Month: October 2021

A group of World Health Organization experts is calling for 70 percent of the global population to be fully vaccinated by mid-2022 to prevent the COVID-19 pandemic from progressing in more dangerous ways. The 15-member Strategic Advisory Group of Experts, known as SAGE, which makes recommendations to WHO on vaccine policy and strategy, just concluded a four-day meeting. The experts say more than enough vaccines are available to cover everyone by the middle of next year if the doses are not hoarded by wealthy countries and are shared equitably with poorer nations which as of yet do not have them.  WHO director of immunization vaccines and biologicals Katherine O’Brien says it is urgent to get the doses to places that are falling behind in the race to vaccinate. “Unless we do that, we will continue to have transmission and transmission will lead to more variants and the issue of the variants is that there is the potential for those variants to escape immune pressure and to undo much of the progress that has been made,” O’Brien said. The experts recommend people who are moderately and severely immune compromised should be offered an additional or third dose of all COVID-19 vaccines.  O’Brien says the third dose should be administered one to three months after people have received their second shot.  “The intent of the third dose is to induce that person’s immune system to have protection that would be at the level that was demonstrated to prevent against severe disease, hospitalization, and death in the clinical trials, which excluded …

Severe storms brought suspected tornadoes and baseball-sized hail to parts of Oklahoma, but there were no reports Monday of deaths or injuries.  The severe weather system that hit Oklahoma late Sunday also brought heavy rain, lightning and wind to parts of Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri and Texas, and more stormy weather is predicted later this week in parts of the central United States.  Severe weather is not unusual in the Southern Plains in October, said Chuck Hodges, senior meteorologist with the National Weather Service in Tulsa. But Sunday’s storm “was kind of more of a spring setup,” he said.  “We had unusually high moisture and a very, very strong weather system that came through,” he said.  Tornado warnings and reports of damage popped up across Oklahoma beginning Sunday afternoon, and survey crews with the weather service will head out Monday to determine how many tornadoes struck, Hodges said.  A possible tornado hit the Tulsa suburb of Coweta late Sunday, causing significant damage to a high school, homes and a gas station, news outlets reported, and Coweta Public Schools classes were canceled Monday.  Building damage was also reported in Anadarko, about 50 miles (80 kilometers) southwest of Oklahoma City.  Earlier, baseball-sized hail shattered windows and dented cars in Norman, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) south of Oklahoma City.  The National Weather Service confirmed two small tornadoes touched down in rural areas of southwestern Missouri — an EF-1 twister in Newton County around 1 a.m. and an EF-0 in Jasper County around 4:45 …

The World Health Organization said Monday that constructive action against climate change could save “millions” of lives.  Ahead of the 2021 United Nations Climate Change Conference, or COP26, scheduled for October 31, the WHO is urging governments to reach concrete agreements to combat climate change.  “Countries must set ambitious national climate commitments if they are to sustain a healthy and green recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic,” the WHO said Monday in a statement announcing a new report on climate change and health.  Amid the pandemic, climate crises including droughts, heat waves, flooding and hurricanes have ravaged all parts of the world. “Changes in weather and climate are threatening food security and driving up food-, water- and vector-borne diseases, such as malaria, while climate impacts are also negatively affecting mental health,” the WHO statement read.  The WHO report came on the same day that an open letter signed by more than 400 health bodies representing over 45 million health care professionals was released, calling for urgent action against climate change.  At this year’s COP26 summit in Glasgow, Scotland, participants will spend two weeks discussing the measures needed to avoid what some are calling an “unprecedented ecological crisis.”    …

