The United Nations said Monday that global hunger grew dramatically in 2020, due in large part to the effects of the COVID-19 pandemic on the cost of and access to food. “The reality is worse than expected,” World Food Program chief economist Arif Husain said. “In one year alone, the number of people in the grip of chronic hunger has risen more than in the previous five years combined.” In its annual report on theFILE – Children shelter from the sun in Ankilimarovahatsy, Madagascar, a village in the far south of the island where most children are acutely malnourished, Nov. 9, 2020.Children have been especially affected. Millions have been deprived of school lunches, due to closures during the pandemic. For many, this is their only reliable daily meal. Stunting and wasting in children were up last year, as was being overweight — an effect of poor nutrition. In addition to COVID-19, conflict, and the impact of climate change on agriculture also affected the global food supply. In all, the U.N. has said some 41 million people in 43 countries are on the brink of famine, and it will not take much to push them over the edge. “To think we are going to end hunger by 2030, that’s not even possible given the direction, the trajectory that we are on now,” Beasley said. “If we don’t address these issues in a very serious way, you are going to have mass famine, destabilization of nations and mass migration.” …
WHO Recommends Global Gene Editing Database
The World Health Organization is recommending the creation of a global database to track “any form of genetic manipulation,” with the goal of preventing unscrupulous or dangerous experimentation.The recommendations come from a group of experts formed in 2018 after Chinese scientist He Jiankui announced he had created genetically edited babies that were immune from HIV, the virus that causes AIDS. He was found guilty in December 2019 of conducting “illegal medical practices” and sentenced by a Chinese court to three years in prison. WHO said all genome editing should be made public and recommends a whistleblowing system in which scientists could report unreported genome editing.WHO strongly opposed making modifications to the human genetic code in humans that could be passed from generation to generation.”No one in their right mind should contemplate doing it, because the techniques are simply not safe enough or efficient enough, and we’re not ready in terms of looking at all the ethical considerations,” said Robin Lovell-Badge, senior group leader at Britain’s Francis Crick Institute, a committee member.Some information in this report comes from The Associated Press and Reuters. …
Tech Giants to Donate COVID Vaccines to Taiwan in China Workaround
Taiwanese tech giants Foxconn and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company announced Monday they will each donate five million coronavirus vaccine doses to the government in a deal with a China-based distributor. Taipei has been struggling to secure enough vaccines for its population, and its precarious political status has been a major stumbling block. As Taipei and Beijing accused each other of hampering vaccine deals, Foxconn and TSMC stepped in with a face-saving solution — buying the Pfizer-BioNTech doses from a Chinese distributor and donating them to Taiwan. “Me and my team feel the public anxiety and expectations on the vaccines and we are relieved to give the public an answer that relevant contracts have been signed,” Foxconn founder Terry Gou said in a post on his Facebook page. “Beijing authorities have not offered any guidance or interfered with the vaccine acquisition process,” he said, adding that the vaccines will be shipped directly by German firm BioNTech. Foxconn and TSMC, the world’s largest contract electronics and chip makers respectively, said they will spend $175 million each on the vaccines. Beijing’s authoritarian leadership views democratic self-ruled Taiwan as part of China’s territory and has vowed to one day seize the island, by force if needed. China tries to keep Taiwan internationally isolated, including blocking it from the World Health Organization. Taipei has been trying to secure Pfizer-BioNTech direct from Germany, but Shanghai-based Fosun Pharma has the distribution rights for China, Hong Kong, Macau and Taiwan. Attempts to sign a direct deal made little headway, something Taiwan blamed on Beijing. In return, Beijing has accused Taiwan of refusing to deal with Fosun Pharma and politicizing its vaccine search. Fosun issued …
China Announces New Cybersecurity Industry Strategy
