Month: July 2023

Officials in Cameroon say vaccine hesitancy is preventing them from inoculating millions of children for childhood diseases in the first major campaign since the COVID-19 pandemic began.  The country has an outbreak of measles and rubella that has killed 18 children and sickened more than 4,000 this year. The public health ministry said several thousand vaccinators have been dispatched to over 200 hospitals in Cameroon to inoculate more than 5.5 million children against measles and rubella.  The government says the vaccinators are also visiting homes, churches, mosques, markets and camps to make sure every child under 10 years old is inoculated. Thirty-six-year-old carpenter Ongene Pierre says he stopped the vaccinators from inoculating his three children at Nyom, a neighborhood in Cameroon’s capital, Yaounde.  He said he doesn't understand why the…

Earth's average temperature set a new unofficial record high on Thursday, the third such milestone in a week that already rated as the hottest on record. The planetary average hit 63 degrees Fahrenheit (17.23 degrees Celsius), surpassing the 62.9-degree mark (17.18-degree mark) set Tuesday and equaled Wednesday, according to data from the University of Maine's Climate Reanalyzer, a tool that uses satellite data and computer simulations to measure the world's condition. That average includes places that are sweltering under dangerous heat — like Jingxing, China, which checked in almost 110 degrees Fahrenheit (43.3 degrees Celsius) — and the merely unusually warm, like Antarctica, where temperatures across much of the continent were as much as 8 degrees Fahrenheit (4.5 degrees Celsius) above normal this week. The temperature is ramping up across…

WASHINGTON - South Korean officials are seeking to tamp down domestic opposition to the likely release of treated wastewater from Japan’s Fukushima nuclear power plant. The release has the potential to undermine a recent warming of relations between the two countries in the face of an increasingly aggressive China, and some analysts worry that Beijing could use it to try to drive a wedge between them. International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) Director General Rafael Grossi is expected to visit Seoul from Friday to Sunday to explain his approval for Japanese plans to release the treated water from the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant into the Pacific Ocean. Grossi issued the approval Tuesday during his trip to Tokyo where he presented a 140-page IAEA report to Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. Grossi…

The chief of the International Atomic Energy Agency is visiting the Asia-Pacific region this week after giving Tokyo the green light on Tuesday to release more than 1 million metric tons of treated nuclear wastewater into the Pacific Ocean. The IAEA says the water is safe for release, but the decision has done little to ease concerns of fishing and environmental communities throughout the region. VOA’s Jessica Stone reports. ...

China reported Thursday that 239 people died from COVID-19 in June in a significant uptick months after it lifted most containment measures. The Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention had reported 164 deaths in May and none in April and March. China started employing a “zero-COVID” containment strategy in early 2020 and credits the strict lockdowns, quarantines, border closures and compulsory mass testing with significantly saving lives. But the measures were lifted suddenly in December with little preparation, leading to a final surge in which about 60,000 people died, according to the official toll. Deaths this year peaked in January and February, hitting a high of 4,273 on January 4, but then declined gradually to zero on February 23, according to the Chinese CDC. Chinese health officials didn’t say…

OceanGate, the U.S.-based company that managed the tourist submersible that imploded during a dive to the wreck of the Titanic, has suspended all exploration and commercial operations, its website showed on Thursday.   The company did not elaborate beyond a red banner at the top of its website: "OceanGate has suspended all exploration and commercial operations."  OceanGate had planned two expeditions to the century-old Titanic ruins, located in a remote corner of the North Atlantic, for June 2024, its website showed.   U.S. and Canadian authorities are investigating the cause of the June undersea implosion, which killed all five people aboard and raised questions about the unregulated nature of such expeditions.  The U.S. Coast Guard last week recovered presumed human remains and debris from the submersible, known as the Titan,…