A key U.N. summit tasked with protecting biodiversity officially opens in China and online Monday, as countries meet to tackle pollution and prevent mass extinction weeks before the COP26 climate conference. Beijing, the world’s biggest polluter, has sought to position itself in recent years as a world leader on climate issues after Washington’s withdrawal from international commitments under the Trump administration. The online session that begins Monday afternoon — setting the stage for a face-to-face meeting in April — will see parties to the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) working out the details of a new document that will set targets for protecting ecosystems by 2030. Up for debate are the “30 by 30” plan to give 30% of lands and oceans protected status — a measure supported by a broad coalition of nations, as well as a goal to stop creating plastic waste. China has not yet committed to the “30 by 30” plan. This year’s COP15 gathering, hosted in the southwest city of Kunming, was originally set for 2020 and postponed due to the Covid-19 pandemic. Around one million animal and plant species are threatened with extinction amid human encroachment on habitats, over-exploitation, pollution, the spread of invasive species, and climate change.  The CBD has been ratified by 195 countries and the European Union — although not the United States, the world’s biggest historical polluter — with parties meeting every two years. Division over targets China said on Friday it has “given high priority to the protection of …

Some days, all Tsimamorekm Aly eats is sugary water. He’s happy if there’s a handful of rice. But with six young kids and a wife to support, he often goes without.  This is the fourth year that drought has devastated Aly’s home in southern Madagascar. Now more than one million people, or two out of five residents, of his Grand Sud region require emergency food aid in what the United Nations is calling a “climate change famine.”  “In previous years there was rain, a lot of rain. I grew sweet potatoes and I had a lot of money… I even got married because I was rich,” said Aly, 44.    “Things have changed,” he said, standing on an expanse of ochre dirt where the only green to be seen is tall, spiky cacti.  Climate change is battering the Indian Ocean island and several U.N. agencies have warned in the past few months of a “climate change famine” here.  “The situation in the south of the country is really worrying,” said Alice Rahmoun, a spokeswoman with the United Nations’ World Food Programme in Madagascar. “I visited several districts… and heard from families how the changing climate has driven them to hunger.”    Rainfall patterns in Madagascar are growing more erratic — they’ve been below average for nearly six years, said researchers at the University of California at Santa Barbara.  “In some villages, the last proper rain was three years ago, in others, eight years ago or even 10 years ago,” said Rahmoun. “Fields are bare, seeds do not sprout and there is no food.”    Temperatures in southern Africa are rising at double the global rate, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate …

From the door of the expedition base, a few small steps to the left an autonomous rover passes by. A few giant leaps to the right is an array of solar panels. The landscape is rocky, hilly, tinged with red. Purposefully it resembles Mars. Here, in the Ramon Crater in the desert of southern Israel, a team of six – five men and one woman – has begun simulating what it will be like to live for about a month on the red planet. Their AMADEE-20 habitat is tucked beneath a rocky outcrop. Inside they sleep, eat and conduct experiments. Outside they wear mock space suits fitted with cameras, microphones and self-contained breathing systems. “We have the motto of fail fast, fail cheap, and have a steep learning curve. Because for every mistake we make here on Earth, we hope we don’t repeat it on Mars,” said Gernot Gromer, director of the Austrian Space Forum. The Austrian association is running the project together with the Israel Space Agency and local group D-MARS. A number of recent Mars probes have captivated astronomy fans across the world with robotic rovers like NASA’s Perseverance and, for the first time, the helicopter Ingenuity, offering a glance of the planet’s surface. But a manned mission is likely more than a decade off. With AMADEE-20, which was supposed to happen in 2020 but was postponed due to COVID-19, the team hopes to bring new insight that will help prepare for that mission, when it comes. “The …

The World Health Organization is calling on governments to allocate the money needed to increase access to mental health treatment.  WHO has published a new Mental Health Atlas marking World Mental Health Day Sunday.    Data collected from 171 countries show none of the World Health Assembly targets for the provision of mental health care by 2020 has been achieved.  Therefore, WHO says it is extending its Comprehensive Mental Health Action Plan to 2030.   Fahmy Hanna is a technical officer in WHO’s Department of Mental Health and Substance Use. He says lack of money is a major reason these goals have been missed.  He says governments allocate just 2.1% of their overall health budgets to mental health services.  “And in the majority of the countries, most of this budget goes to psychiatric hospitals—long-stay, in-patient facilities instead of being spent on community-based mental health services, which are more human-rights-oriented and less decentralized and more accessible to the population,” Hanna said. The WHO reports more than a billion people globally suffer from mental health illness.  The most common such illnesses include anxiety disorders, depression, bipolar and eating disorders, as well as psychotic disorders, including schizophrenia. The data in the atlas was collected in 2019 and reflects the status of pre-pandemic mental health services.  However, health officials agree COVID-19 is having a major impact on people’s mental health and more investments must be made in treating them. Hanna says WHO has carried out two surveys during the pandemic.  He says the findings show major …