China’s technology ministry Monday announced a three-year action plan to develop the country’s cyber-security industry, which it estimates will be worth more than $38 billion by 2023, according to Reuters. The new strategy by the Ministry of Industry and Information Technology is being unveiled as Beijing tightens its grip on the country’s technology sector, underscored by its regulatory probe of ride-hailing giant Didi Global. The company was valued at $68 billion after its June 30 initial public offering, or IPO, on the New York Stock Exchange. But Chinese regulators launched a cybersecurity review of the company and said new users would not be allowed to register during the review, sending Didi Global share prices tumbling. The Cyberspace Administration of China then ordered Didi’s app removed from domestic mobile app stores. The agency has also ordered two other tech-based companies, Uber-like trucking startup Full Truck Alliance and Kanzhun, which connects job seekers and hiring enterprises via a mobile app, to suspend user registrations and submit to security reviews, citing risks to “national data security.” The two companies, like Didi Global, had also recently issued IPOs on U.S. stock exchanges. Some information for this report came from Reuters, CNBC, and the New York Times. …
Florida Breaks Annual Manatee Death Record in First 6 Months
More manatees have died already this year than in any other year in Florida’s recorded history, primarily from starvation due to the loss of seagrass beds, state officials said.The Florida Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission reported that 841 manatee deaths were recorded between Jan. 1 and July 2, breaking the previous record of 830 that died in 2013 because of an outbreak of toxic red tide.The TCPalm website reports that more than half the deaths have died in the Indian River Lagoon and its surrounding areas in Volusia, Brevard, Indian River, St. Lucie and Martin counties along Florida’s Atlantic coast. The overwhelming majority of deaths have been in Brevard, where 312 manatees have perished.Some biologists believe water pollution is killing the seagrass beds in the area.“Unprecedented manatee mortality due to starvation was documented on the Atlantic coast this past winter and spring,” Florida’s Fish and Wildlife Research Institute wrote as it announced the record Friday. “Most deaths occurred during the colder months when manatees migrated to and through the Indian River Lagoon, where the majority of seagrass has died off.”Boat strikes are also a major cause of manatee deaths, killing at least 63 this year.The manatee was once classified as endangered by the federal government, but it was reclassified as threatened in 2017. Environmentalists are asking that the animal again be considered endangered.The federal government says approximately 6,300 manatees live in Florida waters, up from about 1,300 in the early 1990s. …
Billionaire Richard Branson Reaches Space, Safely Returns to Earth
Swashbuckling entrepreneur Richard Branson hurtled into space aboard his own winged rocket ship Sunday, beating out fellow billionaire Jeff Bezos.The nearly 71-year-old Branson and five crewmates from his Virgin Galactic space-tourism company reached an altitude of about 85 kilometers (53 miles) over the New Mexico desert — enough to experience three to four minutes of weightlessness and witness the curvature of the Earth — and then safely glided to a runway landing.”The whole thing, it was just magical,” a jubilant Branson said after the trip home aboard the gleaming white space plane, named Unity. The brief, up-and-down flight — the space plane’s portion took only about 15 minutes, or about as long as Alan Shepard’s first U.S. spaceflight in 1961 — was a splashy and unabashedly commercial plug for Virgin Galactic, which plans to start taking paying customers on joyrides next year.Branson became the first person to blast off in his own spaceship, beating Bezos by nine days. He also became only the second septuagenarian to go into space. Astronaut John Glenn flew on the shuttle at age 77 in 1998.Bezos sent his congratulations, adding: “Can’t wait to join the club!” — though he also took to Twitter a couple of days earlier to enumerate the ways in which he believes his company’s rides will be better.With about 500 people watching, including Branson’s family, Unity was carried aloft underneath a twin-fuselage aircraft. Then, at an altitude of about 13 kilometers (8½ miles), Unity detached from the mother ship and fired …
UN Marks World’s Burgeoning Population
As the United Nations marks World Population Day on July 11, its experts say there is no perfect population number and that human innovation will continue to manage and outpace the growth in the number of humans living on the planet. VOA’s Laurel Bowman has more. …
Malawi’s Survey Confirms AstraZeneca Vaccine Efficacy
In Malawi, a survey by the Ministry of Health to help ascertain the efficacy of AstraZeneca vaccine has shown its effectiveness in fighting the coronavirus. The survey was based on current hospital admissions of COVID-19 patients across the country.The preliminary results of the findings released Saturday were based on COVID-19 admissions between June 26 and July 8 of this year. Image of the preliminary findings of the survey by Malawi Ministry of Health. (Courtesy: Malawi Ministry of Health)These results show that over 80% of 227 COVID-19 patients admitted during the period were those not vaccinated. And those who have only had one AstraZeneca jab were 12% while those fully vaccinated only accounted for 4%. The secretary of the Ministry of Health, Dr. Charles Mwansambo, says