Mar72023 by DmediaNo Comments

Italy Ministers Fume Over Proposed Smoking Ban

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The Italian health minister's proposals to extend a smoking ban include the outdoor areas of bars and parks, according to details reported by local media, drawing the ire of right-wing Cabinet colleagues who labeled him a "communist."  Minister Orazio Schillaci, a technocrat with no party affiliation, said in January he would crackdown on smoking, including e-cigarettes, which are being widely used by teenagers.  The new rules will include the outside areas of bars and at public transport stops, La Stampa newspaper reported on Monday. The prohibition will also be extended to parks if pregnant women and children are present, it said.  Junior Culture Minister Vittorio Sgarbi, known for expressing his opinions, called Schillaci's view "intimidating" and said such bans would instead encourage people to smoke.  "This is something typical of…


Mar72023 by TechmanNo Comments

Attorneys General in 45 US States Demand TikTok Hand Over Information

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A group of attorneys general from 45 U.S. states and Washington, D.C., demanded Monday that social media app TikTok produce materials as part of an investigation into its effect on young users’ mental health.    “We know that social media is taking a devastating toll on young people’s mental health and well-being, and through our investigation we are getting a clearer sense of TikTok’s role,” California Attorney General Rob Bonta said in a statement.    The investigation began last year when eight states, including California, Massachusetts and Tennessee, launched a bipartisan probe of TikTok, focusing on whether the popular video-sharing app is endangering young people and violating state consumer protection laws.     On Monday, Tennessee Attorney General Jonathan Skrmetti asked a Tennessee court to order TikTok to produce subpoenaed materials sought by the…


Mar62023 by DmediaNo Comments

How We Eat Could Add 1 Degree of Warming By 2100

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Greenhouse gas emissions from the way humans produce and consume food could add nearly 1 degree of warming to the Earth's climate by 2100, according to a new study. Continuing the dietary patterns of today will push the planet past the 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) limit of warming sought under the Paris climate agreement to avoid the worst effects of climate change, according to the study published Monday in Nature Climate Change and will approach the agreement's limit of 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit). The modeling study found that most greenhouse gas emissions come from three major sources: meat from animals like cows, sheep and goats; dairy; and rice. Those three sources account for at least 19% of each food's contribution to a warming planet, according to…


Mar62023 by TechmanNo Comments

Twitter Suffers Glitches Over Inaccessible Links

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Twitter users reported a string of problems with the social media site on Monday, including broken links and images not loading. The company's tech support account said in a tweet, "Some parts of Twitter may not be working as expected right now. We made an internal change that had some unintended consequences. We're working on this now and will share an update when it's fixed." Twitter's billionaire owner, Elon Musk, tweeted Monday: "This platform is so brittle (sigh). Will be fixed shortly."  The problems appeared to be resolved about an hour after they began. "Things should now be working as normal," the company tweeted around 1 p.m. Eastern time. The glitches started around midday Monday, with users around the world saying they were unable to read links to articles from…


Mar62023 by DmediaNo Comments

UN Takes Step Toward New Way of Tracking Greenhouse Gases

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The United Nations announced Monday that it had taken a significant step towards trying to fill a key gap in the fight against climate change: standardized, real-time tracking of greenhouse gases. The U.N.'s World Meteorological Organization has come up with a new Global Greenhouse Gas Monitoring Infrastructure that aims to provide better ways of measuring planet-warming pollution and help inform policy choices. The WMO's new platform will integrate space-based and surface-based observing systems, and seek to clarify uncertainties about where greenhouse gas emissions end up. It should result in much faster and sharper data on how the planet's atmosphere is changing. "We know from our measurements that greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere are at record high," WMO chief Petteri Taalas said.  The three major greenhouses gases are carbon dioxide,…


Mar52023 by TechmanNo Comments

Satellites Could Beam Poorest Nations out of Digital Desert 

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Only a third of people in the world's poorest countries can connect to the internet, the U.N. telecoms agency said Sunday, but low-flying satellites could bring hope to millions, especially in remote corners of Africa. Tech giants including Microsoft have pledged to help populations hobbled by poor internet services to "leapfrog" into an era of online connectivity, with satellites set to play a key role as rival firms send thousands of new generation transmitters into low level orbit. At the moment just 36% of the 1.25 billion people in the world's 46 poorest countries can plug into the internet, the International Telecommunication Union said. By comparison, more than 90 percent have access in the European Union. The ITU condemned the "staggering international connectivity gap" that it said had widened over…


