Month: April 2019

Japan’s space agency said its Hayabusa2 spacecraft successfully dropped an explosive designed to make a crater on an asteroid and collect its underground samples to find possible clues to the origin of the solar system. Friday’s crater mission is the riskiest for Hayabusa2, as it had to immediately get away so it won’t get hit by flying shards from the blast.  The Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency, or JAXA, said that Hayabusa2 dropped a “small carry-on impactor” made of copper onto the asteroid Friday morning, and that data confirmed the spacecraft safely evacuated and remained intact. JAXA is analyzing data to examine if or how the impactor made a crater. The copper explosive is the size of a baseball weighing 2 kilograms (4.4 pounds). It was designed to come out of a cone-shaped piece of equipment. A copper plate on its bottom was to turn into a ball during its descent and slam into the asteroid at 2 kilometers (1.2 miles) per second.  JAXA plans to send Hayabusa2 back to the site later, when the dust and debris settle, for observations from above and to collect samples from underground that have not been exposed to the sun or space rays. Scientists hope the samples will be crucial to determine the history of the asteroid and our planet.  If successful, it would be the first time for a spacecraft to take such materials. In a 2005 “deep impact” mission to a comet, NASA observed fragments after blasting the surface but did not …

U.S. health officials say that between January and March, 387 cases of measles have been reported in 15 states, exceeding the count for all of last year. In 2018, 372 cases were reported, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Public health authorities worry about outbreaks in communities where vaccination rates are low, fueled by a growing movement of people who view the MMR vaccine for measles, mumps and rubella as dangerous. The measles component of the vaccine has been in widespread use since the 1960s, and medical experts say the MMR vaccine is safe and highly effective. “We have growing pockets of susceptibility,” said epidemiologist Arthur Reingold of the University of California, Berkeley, School of Public Health, as the virus is carried from regions where measles is more widespread. “When we do have someone travel from New York to Israel or from Europe to Disneyland or whatever you envision, we have the opportunity for much larger outbreaks.”  Measles deaths declined worldwide from 550,000 in 2000 to 110,000 in 2017. Public health officials say the vaccine is the reason. The World Health Organization says measles immunizations prevented 21 million deaths between 2000 and 2017. The organization says more than 95 percent of such deaths occur in countries with low per capita incomes and poor health infrastructure.  In 2017, however, 20 million infants did not receive at least one of the recommended two doses of the measles vaccine, putting their communities at risk. India, Pakistan and Nigeria are among …

The U.N. Children’s Fund says climate change in Bangladesh is threatening the lives and futures of 19 million children or one-third of all children under age 18 in the country. The report forecasts a grim future for millions of children who live in Bangladesh’s flood- and drought-prone lowlands in the country’s north and in the storm-ravaged coastline along the Bay of Bengal. They are the areas most likely to be devastated by floods, cyclones and other environmental disasters. Included among the 19.4 million vulnerable children are nearly one-half-million Rohingya refugee children. They and their parents fled to Bangladesh’s Cox’s Bazar area to escape violence and persecution in Myanmar. They are living in fragile bamboo and plastic shelters, which will not be able to withstand a climatic disaster. The report’s author, Simon Ingram, says climate change will have direct implications on children’s lives, especially the poor, who are most at risk from its devastating impacts. He says more than 6 million climate change refugees have migrated from rural to urban areas. He warns many of the children who end up in Dhaka and other large cities are forced to fend for themselves. “Many children being pushed into very hazardous forms of child labor. Many girls who end up being pushed into taking early marriages because their families can no longer look after them,” Ingram said. “And, there are other girls who also end up in what is clearly a flourishing and expanding sex trade in the cities. Girls who are left …

Public health authorities are coping with outbreaks of measles in communities where vaccination rates are low.  In the United States, this is fueled by a growing movement of people who view vaccines as dangerous. Mike O’Sullivan reports that the battle is being fought on the Internet and in state legislatures. …

As candidates jostle to head the United Nations’ multibillion dollar food agency, experts called on Thursday for a strong leader to tackling rising hunger and climate change threats. Levels of hunger have grown for the past three years, with one in nine people — or 821 million — worldwide without enough to eat, due to drought, floods, conflict and economic slowdowns, U.N. figures show. “We don’t see improvement in terms of poverty and hunger. What we see is degradation and resources that would be lost for future generations. So there’s an emergency,” said Frederic Mousseau, a food policy expert at U.S.-based Oakland Institute. “Agriculture and the way we produce our food and the way we consume our food has to have a major solution. That’s the key challenge for the new director.” The Rome-based Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) has a budget of $2.6 billion for 2018 and 2019, employs nearly 6,000 people and works in more than 130 countries with governments to reduce rural poverty and hunger. The four contenders include a European Union-backed French agronomist, who could become the FAO’s first female head of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), and an agriculture vice-minister from China, whose global influence is on the rise.  Georgia and India have also fielded candidates for the June vote by delegates from the FAO’s 194 member states. “There is very much at stake in an election like this,” said Mousseau, adding that governments are under constant pressure “to expand the corporate-driven model of …