it’s still too early to measure the effectiveness of the AstraZeneca vaccine based on these findings. “We are still vaccinating more and presently our vaccination status is still low. But what we have found out so far is that the majority of those that are coming in those that are not vaccinated,” he said. However, he says the findings would help end fears and doubts some Malawians had over the vaccine, which prevented them from getting vaccinated. Malawi has currently vaccinated about 400,000 people of the 11 million needed to reach herd immunity. “So we encourage more people to come for vaccination because obviously this is strongly putting a case for vaccination. So I encourage citizens to make sure that they come for vaccination,” said Mwansambo. In May, Malawi destroyed about 20,000 doses of …
Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson Flying Own Rocket to Space
After a lifetime of yearning to fly in space, Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson was poised to blast off aboard his own rocket ship Sunday in his boldest, grandest adventure yet. The thrill-seeking billionaire joined five company employees also assigned to the test flight to the edge of space high above the southern desert of New Mexico. Ever the showman, Branson dramatically counted down the days to liftoff via Twitter. He viewed the brief up-and-down trip as a confidence builder — not only for the 600-plus people already holding reservations and waiting in the wings, but potential space tourists willing to plunk down a few hundred-thousand dollars for a shot at space. The London-born founder of the Virgin Group, who turns 71 in a week, wasn’t supposed to fly until later this summer. But he assigned himself to an earlier flight after Blue Origin’s Jeff Bezos announced plans to ride his own rocket into space from West Texas on July 20. Virgin Galactic doesn’t expect to start flying customers before next year. Blue Origin has yet to open ticket sales or even announce prices, but late last week boasted via Twitter that it would take clients higher and offer bigger windows. Unlike Blue Origin and Elon Musk’s SpaceX, which launch capsules atop reusable booster rockets, Virgin Galactic uses a twin-fuselage aircraft to get its rocket ship aloft. The space plane is released from the mothership about 44,000 feet (13,400 meters) up, then fires its rocket motor to streak straight to space. Maximum altitude is roughly 55 …
Virgin Galactic’s Branson Ready for Space Launch Aboard Rocket Plane
British billionaire Richard Branson was due on Sunday to climb into his Virgin Galactic passenger rocket plane and soar more than 50 miles above the New Mexico desert in the vehicle’s first fully crewed test flight to the edge of space. Branson, one of six Virgin Galactic Holding Inc. employees strapping in for the ride, has touted the flight as a precursor to a new era of space tourism, with the company he founded poised to begin commercial operations next year. A discount travel service it is not. But demand is apparently strong, with several hundred wealthy would-be citizen astronauts already having booked reservations, priced at around $250,000 per ticket. The Swiss-based investment bank UBS has estimated the potential value of the space tourism market reaching $3 billion annually by 2030. Proving rocket travel safe for the general public is key, given the inherent dangers of spaceflight. An earlier prototype of the Virgin Galactic rocket plane crashed during a test flight over California’s Mojave Desert in 2014, killing one pilot and seriously injuring another. Branson’s participation in Sunday’s flight, announced just over a week ago, is in keeping with his persona as the daredevil executive whose Virgin brands — from airlines to music companies — have long been associated with ocean-crossing exploits in sailboats and hot-air balloons. His ride-along also upstages rival astro-tourism venture Blue Origin and its founder, Amazon mogul Jeff Bezos, in what has been popularized as the “billionaire space race.” Bezos has been planning to fly aboard his own suborbital rocket ship, the New Shepard, later this month. Branson, a …
Surging California Wildfire Prompts Nevada Evacuation
A Northern California wildfire exploding through bone-dry timber prompted Nevada authorities to evacuate a border-area community as flames leapt on ridgetops of nearby mountains.The Beckwourth Complex — a merging of two lightning-caused fires — headed into Saturday showing no sign of slowing its rush northeast from the Sierra Nevada forest region after doubling in size only a few days earlier.The fire was one of several threatening homes across Western states that are expected to see triple-digit heat through the weekend as a high-pressure zone blankets the region.On Friday, Death Valley National Park in California recorded a staggering high of 54.4 Celsius. If verified, it would be the hottest high recorded there since July 1913, when the same Furnace Creek desert area hit 56.6 degrees Celsius, considered the highest reliably measured temperature on Earth.California’s northern mountain areas already have seen several large fires that have destroyed more than a dozen homes. Although there are no confirmed reports of building damage, the fire prompted evacuation orders or warnings for hundreds of homes and several campgrounds in California along with the closure of nearly 518 square kilometers of Plumas National Forest.Firefighters work to stop the Sugar Fire, part of the Beckwourth Complex Fire, from spreading near Frenchman Lake in Plumas National Forest, Calif., on July 8, 2021.On Friday, ridgetop winds up to 32.2 kph combined with ferocious heat as the fire raged through bone-dry pine, fir and chaparral. As the fire’s northeastern flank raged near the border, the Washoe County Sheriff’s Office asked people to …
