CDC Relaxes COVID Guidelines; Will Schools, Day Cares Follow Suit?
BOSTON — Four years after the COVID-19 pandemic closed schools and upended child care, the CDC says parents can start treating the virus like other respiratory illnesses. Gone are mandated isolation periods and masking. But will schools and child care centers agree? In case you've lost track: Before Friday, all Americans, including school children, were supposed to stay home for at least five days if they had COVID-19 and then mask for a set period of time, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Now, with COVID deaths and hospitalizations dropping, the CDC says children can go back to school when their overall symptoms improve and they're fever-free for 24 hours without taking medication. Students are "encouraged" to wear a mask when they return. Still, the change may not…
As DR Congo Seeks to Expand Drilling, Some Worry Pollution Will Worsen
MOANDA, DR Congo — The oil drills that loom down the road from Adore Ngaka's home remind him daily of everything he's lost. The extraction in his village in western Congo has polluted the soil, withered his crops and forced the family to burn through savings to survive, he said. Pointing to a stunted ear of corn in his garden, the 27-year-old farmer says it's about half the size he got before oil operations expanded nearly a decade ago in his village of Tshiende. "It's bringing us to poverty," he said. Congo, a mineral-rich nation in central Africa, is thought to have significant oil reserves, too. Drilling has so far been confined to a small territory on the Atlantic Ocean and offshore, but that's expected to change if the government successfully…
First US Moon Lander in 50 Years Goes Silent
CAPE CANAVERAL, Florida — The first U.S. spacecraft to land on the moon since the Apollo astronauts fell silent Thursday, a week after breaking a leg at touchdown and tipping over near the lunar south pole. Intuitive Machines' lander, Odysseus, lasted longer than the company anticipated after it ended up on its side with hobbled solar power and communication. The end came as flight controllers received one last photo from Odysseus and commanded its computer and power systems to standby. That way, the lander can wake up in another two to three weeks — if it survives the bitterly cold lunar night. Intuitive Machines spokesman Josh Marshall said these final steps drained the lander's batteries and put Odysseus "down for a long nap." "Good night, Odie. We hope to hear from…
Ukrainian YouTuber Finds Her AI Clone Selling Russian Goods on Chinese Internet
washington — Speaking Mandarin and promoting love for China, countless videos of foreign-looking women made with artificial intelligence started popping up on Chinese social media platforms around the Lunar New Year earlier this month. The avatars in the videos are created with online images that are stolen, reproduced and repurposed so that even the women in real life recognize themselves in the videos. Olga Loiek is one of those women. She’s a 20-year-old Ukrainian who studies cognitive science at the University of Pennsylvania. A couple of months ago, Loiek started a YouTube channel where she talks about mental health and shares her philosophies about life. However, shortly after that, she started receiving messages from followers telling her that they had seen her on Chinese social media. There, she's not Olga Loiek…
Odysseus Lunar Lander Makes History, Then Tips Over
A lunar landing more than 50 years in the making is a partial success. Plus, the U.S. says Russia may launch a nuclear weapon into orbit. The Kremlin calls it spin. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi brings us The Week in Space. ...
Artificial Intelligence Is Game Changer for Election Interference, FBI Warns
WASHINGTON — U.S. security officials are bracing for an onslaught of fast-paced influence operations, from a wide range of adversaries, aimed at impacting the country’s coming presidential election. FBI Director Christopher Wray issued the latest warning about attempts to meddle with American voters as they decide whom to support when they go to the polls come November, telling a meeting of security professional Thursday that technologies such as artificial intelligence are already altering the threat landscape. “This election cycle, the U.S. will face more adversaries moving at a faster pace and enabled by new technology,” Wray said. “Advances in generative AI [artificial intelligence], for instance, are lowering the barrier to entry, making it easier for both more and less sophisticated foreign adversaries to engage in malign influence while making foreign influence…
Biden Deemed ‘Healthy, Active, Robust’ During Annual Physical Exam
washington — U.S. President Joe Biden's is a "healthy, active, robust 81-year-old male who remains fit to successfully execute the duties of the presidency," his physician, Dr. Kevin O'Connor, said in a statement released by the White House on Wednesday, following Biden's annual physical examination. "The president feels well, and this year's physical identified no new concerns. He continues to be fit for duty and fully executes all of his responsibilities without any exemptions or accommodations," O'Connor said following Biden's visit to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, earlier Wednesday. The checkup included consultations with optometry, dentistry, orthopedics, physical therapy, neurology, sleep medicine, cardiology, radiology and dermatology specialists, O'Connor said. It's Biden's third physical since taking office, amid concerns about his age as he seeks a…
Older US Adults Should Get Another COVID Shot, Say Health Officials
new york — Older U.S. adults should roll up their sleeves for another COVID-19 shot, even if they got a booster in the fall, U.S. health officials said Wednesday. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said Americans 65 and older should get another dose of the updated vaccine that became available in September — if at least four months has passed since their last shot. In making the recommendation, the agency endorsed guidance proposed by an expert advisory panel earlier in the day. "Most COVID-19 deaths and hospitalizations last year were among people 65 years and older. An additional vaccine dose can provide added protection ... for those at highest risk," CDC Director Dr. Mandy Cohen said in a statement. The advisory panel's decision came after a lengthy discussion about…
Researchers Find Possible Link to Sudden Death Syndrome in Children
Sudden death syndrome among children, a rare and devastating occurrence, affects nearly 400 families in the U.S. annually. In a breakthrough study at New York University, there's newfound hope of uncovering the cause of some of these tragic losses. Aron Ranen reports. ...