Mar52023 by DmediaNo Comments

Nations Reach Accord to Protect Marine Life on High Seas 

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For the first time, United Nations members have agreed on a unified treaty to protect biodiversity in the high seas — nearly half the planet’s surface — concluding two weeks of talks in New York. The U.N. Convention on the Law of the Sea came into force in 1994, before marine biodiversity was a well-established concept. An updated framework to protect marine life in the regions outside national boundary waters, known as the high seas, had been in discussions for more than 20 years, but previous efforts to reach an agreement had repeatedly stalled. The unified agreement treaty was reached late Saturday. “We only really have two major global commons — the atmosphere and the oceans,” said Georgetown marine biologist Rebecca Helm. While the oceans may draw less attention, “protecting…


Mar52023 by DmediaNo Comments

Can’t Take Statins? New Pill Cuts Cholesterol, Heart Attacks

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Drugs known as statins are the first-choice treatment for high cholesterol but millions of people who can't or won't take those pills because of side effects may have another option. In a major study, a different kind of cholesterol-lowering drug named Nexletol reduced the risk of heart attacks and some other cardiovascular problems in people who can't tolerate statins, researchers reported Saturday. Doctors already prescribe the drug, known chemically as bempedoic acid, to be used together with a statin to help certain high-risk patients further lower their cholesterol. The new study tested Nexletol without the statin combination — and offers the first evidence that it also reduces the risk of cholesterol-caused health problems. Statins remain “the cornerstone of cholesterol-lowering therapies,” stressed Dr. Steven Nissen of the Cleveland Clinic, who led…


Mar52023 by DmediaNo Comments

India Might Issue Alert on Cough Syrup Exports After Toxins Found

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India may issue an alert on cough syrup exported by Marion Biotech, whose products have been linked to deaths in Uzbekistan, after tests showed many of the company's drug samples contained toxins, a drug inspector said Saturday. Indian police arrested three Marion employees Friday and are looking for two directors after tests in a government laboratory found 22 of 36 syrup samples "adulterated and spurious." New Delhi is pursuing the issue even as the government has pushed back against allegations that cough syrup made by another Indian company, Maiden Pharmaceuticals, led to the deaths of children in Gambia last year. Vaibhav Babbar, an inspector involved in the Marion probe, told Reuters the samples had been adulterated with ethylene glycol and diethylene glycol — the toxins that the World Health Organization…


Mar52023 by DmediaNo Comments

Climate Activists Target Artwork Near German Parliament

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Climate activists splashed a dark liquid over an artwork Saturday near the German parliament building. Desecrating the art, engraved with key articles from the country's constitution, drew condemnation from the speaker of parliament and other lawmakers. The Last Generation group said supporters symbolically “soaked in ‘oil’” the outdoor installation — a series of glass plates on which 19 articles from the German Constitution setting out fundamental rights are engraved. They pasted posters over the work that read, “Oil or fundamental rights?” The group said in a statement that “the German government is not protecting our fundamental rights” and argued that continuing to burn oil is incompatible with doing so. Parliament Speaker Barbel Bas said she was appalled by the action and has “no understanding for it.” She said the work…


Mar42023 by DmediaNo Comments

South African Scientists Use Bugs in War Against Water Hyacinth Weed

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The Hartbeespoort dam in South Africa used to be brimming with people enjoying scenic landscapes and recreational water sports. Now, the visitors are greeted to the sight of boats stuck in a sea of invasive green water hyacinth weed. The spike in Harties - as Hartbeespoort is known - can be attributed to pollution, with sewage, industrial chemicals, heavy metals and litter flowing on rivers from Johannesburg and Pretoria. "In South Africa, we are faced with highly polluted waters," said Professor Julie Coetzee, who has studied water hyacinths for over 20 years and manages the aquatic weeds program at the Centre for Biological Control at Rhodes University. Nutrients in the pollutants act as perfect fertilizers for the weed, a big concern for nearby communities due to its devastating impact on…


Mar42023 by DmediaNo Comments

Pharmacy’s Decision on Abortion Pill May Signal Restricted Availability in US

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Walgreens says it will not start selling an abortion pill in 20 states that had warned of legal consequences if it did so. The drugstore chain's announcement Thursday signals that access to mifepristone may not expand as broadly as federal regulators intended in January, when they finalized a rule change allowing more pharmacies to provide the pill. Here's a closer look at the issue. About the abortion pill The U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved mifepristone in 2000 to end pregnancy when used in combination with a second drug, misoprostol. The combination is approved for use up to the 10th week of pregnancy. Mifepristone is taken first to dilate the cervix and block a hormone needed to sustain a pregnancy. Misoprostol is taken a day or two later, causing contractions…


Mar42023 by DmediaNo Comments

Can the Dogs of Chernobyl Teach Us New Tricks About Survival?

