariat and the epidemic of suicides and overdoses in the U.S.

By Anne Amnesia 10 May 2016 (More Crows Than Eagles) – […] See any overlap? I do. AIDS generated a response. Groups like GMHC and ACT-UP screamed against the dying of the light, almost before it was clear how much darkness was descending, but the gay men’s community in the 1970’s and 80’s was an […]

Global urban air pollution levels increased by 8 percent in five years – ‘Urban air pollution continues to rise at an alarming rate, wreaking havoc on human health’

12 May 2016 (UN) – More than 80 per cent of people living in urban areas that monitor air pollution are exposed to air quality levels that exceed guidelines set by the World Health Organization (WHO), with populations in low-income cities the most at risk for respiratory diseases and other long-term health problems. Some 98 […]

UN relief chief: ‘Worst case scenarios’ could become reality without more funding for El Niño response – $2.2 billion funding gap ‘alarming’

26 April 2016 (UN) – With 60 million people across the world affected by droughts, floods and other extreme weather events triggered by El Niño, the top United Nations relief official today called on the international community to act now to address urgent humanitarian needs and support building communities’ resilience to future shocks. “I am […]

In Chernobyl, an arch caps 30 years of work to contain radioactive pollution

By Nathan Hodge25 April 2016 CHERNOBYL, Ukraine (The New York Times) – Enter the Chernobyl zone, and you might expect the worst: Security guards at a checkpoint 19 miles away from the site of the world’s worst nuclear accident scan departing vehicles for signs of radiation, as wolfish strays linger around the checkpoint. But pass […]

Test finds Chernobyl residue in Belarus milk 10 times higher than food safety limits – ‘There is no protection of the population from radiation exposure’

By Yuras Karmanau25 April 2016 GUBAREVICHI, Belarus (AP) – On the edge of Belarus’ Chernobyl exclusion zone, down the road from the signs warning “Stop! Radiation,” a dairy farmer offers his visitors a glass of freshly drawn milk. Associated Press reporters politely decline the drink but pass on a bottled sample to a laboratory, which […]

Exiled scientist: ‘Chernobyl is not finished, it has only just begun’

  By Kim Hjelmgaard18 April 2016 KIEV, Ukraine (USA TODAY) – Yury Bandazhevsky, 59, was the first scientist in Belarus to establish an institute to study Chernobyl’s impact on people’s health, particularly children, near the city of Gomel, about 120 miles over the border from Ukraine. He was arrested in Belarus in 1999 and sentenced […]

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