A report in The New York Times says that the manufacturers of the Moderna coronavirus vaccine which “appears to be the world’s best defense against COVID-19, has been supplying its shots almost exclusively to wealthy nations, keeping poorer countries waiting and earning billions in profit.” The newspaper said their report is based on information from Airfinity, a data firm that tracks vaccine shipments.  According to the Times account, Moderna has shipped approximately a million shots of its vaccines to poor countries. In comparison, Pfizer has shipped 8.4 million shots and Johnson and Johnson has delivered about 25 million doses to low-income countries. In addition, the Times said government officials in some middle-income countries have reported that their countries have had to pay more for Moderna’s shots than the U.S. and the European Union. Protests in Rome Meanwhile, thousands of protesters took the streets of Rome Saturday to protest Italy’s new “Green Pass” vaccine certification that becomes mandatory for public and private workplaces, beginning October 15. Workers and employees will be fined if they do not comply with the certification requirements. Government workers face suspension, if they come to work five times without the pass that documents that the holder has been inoculated with at least one COVID vaccine or recovered from the coronavirus in the last six months or has tested negative in the last 48 hours. The pass is already a requirement for many indoor venues, including restaurants, museums and theaters. It is also needed for long-distance train and …

When Russian regulators approved the country’s own coronavirus vaccine, it was a moment of national pride, and the Pavlov family was among those who rushed to take the injection. But international health authorities have not yet given their blessing to the Sputnik V shot. So when the family from Rostov-on-Don wanted to visit the West, they looked for a vaccine that would allow them to travel freely, a quest that brought them to Serbia, where hundreds of Russian citizens have flocked in recent weeks to receive Western-approved COVID-19 shots. Serbia, which is not a member of the European Union, is a convenient choice for vaccine-seeking Russians because they can enter the allied Balkan nation without visas and because it offers a wide choice of Western-made shots. Organized tours for Russians have soared, and they can be spotted in the capital, Belgrade, at hotels, restaurants, bars and vaccination clinics. “We took the Pfizer vaccine because we want to travel around the world,” Nadezhda Pavlova, 54, said after receiving the vaccine last weekend at a sprawling Belgrade vaccination center. Her husband, Vitaly Pavlov, 55, said he wanted “the whole world to be open to us rather than just a few countries.” Vaccination tours Vaccination tour packages for Russians seeking shots endorsed by the World Health Organization appeared on the market in mid-September, according to Russia’s Association of Tour Operators. Maya Lomidze, the group’s executive director, said prices start at $300-$700, depending on what’s included. Lauded by Russian President Vladimir Putin as world’s …

The COVID-19 outbreak has apparently sparked a global rise in depression and anxiety. According to a study published in the medical journal The Lancet, there were millions more of such cases last year than had been projected. Women and young people were the groups most affected by pandemic-related depression and anxiety. The report also said there has been “no reduction in the global prevalence or burden … for either disorder since 1990, despite compelling evidence of interventions that reduce their impact.” “This pandemic has created an increased urgency to strengthen mental health systems in most countries,” the survey said. “Taking no action to address the burden of major depressive disorder and anxiety disorders should not be an option,” the researchers said. On Friday, Brazil’s health ministry said the country’s COVID-19 death toll has passed 600,000. The Johns Hopkins Coronavirus Resources Center has recorded 21.5 million COVID-19 cases in the South American country. Russia’s state statistics service reported nearly 50,000 coronavirus deaths in the country in August, taking the toll since the beginning of the pandemic to over 400,000, nearly double the official government figure. Rosstat released its figures late Friday, reporting that 49,389 people died from COVID-19 in August, a figure much higher than 24,661, the government tally for the same month. Overall, Rosstat says around 418,000 people have died in Russia since the pandemic began. This nearly doubles the official total death toll of 214,000 published by the Russian coronavirus task force earlier Friday. Russian officials explained the discrepancy, …