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More than 35 years after the world's worst nuclear accident, the dogs of Chernobyl roam among decaying abandoned buildings in and around the closed plant — somehow still able to find food, breed and survive. Scientists hope that studying these dogs can teach humans new tricks about how to live in the harshest, most degraded environments, too. They published the first of what they hope will be many genetics studies on Friday in the journal Science Advances, focusing on 302 free-roaming dogs living in an officially designated "exclusion zone" around the disaster site. They identified populations whose differing levels of radiation exposure may have made them genetically distinct from one another and other dogs worldwide. "We've had this golden opportunity" to lay the groundwork for answering a crucial question: "How…


Mar42023 by DmediaNo Comments

Former President Bush Urges Lawmakers to Reauthorize AIDS Relief Plan 

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Former President George W. Bush last week urged Washington lawmakers to continue to support the President's Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR), an initiative he launched two decades ago against one of deadliest diseases at the time. Bush made his initial plea before Congress at his State of the Union address in 2003, when nearly 30 million people in Africa had the AIDS virus, including 3 million children under age 15. "I ask the Congress to commit $15 billion over the next five years, including nearly $10 billion in new money, to turn the tide against AIDS in the most afflicted nations of Africa and the Caribbean," Bush said at the time. Fast forward to today: Bush, in Washington to mark his plan's 20-year anniversary, said he made the trip…


Mar32023 by DmediaNo Comments

Hong Kongers Keep Wearing Masks Despite Lifting of Mandate

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Days after the Hong Kong government lifted its mask mandate, most Hong Kongers continue to wear the protective anti-COVID-19 coverings, a decision that for some people shows a continued concern about health and for others indicates distrust of the government. Tam Mei Tak, a radio talk-show host and political commentator, told VOA Cantonese that many Hong Kongers have realized that "trusting the government is worse than relying on themselves" in the fight against the pandemic. A poll of Hong Kong residents commissioned by the local South China Morning Post and released in April 2020 found seven in 10 were convinced they would have only themselves to thank rather than the government if the city won its battle against COVID-19. The Hong Kong government officially lifted the mask mandate on Wednesday.…


Mar32023 by DmediaNo Comments

Four New Crew Members Arrive at International Space Station

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The U.S. space agency NASA says two U.S. astronauts, another from the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and a Russian cosmonaut are safely aboard the International Space Station (ISS) after their Space-X Dragon crew capsule docked Friday with the orbiting laboratory. Video from NASA showed U.S. astronauts Stephen Bowen and Woody Hoburg, UAE astronaut Sultan Alneyadi and cosmonaut Andrey Fedyaev being greeted warmly by ISS crew members as they entered the space station about two hours after the docking. The 41-year-old Alneyadi is the second person from his country to fly to space and the first to launch from U.S. soil as part of a long-duration space station team. Space-X says the new crew members will spend six months on the station, where they will conduct more than 200 science experiments…


Mar32023 by DmediaNo Comments

One Month Later, Fallout from Toxic Train Accident Continues

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One month after a freight train derailed in East Palestine, Ohio, sending tons of toxic chemicals into the air and prompting a temporary evacuation of the town, the fallout from the accident continues, both on the ground where local residents complain of lingering effects, and in Washington, where the Biden administration is under assault from conservatives over the federal response. There were no injuries reported as a result of the accident, but residents of the area nearby are complaining of a mix of symptoms that may be related to chemical exposure, including headaches, breathing difficulties and skin rashes. This is despite assertions by state and federal environmental officials who say they have tested air and water samples and have found no evidence of harmful levels of dangerous chemicals. Contractors have…