Europe's workhorse Ariane 5 rocket blasted off for a final time on Wednesday, with its farewell flight after 27 years of launches coming at a difficult time for European space efforts.    Faced with soaring global competition, the continent has unexpectedly found itself without a way to independently launch heavy missions into space due to delays to the next-generation Ariane 6 and Russia withdrawing its rockets.  The 117th and final flight of the Ariane 5 rocket took place around 2200 GMT on Wednesday from Europe's spaceport in Kourou, French Guiana.  The launch had been postponed twice. It was originally scheduled on June 16, but was called off because of problems with pyrotechnical lines in the rocket's booster, which have since been replaced.  Then Tuesday's launch was delayed by bad weather.  The…

The planet's temperature spiked on Tuesday to its hottest day in at least 44 years and likely much longer. Wednesday could become the third straight day that Earth unofficially marks a new record high, the latest in a series of climate-change extremes that alarm but don't surprise scientists. The globe's average temperature reached 62.9 degrees Fahrenheit (17.18 degrees Celsius) on Tuesday, according to the University of Maine's Climate Reanalyzer, a common tool based on satellite data and computer simulations and used by climate scientists for a glimpse of the world's condition. On Monday, the average temperature was 62.6 degrees Fahrenheit (17.01 degrees Celsius), breaking a record that lasted only 24 hours. While it is not an official National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration record, "this is showing us an indication of…

Health organizations in Sudan’s White Nile state said at least 13 children have died over the past week due to a suspected measles outbreak. An official with the Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, said Sudan’s conflict and the approach of the rainy season could make the situation much worse. Officials with the international medical organization MSF say they remain concerned about an increase of suspected measles cases among children in Sudan’s White Nile state. Speaking to VOA via a messaging application from Nairobi, Mitchell Sangma, MSF’s health advisor, says MSF’s ground team have documented more than 200 suspected cases of measles among children in the last month. He says out of that number, 72 were admitted to hospitals and 13 died. “We are also seeing an…

Deeply loved but wracked by crisis, Britain's National Health Service (NHS) on Wednesday marks 75 years since it was founded as the Western world's first universal, free health care system. In a secular age, the NHS is the closest thing Britain has to a national religion — devoutly cherished, with levels of public support higher than the royal family or any other British institution. It was founded three years after World War II by a pioneering Labour government on the principle that everyone should access top-quality health care funded by general taxation, free at the point of care. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, whose parents were an NHS doctor and a pharmacist, paid tribute last week as he outlined a 15-year plan aimed at recruiting hundreds of thousands of new health…

London's expansion of a fiercely debated scheme that charges the most polluting vehicles in the city should be blocked, local authorities bringing a legal challenge over the plan argued on Tuesday. The British capital's Ultra Low Emission Zone (ULEZ) levies a $16 daily charge on drivers of non-compliant vehicles, in order to tackle pollution and improve air quality. London Mayor Sadiq Khan last year decided to extend the scheme to cover almost all of the Greater London area, encompassing an extra five million people in leafier and less-connected outer boroughs, from the end of next month. The decision has pitched Khan and health campaigners against those who say they cannot tolerate another economic hit at a time of soaring living costs. Khan, who is running for a third four-year term…

Maternal deaths across the United States more than doubled over the course of two decades, and the tragedy unfolded unequally.  Black mothers died at the nation's highest rates, while the largest increases in deaths were found in American Indian and Native Alaskan mothers. Some states — and racial or ethnic groups within them – fared worse than others.  The findings were laid out in a new study published Monday in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Researchers looked at maternal deaths between 1999 and 2019 — but not the pandemic spike — for every state and five racial and ethnic groups.  "It's a call to action to all of us to understand the root causes — to understand that some of it is about health care and access to…

