Month: April 2019

Chinese President Xi Jinping says people in China want bluer skies, greener mountains and clearer water. In his address Sunday at the opening ceremony for the 2019 Beijing International Horticultural Expo, Xi said the country has embarked on the construction of “ecological civilization.” China is the world’s worst polluter but has made efforts to cut down on carbon emissions in the past decade. VOA’s Zlatica Hoke reports. …

Adults in the United States who were vaccinated against measles decades ago may need a new dose depending on when they received the shot and their exposure risk, according to public health experts battling the nation’s largest outbreak since the virus was deemed eliminated in 2000. Up to 10 percent of the 695 confirmed measles cases in the current outbreak occurred in people who received one or two doses of the vaccine, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The figure illustrates what can happen when a large number of individuals, even those who have been vaccinated, are exposed to the measles. CDC recommends that people who are living in or traveling to outbreak areas should check their vaccination status and consider getting a new dose. Dr. Allison Bartlett, an infectious disease expert at the University of Chicago Medicine, said the “continued vulnerability to infection” is why high-risk adults such as healthcare workers are routinely advised to get a second dose of the measles vaccine if they have not had one. But knowing your vaccination status can be tricky, experts said. “It’s complicated and often futile because it’s very difficult to resurrect those old records,” said Dr. William Schaffner, an infectious disease expert at Vanderbilt University Medical Center. People vaccinated in the United States since 1989 would most likely have received two doses of the combined measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) shot under federal guidelines, and that is still considered the standard for protection. Anyone vaccinated between …

Nearly 700 people possibly exposed to measles at two Los Angeles universities are still quarantined three days after health officials ordered the precautions to contain the spread of the highly contagious disease. A spokesman for California State University, Los Angeles, said Saturday that 106 staff members and 550 students have been told to stay at home and avoid contact with others.  Thirty students and employees from the University of California, Los Angeles, remain quarantined. Those under quarantine were possibly exposed to a person with measles on each campus earlier this month.  Many people have been cleared after proving their immunity with medical records or tests.  The quarantines mark one of the most sweeping efforts by health officials to contain the nation’s measles outbreak, where cases have reached a 25-year high. …

Pakistani health officials say the country has suspended a nationwide anti-polio campaign after a health worker and two policemen escorting vaccination teams were killed in separate attacks across the country in less than a week. Pakistan is one of three countries in the world where polio is still endemic. The other two are Afghanistan and Nigeria. But militant threats and deep-rooted superstition have spurred many parents to refuse to vaccinate their children. Officials say unidentified gunmen targeted polio workers and police assigned to protect them in three separate attacks this past week, in the heavily rural western regions bordering Afghanistan, before fleeing. Saturday’s decision to halt the campaign against the crippling disease comes after two new polio cases were reported in the country’s northwestern province of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. …

More than 1,000 students and staff members at two Los Angeles universities were quarantined on campus or sent home this week in one of the most sweeping efforts yet by public health authorities to contain the spread of measles in the U.S., where cases have reached a 25-year high. By Friday afternoon, two days after Los Angeles County ordered the precautions, about 325 of those affected had been cleared to return after proving their immunity to the disease, through either medical records or tests, health officials said.   The action at the University of University of California, Los Angeles, and California State University, Los Angeles, which together have more than 65,000 students, reflected the seriousness with which public health officials are taking the nation’s outbreak. Those under the quarantine were instructed to stay at home and avoid contact with others, though it wasn’t clear how those orders might be enforced or what penalties violators might face. “Measles actually kills people. So we have to take that really seriously,” said Dr. Armand Dorian, chief medical officer at USC Verdugo Hills Hospital. ​Measles cases climb The number of measles cases in the U.S. has climbed to nearly 700 this year, including five in Los Angeles County and 38 altogether in California. The surge is blamed largely on parents not getting their children vaccinated because of misinformation about the supposed dangers. Cal State-LA reported 875 students, staff, faculty and visitors were placed under quarantine after possibly being exposed to measles earlier this month. …

