Author: Dmedia

Former NBA star Jeremy Lin, who plays for a Chinese team, was fined 10,000 yuan ($1,400) for “inappropriate remarks” on social media about quarantine facilities ahead of a game, China’s professional league announced Friday, as the government tries to stop protests against anti-virus controls that…

China’s rulers are accusing "hostile forces," including foreigners, of inciting street demonstrations in more than three dozen Chinese cities and many more universities in the biggest domestic political challenge for Beijing since 1989's Tiananmen Square protests. At stake is the legitimacy of the ruling Chinese…

In the highly conservative country of Pakistan, AIDS patients often face discrimination that keeps them from disclosing their diagnosis. Hundreds of HIV cases reported in Sindh Province in 2019 included children. That region was recently devastated by floods, making access to health care for HIV…

The Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday proposed increasing the amount of ethanol and other biofuels that must be blended into the nation's fuel supplies over the next three years, a move welcomed by renewable fuel and farm groups but condemned by environmentalists and oil industry…

As much of the world returned to some kind of new normal in 2022, China remains the only country sticking to a strict “zero-COVID” policy to control the spread of a global pandemic. While credited with saving lives, the policy slowed the economy, exacerbated supply-chain…

Cameroonian health workers and people with HIV marched for World AIDS Day on December 1, calling for access to treatment for patients in conflict areas. About half a million Cameroonians have HIV, and at least 1,000 live in troubled western regions and the border with…

NASA’s uber-expensive test dummy moon mission exceeds expectations. Plus, a lunar flashlight’s frosty mission, and a state visit to NASA headquarters. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi brings us The Week in Space. ...

In October, Zimbabwe became to first African country to approve the use of the injectable HIV prevention drug known as cabotegravir. As Columbus Mavhunga reports from Harare, Zimbabwe, many are eager for the drug to become available. Videography by Blessing Chigwenhembe. ...

A new, long-lasting drug could be a game-changer for preventing HIV infections, experts say. Advocates are hopeful that those who need it most in low- and middle-income countries will not have to wait for it as long as they have for previous HIV drugs. But…

Deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon slowed slightly last year, a year after setting a 15-year high, according to closely watched numbers published Wednesday. The data was released by the National Institute for Space Research. The agency's Prodes monitoring system shows the rainforest lost an area…

In South Africa, which has the world’s largest HIV-positive population, authorities say girls and young women are now the most at-risk demographic with many having resorted to transactional sex to pay the bills during COVID pandemic lockdowns.  Ahead of World Aids Day on Dec. 1, VOA…

Malawi and the World Health Organization are rolling out a new malaria vaccine for young children that backers say will reduce deaths from the mosquito-borne disease. The RTSS vaccine was pilot tested on more than one million children in Ghana, Kenya and Malawi and recommended…

Three Chinese astronauts arrived Wednesday at the country’s space station as part of a six-month mission that includes the station’s first in-orbit crew rotation. The astronauts are replacing three others who have been at the Tiangong station since early June. China docked the last of…

The Biden administration declared the northern long-eared bat endangered on Tuesday in a last-ditch effort to save a species driven to the brink of extinction by white-nose syndrome, a fungal disease. "White-nose syndrome is decimating cave-dwelling bat species like the northern long-eared bat at unprecedented…

In a filthy alley behind a Los Angeles doughnut shop, Ryan Smith convulsed in the grips of a fentanyl high — lurching from moments of slumber to bouts of violent shivering on a warm summer day.  When Brandice Josey, another homeless addict, bent down and…

Twitter has rolled back a policy that was aimed at tackling misinformation related to COVID-19 on the social media platform, lending itself to the risk of a potential surge in false claims even as cases rise in China and some parts of the world. The…

The World Health Organization has renamed monkeypox as mpox, citing concerns the original name of the decades-old animal disease could be construed as discriminatory and racist. The U.N. health agency said in a statement Monday that mpox was its new preferred name for monkeypox, saying…

Children in school uniforms and toddlers with their parents lined up Monday for polio vaccinations in the Sigli town square on the northern tip of the Indonesian island of Sumatra, after four children were found infected with the highly contagious disease that was declared eliminated…

A United Nations-backed mission is recommending that the Great Barrier Reef be added to the list of endangered World Heritage sites, warning that without "ambitious, rapid and sustained" climate action the world's largest coral reef is in peril. The warning came in a report published…

Chinese authorities eased some anti-virus rules but affirmed their severe "zero COVID" strategy Monday after protesters demanded President Xi Jinping resign in the biggest show of opposition to the ruling Communist Party in decades. The government made no comment on the protests or the criticism…

Pakistan authorities said they are launching a five-day polio drive to eradicate the crippling disease from the country. Officials said 100,000 healthcare workers begin working Monday to vaccinate 13.5 million children under the age of five across 36 high risk districts, including Islamabad, the capital.…

Final preparations were being made Monday to send a new three-person crew to China's space station as it nears completion amid intensifying competition with the United States. The China Manned Space Agency said the Shenzhou-15 mission will take off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center…

Just like on other farms where bird flu has been found this year, all the chickens on the Nebraska farm will be killed to limit the spread of the disease. The U.S. Department of Agriculture says more than 52.3 million birds in 46 states —…

Uganda's President Yoweri Museveni has extended a quarantine placed on two districts that are the epicenter of the country's Ebola outbreak by 21 days, adding that his government's response to the disease was succeeding. Movement into and out of the Mubende and Kassanda districts in…

Protests simmered in Shanghai early Sunday, as residents in several Chinese cities, many of them angered by a deadly fire in the country's far west, pushed back against heavy COVID-19 curbs nearly three years into the pandemic. A fire Thursday that killed 10 people in…

Protesters, angry about long COVID-19 lockdowns, have taken to the streets in Urumqi, the capital of China’s far western Xinjiang region. The protests followed a high-rise apartment building fire in Urumqi on Thursday that killed 10 people and concerns that the lockdown measures may have…

China reported 35,183 new COVID-19 infections on Friday, of which 3,474 were symptomatic and 31,709 were asymptomatic, the National Health Commission said on Saturday, setting a new high for the third consecutive day. That compared with 32,943 new cases a day earlier -- 3,103 symptomatic…

NASA's Orion capsule entered an orbit stretching tens of thousands of miles around the moon Friday, as it neared the halfway mark of its test flight. The capsule and its three test dummies entered lunar orbit more than a week after launching on the $4…