Dec202019 by TechmanNo Comments

Senate Passes Anti-robocalls Bill, Sending it to Trump

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The Senate approved a bill Thursday to crack down on robocalls, sending to President Donald Trump a measure meant to combat a persistent and costly problem for Americans.The bill, which Trump is expected to sign, would stiffen enforcement and require that phone companies offer free consumer tools to identify and block scam calls. It also calls for tougher fines when individuals intentionally violate the law.It echoes and builds on preventive measures that the Federal Communications Commission and state attorneys general have pushed for. It potentially speeds up steps the telecom industry is already taking to protect Americans from the billions of scam calls made each month.Maureen Mahoney, policy analyst for Consumer Reports, said the measure was an important step, though “robocalls are not going to disappear overnight.”Robocalls have flooded Americans’…


Dec202019 by DmediaNo Comments

Canada Health Minister Proposes Bans on Vaping Product Advertising

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Canada's minister of health, Patty Hajdu, on Thursday proposed banning promotion and advertising of vaping products in public spaces, convenience stores and online, in an effort to curb youth use of e-cigarettes.Hajdu also announced new mandatory health warnings on vaping product packaging.The proposed regulations come amid growing fears surrounding vaping's safety and mounting evidence that youth vaping is on the rise both among people who once smoked and those who had not.FILE - Canada's Minister of Health Patty Hajdu speaks in the House of Commons on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada, Dec. 10, 2019.While e-cigarettes are marketed as a safer alternative to traditional cigarettes and a means to help smokers quit, health officials are concerned they are getting a new generation hooked on nicotine.The number of Canadian teens who…


Dec202019 by TechmanNo Comments

Federal Study Finds Race, Gender Affect Face-Scanning Tech

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A study by a U.S. agency has found that facial recognition technology often performs unevenly based on a person’s race, gender or age.But the nuanced report published Thursday is unlikely to allay the concerns of critics who worry about bias in face-scanning applications that are increasingly being adopted by law enforcement, airports and a variety of businesses.The National Institute of Standards and Technology has been studying facial recognition for nearly two decades, but this is the first time it has investigated demographic differences in how face-scanning algorithms are able to identify people.The study was prompted in part by growing concern among lawmakers and privacy advocates that biased results in commercial face recognition software could entrench racial discrimination in the criminal justice system and elsewhere.The report cautions against “incomplete” previous research…


Dec192019 by DmediaNo Comments

Private Sector Joins Clean Energy Drive for Africa’s Refugees

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Countries and companies attending a refugee forum in Geneva this week pledged to boost support for refugees' access to clean energy, among other goals. Findings show renewables offer multiple benefits, including reducing some of the root causes of displacement. For VOA, Lisa Bryant reports on what this means for Africa, which hosts roughly one-quarter of the world's refugees. ...


Dec192019 by DmediaNo Comments

WHO: Insecurity, Poor Access Delay End of DR Congo Ebola Outbreak

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The World Health Organization says insecurity and lack of access in conflict-ridden parts of the Democratic Republic of Congo remain major threats to ending the Ebola outbreak there.The latest reports put the number of confirmed cases at 3,354, including 2,218 deaths.Health officials are concerned progress made against the Ebola outbreak in the North Kivu and Ituri provinces could come undone because of ongoing fighting among dozens of armed groups.The World Health Organization says the deadly virus has been cleared from 25 of the region's health zones. It says an average of four to 10 new cases a week have been recorded in four zones in recent weeks.  However, the executive director of the WHO's Health Emergencies Program, Michael Ryan, says there's been a big increase recently in the number of…


Dec192019 by DmediaNo Comments

Rules on Clean Shipping Fuel Start Next Year, But Who Will Enforce Them?