AI – Charting Rules of the Road
Artificial intelligence touches nearly every aspect of our digital lives, but there are few laws governing its use. In this episode of our web series about AI, VOA’s Tina Trinh looks at how lawmakers and tech developers are making rules for something that is changing nearly every day. ...
What Might Happen Without a Leap Day? More Than You Think
NEW YORK — Leap year. It's a delight for the calendar and math nerds among us. So how did it all begin and why? Have a look at some of the numbers, history and lore behind the (not quite) every four-year phenom that adds a 29th day to February. By the numbers The math is mind-boggling in a layperson sort of way and down to fractions of days and minutes. There's even a leap second occasionally, but there's no hullabaloo when that happens. The thing to know is that leap year exists, in large part, to keep the months in sync with annual events, including equinoxes and solstices, according to the Jet Propulsion Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology. It's a correction to counter the fact that Earth's orbit isn't…
China Users on Banned Social Platforms Need Protection, Advocates Say
washington — Rights advocates are urging international social media platforms to do more to prevent Chinese authorities from obtaining the personal information of users. The call comes after two popular Chinese social media influencers alleged on X and YouTube that police in China were investigating their followers and had called some in for questioning. Social media platforms such as X and YouTube and thousands of websites — from The New York Times to the BBC and VOA — are blocked in China by the country's Great Firewall. But increasingly, even as social controls tighten under the leadership of Xi Jinping, many in China are using virtual private networks to access X, YouTube and other sites for news, information and opinions not available in China. Li Ying, who is also known online…
LogOn: AI’s Newest Advance: Realistic High-Definition Video From a Few Words
The latest innovation in artificial intelligence is photorealistic video created from just a few words. Deana Mitchell has the story in this week’s episode of LogOn. ...
Renewal of U.S.-China Science and Tech Pact Faces Hurdles
STATE DEPARTMENT — With a science and technology agreement between the United States and People’s Republic of China due to expire Tuesday, the State Department said it is negotiating to "amend, extend, and strengthen protections within" the agreement but declined to specify if the U.S. would extend the deal. “We are not able to provide information at this time on specific U.S. negotiating positions or on whether the agreement will be extended past its current expiration date,” a State Department spokesperson told VOA. The Science and Technology Cooperation Agreement is a framework for U.S. governmental collaborations with China in science and technology. U.S. officials have said the STA provides consistent standards for government-to-government scientific cooperation between the U.S. and China. While the agreement supports scientific collaboration in areas that…
UN Member States Focus on Environmental Crisis at Nairobi Meeting
The U.N. Environment Assembly, known as UNEA-6, is meeting in Nairobi this week to chart solutions to the triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. Juma Majanga reports from the U.N. Environment headquarters in Nairobi. ...
2 Exiled Chinese Bloggers Warn of Police Interrogating Their Followers
SHANGHAI — Two prominent Chinese bloggers in exile said that police were investigating their millions of followers on international social media platforms, in an escalation of Beijing’s attempts to clamp down on critical speech even outside of the country’s borders. Former state broadcaster CCTV journalist Wang Zhi’an and artist-turned-dissident Li Ying, both Chinese citizens known for posting uncensored Chinese news, said in separate posts Sunday that police were interrogating people who followed them on social media, and urged followers to take precautions such as unfollowing their accounts, changing their usernames, avoiding Chinese-made phones and preparing to be questioned. Li Ying, known as Teacher Li, came to prominence as a source of news about the White Paper protests, a rare moment of anti-government protests in mainland China in 2022. Teacher Li's account…
Private US Lunar Lander Will Stop Working Tuesday
CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. — A private U.S. lunar lander is expected to stop working Tuesday, its mission cut short after landing sideways near the south pole of the moon. Intuitive Machines, the Houston company that built and flew the spacecraft, said Monday it will continue to collect data until sunlight no longer shines on the solar panels. Based on the position of Earth and the moon, officials expect that to happen Tuesday morning. That's two to three days short of the week or so that NASA and other customers had been counting on. The lander, named Odysseus, is the first U.S. spacecraft to land on the moon in more than 50 years, carrying experiments for NASA, the main sponsor. But it came in too fast last Thursday and the foot of…
Japan Moon Lander Revives After Lunar Night
Tokyo — Japan's moon lander has produced another surprise by waking up after the two-week lunar night, the country's space agency said Monday. The unmanned Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) touched down last month at a wonky angle that left its solar panels facing the wrong way. As the sun's angle shifted, it came back to life for two days and carried out scientific observations of a crater with a high-spec camera, the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) said. It went to sleep again as darkness returned and, since it was "not designed for the harsh lunar nights," JAXA had been uncertain whether it would reawaken. "Yesterday we sent a command, to which SLIM responded," JAXA said on X, formerly Twitter, on Monday. "SLIM succeeded in surviving a night on…
South Korea Sets Thursday Deadline for Return of Striking Doctors
SEOUL, South Korea — South Korea's government gave striking young doctors four days to report back to work, saying Monday that they won't be punished if they return by the deadline but will face indictments and suspensions of medical licenses if they don't. About 9,000 medical interns and residents have stayed off the job since early last week to protest a government plan to increase medical school admissions by about 65%. The walkouts have severely hurt the operations of their hospitals, with numerous cancellations of surgeries and other treatments. Government officials say adding more doctors is necessary to deal with South Korea’s rapidly aging population. The country's current doctor-to-patient ratio is among the lowest in the developed world. The strikers say universities can’t handle so many new students and argue the…