More than 900 students and staff members at two Los Angeles universities were quarantined on campus or sent home this week in one of the most sweeping efforts yet by public health authorities to contain the spread of measles in the U.S., where cases have reached a 25-year high. By Friday afternoon, two days after Los Angeles County ordered the precautions, about 200 of those affected had been cleared to return after proving their immunity to the disease, through either medical records or tests, school officials said. The action at the University of University of California, Los Angeles, and California State University, Los Angeles, which together have more than 65,000 students, reflected the seriousness with which public health officials are taking the nation’s outbreak. Those under the quarantine were instructed to stay at home and avoid contact with others, though it wasn’t clear how those orders might be enforced or what penalties violators might face. “Measles actually kills people. So we have to take that really seriously,” said Dr. Armand Dorian, chief medical officer at USC Verdugo Hills Hospital. ​Measles cases climb The number of measles cases in the U.S. has climbed to nearly 700 this year, including five in Los Angeles County and 38 altogether in California. The surge is blamed largely on parents not getting their children vaccinated because of misinformation about the supposed dangers. Cal State-LA reported 656 students and staff still under quarantine, while UCLA said it had fewer than 50. Cal State-LA is primarily a commuter …

President Donald Trump urged Americans Friday to get vaccinated against measles, amid an outbreak of the highly contagious virus in the U.S. that has forced two U.S. universities to quarantine hundreds of students, faculty members and other employees. Trump told reporters at the White House citizens “must get their shots” to protect themselves against the virus that was deemed eradicated in the U.S. nearly 20 years ago. There were nearly 700 cases in 22 states, the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) reported Wednesday, the highest level in 25 years. The CDC partially attributed the surge to misinformation about the safety of the measles vaccine. The beginning of the outbreak has been traced to Orthodox Jews who contracted the disease while traveling overseas. The cases have been concentrated in a small number of states, including New York, New Jersey, Michigan and Washington. Cases also have been confirmed in California, where public health officials ordered dozens of people to be quarantined Tuesday at the University of California at Los Angeles and California State University, Los Angeles following an exposure to the virus earlier this month. Los Angeles County public health officials said some people may have to be quarantined up to one week until proof of immunity is established. The CDC recommends vaccinations for everyone over a year old, except those who contracted measles as children and have since become immune. The vaccine, which first became available in the 1960s, is considered safe and effective by most public health experts.   …

This year, during World Immunization Week, the World Health Organization launched the world’s first malaria vaccine. Scientists are also testing a vaccine for HIV, and they are working on vaccines against cancer. “Vaccines are one of the greatest inventions of humankind,” said Dr. Peter Hotez, a professor at the Baylor College of Medicine. Global vaccination programs have ended smallpox, and they are closing in on polio, a disease that used to paralyze 350,000 people each year. Because of a global immunization program, that number now stands at 20. Pakistan and Afghanistan are the last remaining countries where the polio virus is still spreading. Break the chains Diseases like smallpox, polio and measles can only be transmitted from one person to another. Dr. Walter Orenstein from the Emory Vaccine Center says that’s why they can be wiped off the face of the earth. “If you can break the chains of human to human transmission, you can eradicate the disease,” he said. “That’s how smallpox was eradicated.”   WATCH: Vaccines Could Make World Free of Malaria, HIV, Cancer Malaria vaccine Most of the diseases that can be prevented through vaccines are caused by viruses — think measles, mumps or chickenpox. But the most exciting news during World Immunization Week is about a vaccine against the parasite that causes malaria. Dr. Pedro Alonso of the World Health Organization said Malawi, Ghana and Kenya will begin giving malaria vaccines to children in the coming weeks. “This is the first vaccine against the human malaria …

This year, during World Immunization Week, the World Health Organization launched the world’s first malaria vaccine. Scientists are also testing a vaccine for HIV, and they are working on vaccines against cancer. VOA’s Carol Pearson has more. …

From grubby packaging engulfing small Southeast Asian communities to waste piling up in plants from the US to Australia, China’s ban on accepting the world’s used plastic has plunged global recycling into turmoil. For many years, China received the bulk of scrap plastic from around the world, processing much of it into a higher quality material that could be used by manufacturers. But at the start of 2018, it closed its doors to almost all foreign plastic waste, as well as many other recyclables, in a push to protect the local environment and air quality, leaving developed nations struggling to find places to send their waste. “It was like an earthquake,” Arnaud Brunet, director general of Brussels-based industry group The Bureau of International Recycling, told AFP. “China was the biggest market for recyclables. It created a major shock in the global market.” Instead, plastic is being redirected in huge quantities to Southeast Asia, where Chinese recyclers have shifted en masse.  With a large Chinese-speaking minority, Malaysia was a top choice for Chinese recyclers looking to relocate, and official data showed plastic imports tripled from 2016 levels to 870,000 tonnes last year. In the small town of Jenjarom, not far from Kuala Lumpur, plastic processing plants suddenly appeared in large numbers, pumping out noxious fumes day and night. Huge mounds of plastic waste, dumped in the open, piled up as recyclers struggled to cope with the influx of packaging from everyday goods, such as foods and laundry detergents, from as far …

