Month: August 2024

GENEVA — The U.N. health agency on Monday launched a six-month plan to help stanch outbreaks of mpox transmission, including ramping up staffing in affected countries and boosting surveillance, prevention and response strategies. The World Health Organization said it expected the plan, running from September through February next year, would require $135 million in funding. The plan would also aim to improve fair access to vaccines, notably in African countries hardest hit by the outbreak. "The mpox outbreaks in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and neighboring countries can be controlled, and can be stopped," said WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus in a statement. The agency is "significantly scaling up staff" in affected countries, it said. In mid-August, WHO classified the current mpox outbreak as a global health emergency. Also Monday,…

The rapid rise in disposable electronic cigarette, or vape, usage is creating a tidal wave of pollution, and it’s raising serious environmental concerns. Aron Ranen reports from New York City about one woman who is trying to make a difference. ...

Brazzaville, Congo — Twenty-one cases of mpox have been recorded in Congo-Brazzaville, the country's health minister told state television Sunday. Gilbert Mokoki said that the central African country had "registered 158 suspect cases" since the beginning of the year, "21 of which we have confirmed." The latest two were reported Thursday, he said. Cases of the infectious disease — formerly known as monkeypox — have been surging in eastern and central Africa, but the virus has also been detected in Asia and Europe, with the World Health Organization declaring an international emergency. The virus has been reported in five of Congo-Brazzaville's 15 regions, with the forested areas of Sangha and Likouala in the north particularly affected. A new variant of mpox has swept across neighboring DR Congo, killing more than 570 people so…

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GENEVA — U.N. agencies are scaling up cholera prevention and treatment programs to get on top of a new, deadly cholera outbreak in Sudan that threatens to further destabilize communities suffering from hunger and the ill effects of more than 16 months of conflict. The recent cholera outbreak has resurged after several weeks of heavy rainfall and resulting flooding,” Kristine Hambrouck, UNHCR representative in Sudan, told journalists Friday in Geneva. Speaking on a video-link from Port Sudan, she warned, “Risks are compounded by the continuing conflict and dire humanitarian conditions, including overcrowding in camps and gathering sites for refugees and Sudanese displaced by the war, as well as limited medical supplies and health workers.” She expressed particular concern about the spread of the deadly disease in areas hosting refugees, mainly in…

CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida — NASA decided Saturday it’s too risky to bring two astronauts back to Earth in Boeing’s troubled new capsule, and they'll have to wait until next year for a ride home with SpaceX. What should have been a weeklong test flight for the pair will now last more than eight months. The seasoned pilots have been stuck at the International Space Station since the beginning of June. A cascade of vexing thruster failures and helium leaks in the new capsule marred their trip to the space station, and they ended up in a holding pattern as engineers conducted tests and debated what to do about the trip back. After almost three months, the decision finally came down from NASA’s highest ranks on Saturday. Butch Wilmore and Suni Williams…

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Port Sudan — For the second consecutive year Sudan is in the grip of a cholera outbreak that has left at least 28 people dead in the last month as rains fall in areas crammed with those fleeing the country's 16-month-old war, officials said. Since July 22, when the current wave began, 658 cases of cholera have been recorded across five states, World Health Organization (WHO) country director Shible Sahbani told Reuters in Port Sudan. With much of the country's health infrastructure collapsed or destroyed and staffing thinned by displacement, 4.3% of cases have resulted in deaths, a high rate compared to other outbreaks, Sahbani said. Some 200,000 are at high risk of falling ill, he said. The war between the army and the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces (RSF) has created…

BERLIN — The Berlin Zoo announced Friday that longtime resident giant panda Meng Meng has given birth to twins — for a second time. The cubs were born on Thursday, the zoo said in a statement. They were born only 11 days after ultrasound scans showed that Meng Meng, 11, was pregnant. Their sex has not yet been determined "with certainty." "Now it's time to keep your fingers crossed for the critical first few days," the zoo said. The cubs are tiny, weighing just 169 grams and 136 grams respectively, and are about 14 centimeters long. As with other large bears, giant pandas are born deaf, blind and pink. Their black-and-white panda markings only develop later. "I am relieved that the two were born healthy," zoo director Andreas Knieriem said. "The…