The head of the United Nations called Monday for maritime nations to agree on a course for the shipping industry to reduce its climate-harming emissions to net zero by the middle of the century at the latest. The appeal by U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres came at the start of a meeting of the International Maritime Organization in London that's seen as key for helping achieve the international goal of limiting global warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 Fahrenheit). "Shipping, which accounts for almost 3% of global emissions, will be vital," Guterres said. He urged delegates to agree a new greenhouse gas strategy for shipping that includes "ambitious science-based targets starting in 2030 – both on absolute emissions reductions and the use of clean fuels." The IMO's current target is for…

Doctors Without Borders said Sunday that there is a suspected outbreak of measles in an internal displacement camp in Sudan. The international humanitarian organization said 13 children have died recently in the suspected outbreak at the camp in Sudan’s White Nile state. “We are receiving sick children with suspected measles every day, most with complications,” the organization posted in a tweet. A steady stream of people is coming to the camp as they flee the fighting between the country’s two warring factions. Doctors Without Borders has two clinics in White Nile. The organization says it had over 3,000 patients in June and needs to “increase assistance, scale up services like vaccinations, nutritional support, shelter, water and sanitation.” ...

The head of the U.N.'s Food and Agriculture Organization, Qu Dongyu, was re-elected Sunday for a second term as head of the U.N. agency. He was the only candidate standing for the role of FAO director-general and received 168 out of 182 votes in a ballot in Rome on Sunday. Qu, a former Chinese government minister who was nominated for the post by Beijing, will serve a new four-year term from August 1. His appointment is seen as a part of a drive by Beijing to get more Chinese figures into senior jobs at international bodies. Qu, a biologist by training, was vice-minister of agriculture before taking over as head of the U.N. agency in 2019. FAO directors can hold the role for a maximum of two consecutive terms. The…

Following an outbreak of anthrax disease in the West African nation of Ghana, Nigerian authorities have urged citizens to halt consumption of cooked animal hides, a delicacy also known as “pomo” in the country. Gibson Emeka has this story from Abuja, Nigeria, narrated by Salem Solomon. ...

The only break much of America can hope for soon from eye-watering, dangerous smoke from fire-struck Canada would be brief bouts of shirt-soaking, sweltering heat and humidity from a deadly, Southern heat wave, forecasters say. And then the smoke will likely return to the Midwest and East. Here’s why: Neither the 235 out-of-control Canadian wildfires nor the weather pattern that's responsible for this mess of meteorological maladies are showing signs of relenting for the next week or longer, according to meteorologists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's Weather Prediction Center. First, the weather pattern made abnormally hot and dry conditions for Canada to burn at off-the-chart record levels. Then it created a setup where the only relief comes when low pressure systems roll through, which means areas on one…

Researchers say they are detecting a dramatic spike in ocean surface temperatures around the world — reaching as much as 5 degrees Celsius (9 degrees Fahrenheit) above normal in the North Atlantic — and they could rise even higher. “It is very alarming, and as temperatures keep spiking, this is not unexpected,” said Kim Cobb, a climate scientist and professor of earth, environmental and planetary sciences at Brown University in Rhode Island. As the oceans get warmer each year, scientists say they are triggering chaotic weather patterns around the world, including torrential downpours and intense heat waves that cause flooding and severe drought. Climate scientists attribute much of the warming to so-called greenhouse gases and say that to prevent the most severe consequences, the use of fossil fuels must be…

NAIROBI, Kenya — Nowhere in the world has a higher rate of unsafe abortions or unintended pregnancies than sub-Saharan Africa, where women often face scorn for becoming pregnant before marriage. Efforts to legalize and make abortions safer in Africa were shaken when the U.S. Supreme Court ended the national right to an abortion a year ago. Within days, Sierra Leone President Julius Maada Bio declared that his government would decriminalize abortion "at a time when sexual and reproductive health rights for women are being either overturned or threatened." But some U.S.-based organizations active in Africa were emboldened, especially in largely Christian countries. One is Family Watch International, a nonprofit Christian conservative organization whose anti-LGBTQ+ stance, anti-abortion activities and "intense focus on Africa" led to its designation as a hate group…