Category: News

WASHINGTON - U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken called Friday on dozens of countries to work together to combat synthetic drugs, but China — facing blame in Washington over an addiction epidemic — denounced the effort.  Inaugurating a new U.S.-led "coalition" on the scourge, Blinken told…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…

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…