Harare, Zimbabwe — The United Nations said Thursday it is working with governments and health officials in Eastern and Southern Africa to contain the outbreak of mpox there. UNICEF, the World Health Organization and the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, along with local partners, are responding to the spread of the new mpox clade 1b variant, said Etleva Kadilli, UNICEF’s regional director for Eastern and Southern Africa. Kadilli said in a statement that more than 200 confirmed cases have been detected in five countries: Burundi, Kenya, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda. Dr. Francis Kasolo, director and head of the WHO at the African Union and U.N. Economic Commission for Africa, told a joint WHO-Africa CDC meeting, “Our collaboration has been instrumental in enhancing surveillance, laboratory capacity and effective deployment…

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COPENHAGEN, denmark — A volcano in southwestern Iceland erupted on Thursday, the meteorological office said, spraying red-hot lava and smoke in its sixth outbreak since December. "An eruption has begun. Work is under way to find out the location of the recordings," the Icelandic Met Office, which is tasked with monitoring volcanoes, said in a statement. The total length of the fissure was about 3.9 kilometers (2.42 miles) and had extended by 1.5 kilometers (.93 mile) in about 40 minutes, it said. Livestreams from the volcano on the Reykjanes peninsula showed glowing hot lava shooting from the ground. Studies had shown magma accumulating underground, prompting warnings of new volcanic activity in the area just south of Iceland's capital, Reykjavik. The most recent eruption on the Reykjanes peninsula, home to 30,000 people…

A green revolution is sweeping Pakistan as consumers switch to generating their own solar electricity. But as VOA Pakistan bureau chief Sarah Zaman reports, the move to the increasingly affordable, green option may also cause a crisis for the national grid. Videographer: Wajid Asad ...

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BANGKOK — Thailand has detected an mpox case in a European man who arrived from Africa last week and is awaiting test results to determine the strain, a disease control official said on Wednesday.   Thai authorities were treating the case as if it were the Clade 1 form of mpox, as the person, a 66-year-old European man with residency in Thailand, had arrived on Aug. 14 from an African country where it was spreading, Thongchai Keeratihattayakorn, director-general of the Department of Disease Control, told Reuters.   "After he arrives from the flight there is very little time frame where he come into contact with others," Thongchai said. "He arrives around 6 pm and on the next day, Aug 15, he went to see the doctor at the hospital."  Thongchai said…

Palestinian residents of a Jerusalem neighborhood have appealed to the Israeli Supreme Court demanding they be supplied with more water. The 120,000 residents of the area say they receive water only three hours a week. Linda Gradstein reports for VOA from Kufr Aqab. Camera: Ricki Rosen. ...

Gaborone, Botswana — Health officials in Botswana have started screening travelers for mpox at the country's entry points.  Neighboring South Africa has recorded three deaths as a result of the dangerous strain of mpox, and Botswana is anxious to keep out the rapidly spreading disease. "Although we have not recorded any case of mpox in Botswana, I want to take this opportunity to assure Botswana that we have significantly enhanced our broader surveillance systems," the country's minister of health, Dr Edwin Dikoloti, told the media Tuesday. "We are currently intensifying our surveillance at key entry points, which is borders and airports, focusing on high-risk areas.” South Africa shares a 1,900-kilometer border with Botswana and as of Aug. 5 had recorded three mpox deaths. In Africa, the disease has claimed the lives…

Berlin — A World Health Organization official stressed on Tuesday that mpox, regardless of whether it is the new or old strain, is not the new COVID, as authorities know how to control its spread. "We can and must tackle mpox together," said Hans Kluge, WHO regional director for Europe, in a U.N. media briefing. "So will we choose to put the systems in place to control and eliminate mpox globally? Or we will enter another cycle of panic and neglect? How we respond now and in the years to come will prove a critical test for Europe and the world," he added. Mpox, a viral infection that causes pus-filled lesions and flu-like symptoms, is usually mild but can kill. The clade 1b variety has caused global concern because it seems…

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