Early Clinical Trials of New Malaria Vaccine Show Strong Protection Against Disease
A new type of malaria vaccine is showing promise in FILE – A worker sprays insecticide for mosquitoes at a village in Bangkok, Thailand, Dec. 12, 2017.”Malaria has been a really tricky infection to make a vaccine against,” said Alexis Kaushansky, a malaria researcher at the University of Washington and Seattle Children’s Research Institute who was not involved in the new study. “I think this vaccine is really exciting and promising.” ‘A game changer’ Earlier studies have shown that people can develop immunity to malaria, but it requires exposure to many more parasites than mosquito bites deliver. The new vaccine, developed by biotechnology company Sanaria, involves directly injecting large doses of parasites and administering antimalarial drugs to prevent patients from getting sick. Mass producing enough parasites for a vaccine is a challenge, however. Over many years, Sanaria developed a process to grow, feed and extract parasites from large numbers of mosquitoes at its facility. Sanaria’s manufacturing process has made it possible to test this type of vaccine made of live, purified parasites, said Patrick Duffy, an internal medicine physician at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases and a co-author of the study. “That’s been a game changer.” FILE – A woman carrying a baby holds a treated mosquito net during a malaria prevention action at Ajah in Eti Osa East district of Lagos, Nigeria, April 21, 2016.In the latest clinical trial on a small number of volunteers, at least 77.8% of the participants who received the vaccine with chloroquine or pyrimethamine were protected against …
Hackers Disrupt Iran’s Rail Service with Fake Delay Messages
Iran’s railroad system came under cyberattack Friday, a semi-official news agency reported, with hackers posting fake messages about train delays or cancellations on display boards at stations across the country. The hackers posted messages such as “long delayed because of cyberattack” or “canceled” on the boards. They also urged passengers to call for information, listing the phone number of the office of the country’s supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei. The semiofficial Fars news agency reported that the hack led to “unprecedented chaos” at rail stations. No group took responsibility. Earlier in the day, Fars said trains across Iran had lost their electronic tracking system. It wasn’t immediately clear if that was also part of the cyberattack. Fars later removed its report and instead quoted the spokesman of the state railway company, Sadegh Sekri, as saying “the disruption” did not cause any problem for train services. In 2019, an error in the railway company’s computer servers caused multiple delays in train services. In December that year, Iran’s telecommunications ministry said the country had defused a massive cyberattack on unspecified “electronic infrastructure” but provided no specifics on the purported attack. It was not clear if the reported attack caused any damage or disruptions in Iran’s computer and internet systems, and whether it was the latest chapter in the U.S. and Iran’s cyber operations targeting the other. Iran disconnected much of its infrastructure from the internet after the Stuxnet computer virus — widely believed to be a joint U.S.-Israeli creation — disrupted thousands of Iranian centrifuges …
US Health Agency Calls for Inquiry into Alzheimer’s Drug Review
The acting head of the Food and Drug Administration on Friday called for a government investigation into highly unusual contacts between her agency’s drug reviewers and the maker of a controversial new Alzheimer’s drug. Dr. Janet Woodcock announced the extraordinary step via Twitter. It’s the latest fallout over last month’s approval of Aduhelm, an expensive and unproven therapy that the agency OK’d against the advice of its own outside experts. Woodcock made the request to the Department of Health and Human Services’ inspector general, the watchdog agency that oversees the FDA and other federal health agencies. The move comes after numerous calls for a probe into the approval from medical experts, consumer advocates and members of Congress. Two congressional committees have already launched their own review. The FDA’s Janet Woodcock speaks during a news conference at the U.S. Food and Drug Administration building on June 14, 2011.”We believe an independent assessment is the best manner in which to determine whether any interactions that occurred between the manufacturer and the agency’s review staff were inconsistent with FDA’s policies and procedures,” Woodcock wrote on Twitter. Biogen pledged to cooperate with the inquiry. Last month, the health news site Stat reported on the unusually close collaboration between Aduhelm drugmaker Biogen and FDA staff. In particular, the site reported an “off-the-books” meeting in May 2019 between a top Biogen executive and the FDA’s lead reviewer for Alzheimer’s drugs. The meeting came after Biogen stopped two studies because the drug didn’t seem to slow the disease as intended. Biogen and …