When the remnants of Hurricane Ida dumped record-breaking rain on the East Coast this month, staircases into New York City’s subway tunnels turned into waterfalls and train tracks became canals. In Philadelphia, a commuter line along the Schuylkill River was washed out for miles, and the nation’s busiest rail line, Amtrak’s Northeast Corridor running from Boston to Washington, was shut down for an entire day. Nearly a decade after Superstorm Sandy spurred billions of dollars in investment in coastal flooding protection up and down the East Coast — some of which remains unfinished — Hurricane Ida and other storms this summer provided a stark reminder that more needs to be done — and quickly — as climate change brings stronger, more unpredictable weather to a region with some of the nation’s oldest and busiest transit systems, say transit experts and officials. “This is our moment to make sure our transit system is prepared,” said Sanjay Seth, Boston’s “climate resilience” program manager. “There’s a lot that we need to do in the next 10 years, and we have to do it right. There’s no need to build it twice.” In New York, where some 75 million gallons (285 million liters) of water were pumped out of the subways during Ida, ambitious solutions have been floated, such as building canals through the city. But relatively easy, short-term fixes to the transit system could also be made in the meantime, suggests Janno Lieber, acting CEO of the Metropolitan Transit Authority. Installing curbs at …

Russia’s state statistics service reported nearly 50,000 coronavirus deaths in the country in August, taking the toll since the beginning of the pandemic to over 400,000, nearly double the official government figure. Rosstat released its figures late Friday, reporting that 49,389 people died from COVID-19 in August, a figure much higher than 24,661, the government tally for the same month. Overall, Rosstat says around 418,000 people have died in Russia since the pandemic began. This nearly doubles the official total death toll of 214,000 published by the Russian coronavirus task force earlier Friday. Russian officials explained the discrepancy, saying COVID-19 deaths are counted differently by the two agencies. The government coronavirus task force counts only fatalities for which an autopsy confirms COVID-19 as the primary cause of death, while Rosstat uses a broader definition for deaths linked to the virus. In other developments Friday, the World Health Organization announced it has established and released the first standardized clinical definition of what is commonly known as “long COVID” to help boost treatment for sufferers. Speaking virtually to reporters from the agency’s Geneva headquarters, WHO Head of Clinical Management Janet Diaz said the definition was agreed on after global consultations with health officials. She said the condition, in which symptoms of the illness persist well beyond what is commonly experienced, is usually referred to as “post COVID.” Moreover, it occurs in people who have had confirmed or probable new coronavirus infections, “usually three months on from the onset of the COVID-19, with …

President Joe Biden on Friday signed legislation that will provide financial support to U.S. government employees believed to be suffering from the so-called Havana syndrome, mysterious health incidents that have affected American intelligence officers, diplomats and other personnel around the world. “Today, I was pleased to sign the HAVANA Act into law to ensure we are doing our utmost to provide for U.S. Government personnel who have experienced anomalous health incidents,” Biden said in a statement released by the White House. The Helping American Victims Afflicted by Neurological Attacks Act, or HAVANA Act, was passed unanimously by the Senate on June 7 and the House of Representatives on Tuesday. In his statement, Biden acknowledged that American civil servants, intelligence officers, diplomats and military personnel around the world have been affected by “anomalous health incidents,” and some are struggling with debilitating brain injuries that have curtailed their careers. He vowed to commit the full resources of the U.S. government to provide medical care to victims and determine what causes it and who is responsible. The Havana syndrome — a set of ailments that includes migraines, nausea, dizziness, tinnitus, visual and hearing problems, vertigo, memory lapses, and even mental breakdown — became public in 2016 after dozens of diplomats at the U.S. Embassy in Havana complained of the symptoms. Since then, other U.S. personnel in China, Russia, Poland, Austria and other countries have reported similar symptoms. Robyn Garfield, an advocate for Havana syndrome victims, welcomed the signing but said much more needs …