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Sweeping new fuel rules aiming to cut pollution belching from ships and save lives are now just a couple of weeks away, but with no central policing agency and several countries still not signed up to them, compliance is a major concern.    From January 2020, ships must use fuel with a sulfur content of 0.5%, down from 3.5%, or install devices, known as scrubbers, that strip out the toxic pollutant.    As a result, refiners and shipping companies will spend billions of dollars in the years ahead on ensuring fuel and engines comply.    But enforcement of the U.N. convention on cleaner fuels — known as MARPOL Annex VI — rests with individual countries and flag states, meaning for some routes and regions, compliance is already looking patchy.    A handful of major states resisted pressure…


Dec192019 by DmediaNo Comments

Philippines Approves GMO Rice to Fight Malnutrition

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A breed of rice genetically engineered to combat vitamin A deficiency has received approval from regulators in the Philippines.Supporters say "Golden Rice" could remedy a condition that kills up to 250,000 children each year worldwide and blinds twice that number, according to the World Health Organization.It's the first genetically modified organism (GMO) designed to fight a public health issue to get a green light from food safety officials in the developing world.Golden Rice has faced vigorous opposition from GMO opponents throughout its development, citing safety concerns and other issues. Protesters destroyed test fields in the Philippines in 2013.The Philippine Department of Agriculture Bureau of Plant Industry announced Wednesday that Golden Rice is as safe as conventional rice. Regulators in the United States, Canada, Australia and New Zealand have also cleared…


Dec192019 by DmediaNo Comments

WHO Reports Smoking on the Decline Among Men for First Time

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The World Health Organization projects that, for the first time, the number of men smoking around the world is dropping, indicating measures to end the global tobacco epidemic are paying off.WHO officials called it a major shift in the fight against tobacco, which every year kills more than eight million people prematurely.Data from 143 countries shows that tobacco use among men has stopped growing, following a steady rise in the use of this deadly product during the past two decades.During this period, WHO reports 60 million of the world's nearly 1.4 billion smokers have quit the habit.  Most of those reductions were driven by women, as male use of tobacco over the same period rose by around 40 million."But now we are seeing for the first time a decline in…


Dec192019 by DmediaNo Comments

Dengue Fever Strikes Thousands in Conflict-Torn Yemen

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Yemenis are facing a new battle: Dengue Fever, a potentially fatal illness that spreads in the unsanitary conditions and decimated infrastructure of their conflict-torn country. The World Health Organization says nearly 59,500 suspected cases, including 219 deaths, were recorded in the first 11 months of 2019. VOA’s Mariama Diallo reports on this new challenge for a country that has endured five years of war that have killed thousands and pushed millions to the brink of famine. ...


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

WHO Moves Step Closer to Cheaper Breast Cancer Treatment

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The World Health Organization (WHO) announced Wednesday that it had for the first time approved a "biosimilar" medicine — one derived from living sources rather than chemicals — to make breast cancer treatment affordable to women globally.The trastuzumab drug has shown "high efficacy" in curing early-stage breast cancer and in some cases more advanced forms of the disease, WHO said in a statement.But the annual cost of the original drug is an average of $20,000, "a price that puts it out of reach of many women and healthcare systems in most countries," the statement added.However, the biosimilar version of trastuzumab is generally 65 percent cheaper than the original."With this WHO listing, and more products expected in the prequalification pipeline, prices should decrease even further," WHO said.The cheaper but equally effective…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

In a First, Peruvian With Down Syndrome Runs for Parliament

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Bryan Russell has Down syndrome and does daily speech exercises, putting pens and corks in his mouth to help build up low muscle tone there. He is also waging a long-shot bid to become a national Peruvian lawmaker, going door to door in Lima to ask for votes.Russell, 27, wants to use his campaign to raise awareness about people with developmental disabilities and he says he represents an alternative to the scourge of corruption in Peru that has brought down presidents and weakened democratic institutions."I'm someone clean, honest, transparent," Russell said in an interview with The Associated Press. He spoke while sitting next to Amor, a pet dog he rescued from the street.The purpose of politicking, he said, is to "break the paradigm" that people with Down syndrome can't be…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