Biden, Putin Discuss Ransomware Attacks From Russia
U.S. President Joe Biden discussed recent ransomware attacks on the U.S. from Russia in a phone call Friday with Russian President Vladimir Putin, according to the White House.“President Biden underscored the need for Russia to take action to disrupt ransomware groups operating in Russia and emphasized that he is committed to continued engagement on the broader threat posed by ransomware,” according to a readout of the conversation released by the White House.Biden warned of consequences if ransomware attacks from Russia continued, the White House said.“President Biden reiterated that the United States will take any necessary action to defend its people and its critical infrastructure in the face of this continuing challenge,” the White House said.The call came more than three weeks after the two leaders met in Geneva on June 16, when Biden appealed to Putin, who has denied any responsibility, to crack down on cyber hackers in Russia.Some information for this report came from Reuters. …
US Ships Moderna Vaccine to Indonesia Amid COVID-19 Surge
As Indonesia deals with a surge in COVID-19 cases, the Biden administration is sending three million doses of the Moderna coronavirus vaccine to the country on July 9, a senior administration official tells VOA. The shipment is one of the largest batches the U.S. has donated, the official said. In total, the U.S. has allocated four million doses for Indonesia, with the remaining one million doses to be shipped “soon.”The administration is also sending 500,000 doses of the Johnson & Johnson vaccine to Moldova, the first batch of U.S. vaccine shared with Europe. A woman receives a shot of the Sinovac COVID-19 vaccine during a mass vaccination at Gelora Bung Karno Main Stadium in Jakarta, Indonesia, June 26, 2021.Indonesia surge Indonesia is battling a record-breaking surge in new cases and deaths, due to the highly contagious delta variant. “We recognize the difficult situation Indonesia currently finds itself in with a surge of COVID-19 cases,” said the Biden administration official. “Our thoughts are with all those in Indonesia affected by this surge. We support the Indonesian people as they fight this surge and are doing everything we can to help them in this time of need.” During a Friday press conference, Indonesian Minister for Foreign Affairs Retno Marsudi confirmed the shipment.“This is the first shipment through the COVAX mechanism,” Marsudi said, referring to the United Nations vaccine sharing mechanism.Indonesia relies heavily on Chinese vaccines, with only about 5% of its population fully vaccinated. The country has procured 108.5 million doses of the Sinovac vaccine but is seeing rising infections among medical workers fully vaccinated with it.After several fully inoculated medical personnel died from COVID-19, Health Minister Budi Gunadi Sadikin said on Friday the …
Zika Virus Detected in India’s Kerala State
Authorities in India’s southern Kerala region have issued a statewide alert after a case of the Zika virus was confirmed, officials said Friday. A further 13 suspected cases were being investigated, state health minister Veena George said. A 24-year-old pregnant woman was found to be infected with the mosquito-borne disease and was undergoing treatment at a hospital in Thiruvananthapuram city. Pregnant women are particularly vulnerable and can transmit the infection to their newborns, which can result in life-altering conditions such as Guillain-Barre syndrome, a rare auto-immune disease. Samples from the 13 suspected cases have been sent for further investigation to a lab in Pune, the minister added. Zika is mostly spread through the bite of the Aedes mosquito but can also be sexually transmitted, according to the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The virus was first discovered in monkeys in Uganda’s Zika forest in 1947 and has caused several outbreaks across the world in recent decades. No vaccines or anti-viral drugs are available as prevention or cure. Symptoms include fever, skin rashes, conjunctivitis and muscle and joint pain, but fatalities are rare. Officials said the infected woman had showed symptoms including fever, headache and rashes before being admitted to a hospital, where she safely delivered a baby on Wednesday. Health teams have been assigned to the area to monitor for any further cases. India also saw Zika outbreaks in 2017 and 2018, with hundreds of cases reported …