Up to 1 million species face extinction because of human influence, according to a draft U.N. report obtained by AFP that painstakingly catalogues how humanity has undermined the natural resources upon which its very survival depends. The accelerating loss of clean air, drinkable water, CO2-absorbing forests, pollinating insects, protein-rich fish and storm-blocking mangroves — to name but a few of the dwindling services rendered by nature — poses no less of a threat than climate change, says the report, set to be unveiled May 6. Indeed, biodiversity loss and global warming are closely linked, according to the 44-page Summary for Policy Makers, which distills a 1,800-page U.N. assessment of scientific literature on the state of nature. Delegates from 130 nations meeting in Paris from April 29 will vet the executive summary line-by-line. Wording may change, but figures lifted from the underlying report cannot be altered. “We need to recognize that climate change and loss of nature are equally important, not just for the environment, but as development and economic issues as well,” Robert Watson, chair of the U.N.-mandated body that compiled the report, told AFP, without divulging its findings. “The way we produce our food and energy is undermining the regulating services that we get from nature,” he said, adding that only “transformative change” can stem the damage. Deforestation and agriculture, including livestock production, account for about a quarter of greenhouse gas emissions, and have wreaked havoc on natural ecosystems as well. ​‘Mass extinction event’ The Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on …

A quarantine order was issued Thursday for hundreds of students and staff at two Los Angeles universities who may have been exposed to measles and either have not been vaccinated or can’t verify that they have immunity.  Measles in the United States has climbed to its highest level in 25 years, closing in on 700 cases this year in a resurgence largely attributed to misinformation that is turning parents against vaccines. Roughly three-quarters of this year’s illnesses in the U.S. have been in New York state. The University of California, Los Angeles, said that as of Wednesday there were 119 students and 8 faculty members under quarantine. Seventy-one students and 127 staff members are quarantined at California State University, Los Angeles after a possible measles exposure at a campus library, school officials said.  “The Department of Public Health has determined that there is no known current risk related to measles at the library at this time,” Cal State said in a statement.  Quarantines vary UCLA said some people could remain in quarantines for up to 48 hours before they prove immunity. A few may need to remain in quarantine for up to seven days, officials said. Such an order mandates that the exposed people stay home and notify authorities “if they develop symptoms of measles, and to avoid contact with others until the end of their quarantine period or until they provide evidence of immunity,” the Los Angeles County Department of Public Health said in a statement.  The orders come …

As recent illnesses tied to raw turkey, ground beef, cut melon and romaine lettuce suggest, U.S. food poisoning cases don’t appear to be going away anytime soon. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said in a report Thursday that the frequency of several types of food poisoning infections climbed last year, but that the increases could be the result of new diagnostic tools that help identify more cases.    Overall, the agency believes food poisoning rates have remained largely unchanged.    Dr. Robert Tauxe, director of the agency’s foodborne illness division, said the figures show more needs to be done to make food safer. He noted the two most common causes of infection have been longtime problems.    One of the two, salmonella, can come from an array of foods including vegetables, chicken, eggs, beef and pork. The other germ, campylobacter, is commonly tied to chicken. People may not hear as much about it because health officials often can’t group cases into outbreaks. Both bacteria are spread through animal feces. “For some reason, campylobacter is making people sick with lots of different fingerprints,” Tauxe said.    Obstacles to better understanding The report is based on monitoring in 10 states, but is seen as an indicator of national trends. It highlights the difficulty in understanding food poisoning when so many cases go unreported, diagnostic methods are inconsistent, and production practices and eating habits are constantly changing.    With chicken, for instance, companies have brought down salmonella rates in raw whole carcasses since the government began publishing test results of …