Study: India Leads World in Pollution-Linked Deaths

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India leads the world in pollution-linked deaths, followed by China and Nigeria, according to a report published Wednesday that estimated the global impact of contaminants in the air, water and workplace.    The report by the Global Alliance on Health and Pollution (GAHP) found pollution to be the largest environmental cause of premature death on the planet, causing 15 percent of all deaths — 8.3 million people.    Among the 10 countries with the most pollution deaths in 2017, the latest year for which data were available, were some of the world's largest and wealthiest nations, along with some poorer ones.    India and China led in the number of pollution deaths, with about 2.3 million and 1.8 million deaths, respectively, followed by Nigeria, Indonesia and Pakistan.    The United States, with 325 million people, came in…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

Moscow’s Snowless December Warmest in 133 Years

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Moscow registered the warmest December weather in over a century on Wednesday, as an unusually snowless month put winter activities on hold and confused plants into blooming.One weather station in northern Moscow registered a temperature of 5.4 degrees Celsius (41.7 degrees Fahrenheit), said the Fobos weather center."This is a new record of maximum air temperature for 18 December," surpassing a previous record of 5.3 degrees set in 1886, it said.The Russian capital, normally covered with a blanket of snow by mid-December, thus far has had a snowless and cloudy winter, and the Russian weather service warned Wednesday that it may get even warmer.A botanical garden in Moscow this week announced that its snowdrop flowers, which normally indicate the first signs of spring, were blooming because they "confused winter and spring.""Gardeners…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

New Technology Helps Some Patients Avoid Pancreatic Cancer

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Pancreatic cancer is one of the deadliest kinds of cancer there is because it's almost always found too late. This cancer is hard to detect, and symptoms only show up when the cancer is advanced. But, as VOA's Carol Pearson reports, researchers are beginning to make inroads in this most difficult to diagnose disease. ...


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

India Plans Bio-Gas Plants to Tackle Toxic Pollution, But Experts Skeptical

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India is planning to set up more than 100 bio-gas plants and provide thousands of farmers with machines to dispose of crop stubble in a bid to halt the choking crop-burning pollution that blights the country every winter.A major source of the smog that engulfs vast swathes of northern India, including the capital New Delhi, is the burning the straw and stubble of the previous rice crop to prepare for new planting in October and November.New Delhi is regularly judged to be one of the world's most polluted major cities.Government-backed Indian Oil Corp Ltd will invite private companies to apply to set up 140 bio-gas plants that will use rice stubble as feed stock, said two government officials, who didn't wish to be identified in line with official policy.FILE -…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

Trump Unveils Plan to Import Cheaper Foreign Drugs

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Donald Trump's administration unveiled a plan Wednesday to allow for importation of lower-price prescriptions from Canada and other countries, a cost-saving goal championed by both the US president and Democratic rivals on the 2020 campaign trail."No president in history has ever had an FDA willing to open the door to safe importation of drugs from Canada," Health Secretary Alex Azar said in a conference call with the press.The Department of Health and Human Services published proposed rules and guidance Wednesday outlining two pathways to formalize the president's plan, first laid out at the end of July.Under a first pathway, U.S. states would be allowed to propose importation programs for drugs already authorized in Canada, subject to approval by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). States bordering the United States'…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

French Strikers Angry About Pension Reform Cut Power to Homes, Companies

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France's warring trade unions on Wednesday defended their decision to cut power to thousands of homes, companies and even the Bank of France to force a weakened government to drop a wide-ranging pension reform.The power cuts added to a sense of chaos in the second week of nationwide strikes that have crippled transport, shut schools and brought more than half a million people onto the street against President Emmanuel Macron's reform.Asked on French radio whether the power cuts, illegal under French law, weren't a step too far, Philippe Martinez, the head of the hardline CGT union, said the cuts were necessary to force Macron to back down."I understand these workers' anger," the mustachioed union leader said. "These are targeted cuts. You'll understand that spitting on the public service can make…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