New data finds women everywhere live on average 4.4 years longer than men because they see the doctor more frequently and generally take better care of their health. While women outlive men around the world, the World Health Organization’s Statistics Overview 2019 says their life expectancy is sharply reduced because of maternal deaths. It says this highlights the big health gap that still exists between rich and poor countries. The World Health Organization reports one in 41 women die from maternal causes in poor countries where access to health services are scarce. This compared with one in 3,300 maternal deaths in rich countries. Samira Asma is WHO assistant director general for data, analytics and delivery. She says men die earlier than women because they do not take as good care of their health as women. Also, they tend to be exposed to greater risks. “In many circumstances, men use health care less than women. They are less likely to seek care and to continue care once diagnosed of a certain condition. And also, men are more likely to die from preventable and treatable noncommunicable diseases and road traffic accidents,” says Asma. Leading causes of death Of the 40 leading causes of death, the report says men have higher death rates than women from 33 of the risk factors. For example, the report says men smoke and drink alcohol much more than women. It finds global suicide mortality rates are 75 percent higher in men than in women. Asma says noncommunicable …

The day after Tarek Saoud contemplated ending his life, the college student reached out for help on the campus of the university in Ohio he attended. “I called the student mental health services and they told me I could see one of their therapists in, like, two months, which wasn’t going to work for me, unless it was urgent,” he recalls. “So I called back a week later when I was like, ‘I’m not going to survive this any longer, and they asked if it was urgent and I said, ‘Yes.’ They said, ‘Does that mean suicidal?’ I said ‘Yes’ and then at that point they got me an appointment the next week.” The delay frustrated Saoud, now 22, who by that point had been thinking about suicide for months. “For me it was a do-or-die situation,” he says. “When I called health services and told them I was suicidal, that was very true. I don’t want to say I made an attempt the night before but it looks like it was very close. A friend found me and told me straight up what I needed to hear, which was, ‘You can’t be here anymore. You need help now.’” The delay Saoud experienced in getting the mental health care he was desperate for highlights a growing unmet need on college campuses throughout the country. In the spring of 2018, more than 63 percent of college students experienced overwhelming anxiety, according to the American College Health Association. But those who seek …

One in five deaths globally is linked to poor diet, experts said in a study released Thursday, warning that overconsumption of sugar, salt and meat was killing millions of people every year.    The United Nations estimates that nearly 1 billion people worldwide are malnourished, while nearly 2 billion are “overnourished.”     But the latest study on global diet trends, published in The Lancet, showed that in nearly every one of the 195 countries surveyed, people were also eating too much of the wrong types of food — and consuming worryingly low levels of healthier produce.  Sugar, sodium   For example, the world on average consumes more than 10 times the recommended amount of sugar-sweetened beverages, and 86 percent more sodium per person than is considered safe.    The study, which examined consumption and disease trends between 1990 and 2017, also cautioned that too many people were eating far too few whole grains, fruit, nuts and seeds to maintain a healthy lifestyle.    Of the 11 million deaths attributed to poor diet, by far the largest killer was cardiovascular disease, which is often caused or worsened by obesity.    “This study affirms what many have thought for several years — that poor diet is responsible for more deaths than any other risk factor in the world,” said study author Christopher Murray, director of the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington.     “Our assessment suggests the leading dietary risk factors are high intake of sodium, or low intake …

Spain’s health minister called on Wednesday for so-called conversion therapy to be abolished after a report that a branch of the Catholic Church had offered to “cure” gay people. El Diario, an online newspaper, said a reporter posing as a gay man trying to change his sexuality was told to stop watching porn and masturbate less in a counselling session provided by a diocese of the Catholic Church close to the capital Madrid. Its representatives called the report “fake news.” Minister expresses regret But Maria Luisa Carcedo Roces, Spain’s minister for health, consumption and social welfare, expressed regret that the practice persisted, saying it was illegal and calling for it to be “completely abolished.” “I thought that in Spain, accepting the various sexual orientations was assumed in all areas, but unfortunately we see that there are still pockets where people are told what their sexual orientation should be,” she said at a press conference. “I regret that this is happening and that a law is being broken,” she said, according to an audio recording sent to the Thomson Reuters Foundation by the ministry press office. Conversion therapy, which can include hypnosis and electric shocks, is based on the belief that being lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgender is a mental illness that can be cured. Promoting or carrying out conversion therapy is banned in the region of Madrid, regardless of whether the person undergoing it has consented or not. Punishments include fines of up to 45,000 euros ($51,000). ‘Fake news’ In …

Boeing’s new space capsule for astronauts faces more launch delays. The Starliner capsule was supposed to make its debut this month, after a series of postponements. But the first test flight is now off until August. And the second test flight, with astronauts, won’t occur until late in the year. NASA announced the revised lineup Wednesday. At the same time, officials said the first Starliner crew will remain at the International Space Station longer than the few weeks originally anticipated. The mission length will be decided later. SpaceX, NASA’s other commercial crew provider, successfully flew its new Dragon capsule without a crew to the International Space Station last month. The first flight with astronauts could be as early as this summer, but the schedule is under review. Boeing said the last major milestones have been cleared and the capsule is almost finished. But scheduling conflicts with an early summer Air Force launch helped push the Starliner’s debut into August.  The Starliner will fly on United Launch Alliance’s Atlas V rocket, the same kind of rocket needed for the Air Force’s critical mission in late June, from the same pad. While the first SpaceX astronauts will visit the space station for a few weeks at most, the Starliner’s three-person crew will move into the orbiting complex for an extended period. The typical station stay is about six months. NASA wants to reduce its reliance on expensive Russian Soyuz capsules as soon as possible, and so the Boeing test flight will double …