Mar22023 by DmediaNo Comments

Carbon Dioxide Emissions Reached a Record High in 2022

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Communities around the world emitted more carbon dioxide in 2022 than in any other year on records dating to 1900, a result of air travel rebounding from the pandemic and more cities turning to coal as a low-cost source of power. Emissions of the climate-warming gas that were caused by energy production grew 0.9% to reach 36.8 gigatons in 2022, the International Energy Agency reported Thursday. (The mass of one gigaton is equivalent to about 10,000 fully loaded aircraft carriers, according to NASA.) Carbon dioxide is released when fossil fuels such as oil, coal or natural gas are burned to powers cars, planes, homes and factories. When the gas enters the atmosphere, it traps heat and contributes to the warming of the the climate. Extreme weather events intensified last year's…


Mar22023 by DmediaNo Comments

SpaceX Launches Latest Space Station Crew to Orbit for NASA

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Elon Musk's rocket company SpaceX launched a four-person crew on a trip to the International Space Station early Thursday, with a Russian cosmonaut and United Arab Emirates astronaut joining two NASA crewmates on the flight. The SpaceX launch vehicle, consisting of a Falcon 9 rocket topped with an autonomously operated Crew Dragon capsule called Endeavour, lifted off at 12:34 a.m. EST (0534 GMT) from NASA's Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida. A live NASA webcast showed the 25-story-tall spacecraft ascending from the launch tower as its nine Merlin engines roared to life in billowing clouds of vapor and a reddish fireball that lit up the predawn sky. The launch was expected to accelerate the Crew Dragon to an orbital velocity of 28,164 kph, more than 22 times the speed…


Mar22023 by TechmanNo Comments

US Launches Aggressive National Cybersecurity Strategy

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The Biden administration is pushing for more comprehensive federal regulations to keep the online realm safer against hackers, including by shifting cybersecurity responsibilities away from consumers to industry and treating ransomware attacks as national security threats. The plan is part of the National Cyber Strategy that the administration released Thursday, outlining long-range goals for how individuals, government and businesses can safely operate in the digital world. This includes placing the burden on the computer and software industry to develop “secure by design” products that are purposefully designed, built and tested to significantly reduce the number of exploitable flaws before they're introduced into the market. The strategy “fundamentally reimagines America's cyber social contract” and will “rebalance the responsibility for managing cyber risk onto those who are most able to bear it,”…


Mar12023 by DmediaNo Comments

Asteroid-Bashing Spacecraft ‘Phenomenally Successful,’ Studies Find

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NASA's DART spacecraft slammed into the asteroid Dimorphos at a spot between two boulders during last September's first test of a planetary defense system, sending debris hurtling into space and changing the rocky, oblong-shaped object's path a bit more than previously calculated.  Those were among the findings released by scientists on Wednesday in the most detailed account of the U.S. space agency's proof-of-principle mission on using a spacecraft to change a celestial object's trajectory — employing sheer kinetic force to nudge it off course just enough to keep Earth safe.  "The DART test was phenomenally successful. We now know that we have a viable technique for potentially preventing an asteroid impact if one day we had the need to," said planetary scientist Terik Daly of the Johns Hopkins University Applied…


Mar12023 by DmediaNo Comments

Lilly Plans to Slash Some Insulin Prices, Expand Cost Cap

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Eli Lilly will cut prices for some older insulins later this year and immediately give more patients access to a cap on the costs they pay to fill prescriptions.  The moves announced Wednesday promise critical relief to some people with diabetes who can face thousands of dollars in annual costs for insulin they need in order to live. Lilly's changes also come as lawmakers and patient advocates pressure drugmakers to do something about soaring prices.  Lilly said it will cut the list prices for its most commonly prescribed insulin, Humalog, and for another insulin, Humulin, by 70% or more in the fourth quarter, which starts in October.  List prices are what a drugmaker initially sets for a product and what people who have no insurance or plans with high deductibles…


Mar12023 by TechmanNo Comments

Can AI Help Solve Diplomatic Dispute Over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam?

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Ethiopia's hydropower dam on the Blue Nile River has angered downstream neighbors, especially Sudan, where people rely on the river for farming and other livelihoods. To reduce the risk of conflict, a group of scientists has used artificial intelligence, AI, to show how all could benefit. But getting Ethiopia, Sudan, and Egypt to agree on an AI solution could prove challenging, as Henry Wilkins reports from Khartoum, Sudan. ...