European Planet-Studying Mission Launches from South America

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A European spacecraft launched from South America Wednesday on a three-year mission to study planets in other solar systems.The Characterizing ExOPlanets Satellite (CHEOPS) mission blasted off from Kourou, French Guiana at 0854 GMT (3:54 a.m. EST) atop a Russian Soyuz rocket. The launch came 24 hours after a first attempt was delayed shortly before liftoff because of a software problem in the upper stage of the rocket.The European Space Agency says the satellite is the first mission dedicated to studying bright nearby stars that are already known to have planets, and will focus on "planets in the super-Earth to Neptune size range.'' The agency hopes that the data sent by the mission will enable the bulk density of those planets to be calculated, a first step toward understanding them better.Its…


Dec182019 by TechmanNo Comments

Fiat Chrysler and Peugeot Sign Deal for 50-50 Merger

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The boards of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles and PSA Peugeot on Wednesday signed a binding merger deal creating the world's fourth-largest auto company with the scale to confront the challenges of stricter emissions regulations and the transition to new driving technologies.The companies said in a joint statement the new group will be led by PSA's cost-cutting CEO Carlo Tavares, with Fiat Chrysler's chairman John Elkann as chairman of the merged company. Fiat Chrysler CEO Mike Manley will stay on, but it was not announced in what capacity.No name for the new company has been decided, executives said in a conference call, but both Tavares and Manley insisted that it was not a "touchy subject."The deal, which was unveiled in October, was announced as a 50-50 merger, but PSA has one extra…


Dec182019 by DmediaNo Comments

Gunmen Kill 2 Policemen Escorting Polio Team in Pakistan

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Gunmen in Pakistan shot and killed two policemen on Wednesday who were part of the most recent anti-polio drive in the country's rugged and volatile northwest, officials said.The gunmen opened fire as the policemen were heading on foot to the town of Lower Dir in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province, bordering Afghanistan, said local police official Saeedur Rehman. He said the attackers fled the scene and a search was underway to find them.The policemen were to escort a team of medics going house-to-house to vaccinate children against the crippling disease. No one immediately claimed responsibility for the shooting.Pakistan regularly carries out anti-polio drives, despite threats from the Taliban who claim the campaign is a Western conspiracy to sterilize children. Polio teams and security forces escorting them are often targeted in deadly…


Dec172019 by DmediaNo Comments

Did It Keep Its Flavor? Stone-Age ‘Chewing-Gum’ Yields Human DNA

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Danish scientists have managed to extract a complete DNA sample from a piece of birch pitch more than 5,000 years old, used as a kind of chewing gum, a study revealed Tuesday.The Stone-Age sample yielded enough information to determine the source's sex, what she had last eaten and the germs in her mouth. It also told them she probably had dark hair, dark skin and blue eyes.And genetically, she was more closely related to hunter-gatherers from the mainland Europe than to those living in central Scandinavia at the time, they concluded."It is the first time that an entire ancient human genome has been extracted from anything other than human bones," Hannes Schroeder of the University of Copenhagen, told AFP.Schroeder is co-author of the study, which was published in the review…


Dec172019 by TechmanNo Comments

Europe Postpones Launch of Planet Mission, Seeks Soyuz Fix

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European space officials on Tuesday postponed the launch of a three-year mission to study planets in other solar systems shortly before it was due to blast off.The European Space Agency announced that the launch from Kourou, French Guiana, of the Characterising ExOPlanets Satellite (CHEOPS) mission would be delayed by at least a day. It had been scheduled for 0854 GMT (3:54 a.m. EST).ESA Director of Science Guenther Hasinger tweeted that "a software error in the Fregat upper stage" of the Soyuz rocket was responsible for the postponement."With this complex mission, we will not take any risks," he added, advising people to "keep fingers crossed for [a launch] tomorrow" at the same time.Europe's Arianespace, which has been operating Russian Soyuz rockets from Kourou since 2011, said during the countdown that "the…