Vietnam Announces Lockdown, Vaccination Goals
Vietnam enacted on Friday a two-week lockdown on movement in Ho Chi Minh City to battle a growing outbreak of the coronavirus.Hanoi also announced plans to vaccinate 50% of the population age 18 and older by the end of the year and set a goal of 70% of its population vaccinated by next March.”Vaccination against COVID-19 is a necessary and important measure to contain the disease and ensure socio-economic development,” the Health Ministry said in a statement, according to Agence France-Presse.The country of 100 million had registered fewer than 3,000 cases of COVID-19, the disease caused by the coronavirus, as of April. As of Friday, Vietnam had 24,810 confirmed cases of COVID-19 and 104 deaths, according to the Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Research Center.Vietnam has administered about 4 million vaccine doses, with about 240,000 people fully vaccinated – 0.25% of the population, according to Johns Hopkins’ Vaccine Tracker.The 9 million residents of Ho Chi Minh City, the country’s economic hub, are barred from gathering in groups larger than two people and are allowed to leave their homes for the next two weeks only in cases of emergency or to buy food or medicine.Meanwhile, Fiji Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama said the South Pacific nation would make it compulsory for residents to become vaccinated against the coronavirus.”No jabs, no job — that is what the science tells us is safest and that is now the policy of the government and enforced through law,” Bainimarama said in a national address late Thursday, according to …
Australian Police Crack Down on COVID-19 Rule-breakers In Sydney
Coronavirus infections are rising in Australia, despite a two-week-old lockdown intended to stop their spread. Officials are now focusing on how to enforce compliance with COVID-19 lockdown rules, particularly where such restrictions appear to be mostly ignored.Authorities have said that strict stay-at-home orders in some of Australia’s most ethnically diverse areas in Sydney have been widely flouted, although charities have said community health messages for some migrant groups have been inadequate.A major police operation is underway in parts of Sydney to ensure the rules are followed. Officers on horseback are expected to patrol main shopping areas.Senior commanders have denied the crackdown is targeting multicultural areas.Australian Prime Minister Prime Minister Scott Morrison said too many people have broken the rules.“We haven’t seen the compliance that has been necessary. It is important to get that compliance in place,” he said. “The virus does not move on its own. It moves by people moving the virus around, and that is why it is so important that the restrictions that have been put in place that are appropriate just need to be complied with.”Under Sydney’s lockdown, which is due to end on July 16, residents can only leave home to work, study, buy groceries, care for a relative or other dependent, or receive a COVID-19 vaccination.Starting Friday, people will only be able to exercise in groups of two and do so within 10 kilometers of their homes.The New South Wales chief health officer, Dr. Kerry Chant, urged residents to stay home.“People are looking at …
Buddhist Digital Amulets Mark Thai Entry Into Crypto Art Craze
Karmic fortune has arrived to the digital art market, with a kaleidoscopic splash of colors and the face of a revered Thai monk offering portable Buddhist good luck charms to tech-savvy buyers.Sales of non-fungible tokens (NFTs) — virtual images of anything from popular internet memes to original artwork — have swept the art world in recent months, with some fetching millions of dollars at major auction houses.CryptoAmulets is the latest venture to chase the craze, with founder Ekkaphong Khemthong sensing opportunity in Thailand’s widespread practice of collecting talismans blessed by revered monks.”I am an amulet collector and I was thinking about how I could introduce amulets to foreigners and to the world,” he told AFP.Collecting amulets and other small religious trinkets is a popular pastime in Buddhist-majority Thailand, where the capital Bangkok has a market solely dedicated to the traders of these lucky objects.Their value can rise thousands of dollars if blessed by a well-respected monk.Despite being a digital format, Ekkapong wanted CryptoAmulets to have the same traditional ceremony as a physical piece, which is why he approached Luang Pu Heng, a highly regarded abbot from Thailand’s northeast.”I respect this monk and I would love the world to know about him — he is a symbol of good fortune in business,” he said.Luang Pu Heng last month presided over a ceremony to bless physical replicas of the digital amulets, which show a serene image of his face.He splashed holy water onto his own visage as his saffron-robed disciples chanted and …
With 4 Million COVID Dead, Many Kids Left Behind