Firefighters and numerous studies credit intensive forest thinning projects with helping save communities like those recently threatened near Lake Tahoe in California and Nevada, but dissent from some environmental advocacy groups is roiling the scientific community.  States in the U.S. West and the federal government each year thin thousands of acres of dense timber and carve broad swaths through the forest near remote communities, all designed to slow the spread of massive wildfires. The projects aim to return overgrown forests to the way they were more than a century ago, when lower-intensity blazes cleared the underbrush regularly and before land managers began reflexively extinguishing every wildfire as soon as possible.  Such so-called fuel reduction efforts also include using fire to fight fire, with fires deliberately set in the cooler, wetter months to burn out dangerous fuels. Forest managers credit such burns with helping protect the Giant Forest in Sequoia National Park. The state of California eased some regulations to increase the use of that tactic.  While most scientific studies find such forest management is a valuable tool, environmental advocates say data from recent gigantic wildfires support their long-running assertion that efforts to slow wildfires have instead accelerated their spread.  The argument is fueling an already passionate debate.  It has led to a flurry of citations of dueling studies and fed competing claims that the science may be skewed by ideology.  The debate came to a head over this year’s giant Bootleg Fire in southern Oregon.  “Not only did tens of …

A case of Ebola has been confirmed in eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, according to an internal report on Friday from the national biomedical laboratory, five months after the end of the most recent outbreak there.  Congo’s health minister declined to confirm the information but said a statement would be published shortly.  It was not immediately known if the case was related to the 2018-20 outbreak that killed more than 2,200 people in eastern Congo, or the flare-up that killed six this year.  The report from the biomedical lab, the INRB, said the positive result came from a 2-year-old in a densely populated neighborhood of the city of Beni, one of the epicenters of the 2018-20 outbreak, which was the second deadliest on record.  Three of the baby’s neighbors presented symptoms consistent with Ebola last month and then died, the report said, but none were tested for the virus.  It is not unusual for sporadic cases to occur following a major outbreak, health experts say. Particles of the virus can remain present in semen for months after recovery from an infection.  Congo has recorded 11 outbreaks since the disease, which causes severe vomiting and diarrhea and is spread through contact with body fluids, was discovered near its Ebola River in 1976.  The country’s equatorial forests have been a breeding ground for the virus. …

A Russian film crew blasts into space on a moviemaking history mission, an American actor known for playing a space explorer gets the chance to see the real deal, and more. VOA’s Jesusemen Oni has more on the Week in Space. …

The announcement of the first-ever malaria vaccine not only inspires hope in the battle against one of the planet’s most pernicious diseases but also underscores the need to attack this scourge on multiple fronts, says the head of the U.S. President’s Malaria Initiative, which this week rolled out an ambitious five-year plan aimed at taming what he described as “the oldest pandemic.” Malaria, a parasitic infection spread by mosquitoes, kills hundreds of thousands of people every year. Most of the victims are young children, and most malaria cases occur in sub-Saharan Africa. While malaria is not endemic to the United States, the administration of U.S. President Joe Biden considers anti-malaria efforts a priority, said Dr. Raj Panjabi, who was appointed as PMI’s global malaria coordinator in February. PMI is a U.S. government program dedicated to fighting the disease.  “It’s the right thing to do,” he told VOA. “There are too many people — over 400,000 — who die every year from malaria. Most of them are children. In fact, a child dies every two minutes from this disease. And over 200 million cases still occur every year. This is the oldest pandemic. It is a pandemic that has killed perhaps more children than any other, certainly in sub-Saharan Africa.  “So that’s the first reason: It’s just the right thing to do. It’s the moral thing to do. We have the tools, the medicines, the tests. Now we have a vaccine that can help us save lives. The second reason is …