Dec162019 by DmediaNo Comments

‘Obamacare’ Sign-Up Deadline Extended Following Glitches

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People will get more time to sign up for "Obamacare" health insurance, the Trump administration announced Monday, following a spate of computer glitches over the weekend.The new HealthCare.gov deadline is 3 a.m. Eastern time on Wednesday, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services said in a statement. Coverage takes effect Jan. 1.It was the second round of problems with online sign-ups for the agency in weeks. Senior lawmakers of both major parties are urging the administration to publicize the availability of a redo for seniors who got inaccurate or confusing results using the Medicare Plan Finder. A redesign of the Medicare site produced search results that didn't automatically rank the prescription drug plan with the lowest total cost first.The problems with HealthCare.gov happened Sunday, which was the original sign-up deadline.…


Dec162019 by DmediaNo Comments

Study: Vaping Raises Lung Disease Risk, but Less So Than Smoking

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A new U.S. study has concluded that the use of e-cigarettes, called vaping, increases the risk of developing chronic lung diseases, but less so than smoking.The study, published in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine, surveyed 32,000 American adults between 2013 and 2016 who had no signs of lung disease when the study began.Scientists found that those who used e-cigarettes were 1.3 times more likely to develop chronic lung diseases such as asthma, bronchitis, emphysema, and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease.For people who used both e-cigarettes and regular cigarettes, the risk nearly tripled. Senior author Stanton Glatz, a University of California San Francisco professor of medicine, noted that many smokers did not abandon conventional cigarettes when they began using e-cigarettes.But the study noted that even for those who switched completely to…


Dec162019 by DmediaNo Comments

UN AIDS Agency Fires Whistleblower After Misconduct Probe

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The United Nations' AIDS agency has fired two staffers for financial and sexual misconduct, including a whistleblower whose allegations of being sexually assaulted sparked months of turmoil at the organization. Last March, Martina Brostrom publicly accused a senior UNAIDS director of forcibly kissing her and trying to drag her out of a Bangkok elevator in 2015. She also said he had sexually harassed her on other occasions. But before those allegations became public, Brostrom herself and a supervisor were being investigated by U.N. officials for their own sexual and financial misconduct, as revealed in an Associated Press story  in April. Internal documents obtained by the AP showed U.N. officials had "evidence" Brostrom and a supervisor had taken part in "fraudulent practices and misuse of travel funds." Among other charges, the…


Dec162019 by DmediaNo Comments

Zimbabwe Doctors’ Strike Floods Mission Hospitals with Patients

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With no end in sight to the Zimbabwe doctors' strike over salaries and poor working conditions, desperate patients have looked to church-run mission hospitals for much-needed healthcare. Karanda Mission Hospital, about 200 kilometers north of the capital Harare, is overwhelmed by patients seeking treatment. Columbus Mavhunga reports from Mount Darwin, Zimbabwe. ...


Dec152019 by BusmanNo Comments

Регулярная публикация ваших рекламных статей сразу на 200 информационных сайтах

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Предложение для предпринимателей, производителей, коммерсантов! Рекламная сеть SeLLines объединяет более 200 сайтов разнообразной информационной тематики, которые ежедневно публикуют свежые, интересные и актуальные статьи. Среди них могут быть ваши рекламные сообщения, которые могут cодержать: информацию о вашем новом продукте (продуктах) или акциях компании; напоминание о ваших продуктах или услугах (анонсы, обзоры, статьи, в т.ч. видеоматериалы); информацию для укрепление репутации компании и торговой марки; информацию для увеличение узнаваемости торговой марки или бренда; информацию для повышения лояльности и доверия к бренду; информация вызывающая дополнительную стимуляцию целевой аудитории к совершению покупки. наш email: sellines@i.ua наш skype: isgnet Больше информации на сайте SeLLines