Some won’t ever remember the parents they lost because they were too young when COVID-19 struck. Others are trying to keep the memory alive by doing the things they used to do together: making pancakes or playing guitar. Others still are clutching onto what remains, a pillow or a photo, as they adapt to lives with aunts, uncles and siblings stepping in to fill the void.The 4 million people who have died so far in the coronavirus pandemic left behind parents, friends and spouses — but also young children who are navigating life now as orphans or with just one parent, who is also mourning the loss.It’s a trauma that is playing out in big cities and small villages across the globe, from Assam state in northeast India to New Jersey and points in between.And even as vaccination rates tick up, the losses and generational impact show no sign of easing in many places where the virus and its variants continue to kill. As the official COVID-19 death toll reached its latest grim milestone this week, South Korea reported its biggest single-day jump in infections and Indonesia counted its deadliest day of the pandemic so far.Victoria Elizabeth Soto didn’t notice the milestone. She was born three months ago after her mother, Elisabeth Soto, checked into the hospital in Lomas de Zamora, Argentina, eight months pregnant and suffering symptoms of COVID-19.Soto, 38, had tried for three years to get pregnant and gave birth to baby Victoria on April 13. The mother …
Oxfam: 11 People Die of Hunger Each Minute Around the Globe
Anti-poverty organization Oxfam said Thursday that 11 people die of hunger each minute and that the number facing faminelike conditions around the globe has increased six times over the last year.In a report titled The Hunger Virus Multiplies, Oxfam said that the death toll from famine outpaces that of COVID-19, which kills around seven people per minute.”The statistics are staggering, but we must remember that these figures are made up of individual people facing unimaginable suffering. Even one person is too many,” said Oxfam America’s president and CEO, Abby Maxman.The humanitarian group also said that 155 million people around the world are now living in crisis levels of food insecurity or worse — some 20 million more than last year. Around two-thirds of them face hunger because their country is in military conflict.”Today, unrelenting conflict on top of the COVID-19 economic fallout, and a worsening climate crisis, has pushed more than 520,000 people to the brink of starvation,” Maxman said. “Instead of battling the pandemic, warring parties fought each other, too often landing the last blow to millions already battered by weather disasters and economic shocks.”Despite the pandemic, Oxfam said that global military spending increased by $51 billion during the pandemic — an amount that exceeds by at least six times what the U.N. needs to stop hunger.The report listed a number of countries as “the worst hunger hotspots,” including Afghanistan, Ethiopia, South Sudan, Syria and Yemen — all embroiled in conflict.”Starvation continues to be used as a weapon of …
Billionaire Blastoff: Rich Riding Own Rockets into Space
Two billionaires are putting everything on the line this month to ride their own rockets into space.It’s intended to be a flashy confidence boost for customers seeking their own short joyrides.The lucrative, high-stakes chase for space tourists will unfold on the fringes of space — 88 kilometers to 106 kilometers up, pitting Virgin Galactic’s Richard Branson against the world’s richest man, Blue Origin’s Jeff Bezos.Branson is due to take off Sunday from New Mexico, launching with two pilots and three other employees aboard a rocket plane carried aloft by a double-fuselage aircraft.Bezos departs nine days later from West Texas, blasting off in a fully automated capsule with three guests: his brother, an 82-year-old female aviation pioneer who’s waited six decades for a shot at space and the winner of a $28 million charity auction.Branson’s flight will be longer, but Bezos’ will be higher. Branson’s craft has more windows, but Bezos’ windows are bigger. Branson’s piloted plane has already flown to space three times. Bezos’ has five times as many test flights, though none with people on board.Either way, they’re shooting for sky-high bragging rights as the first person to fly his own rocket to space and experience three to four minutes of weightlessness.Branson, who turns 71 in another week, considers it “very important” to try it out before allowing space tourists on board. He insists he’s not apprehensive; this is the thrill-seeking adventurer who’s kite-surfed across the English Channel and attempted to circle the world in a hot air balloon.”As …
Billionaires Gear Up for Space as the Arab World Names First Female Astronaut
It seems Richard Branson, and not Jeff Bezos, will be the first billionaire in space. Plus, a new robot could make work safer on the International Space Station, while the UAE names its first female astronaut. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi has the Week in Space.Camera: AP/NASA/EUROPEAN SPACE AGENCY (ESA)/REUTERS/VIRGIN GALACTIC/SPACE X/GSMA/ESA Produced by : Arash Arabasadi …