Robert F. Kennedy Jr., President Donald Trump’s nominee to serve as the nation’s top health official, faced tough questions from senators Wednesday about his views on vaccinations, COVID-19 and the nation’s health care system. A member of one of America’s most famous political families, Kennedy could face a tough road to confirmation. VOA’s Congressional Correspondent Katherine Gypson has more.
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WASHINGTON — In a contentious confirmation hearing on his nomination to become the nation’s top health official, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. struggled to answer questions about how he would reform Medicaid or Medicare, the government health care programs used by millions of disabled, poor and older Americans.
Republican Senator Bill Cassidy of Louisiana, a physician and key vote Kennedy needs to win, repeatedly pressed the nominee on Wednesday to share ways he plans to reform Medicaid, a multibillion-dollar taxpayer-funded program that covers health care for about 80 million people, including children. Republicans have said they might need to make deep cuts to Medicaid to fund President Donald Trump’s proposals.
“I don’t have a broad proposal for dismantling the program,” Kennedy said.
Kennedy also inaccurately claimed that Medicaid is fully paid for by the federal government. It’s not; states and federal taxpayers fund it. He also said most Americans have purchased a Medicare Advantage plan, when only about 1 in 10 Americans have.
His misstatements about the program were peppered in between suggestions that he would seek to push privatization of the programs, repeatedly saying that most Americans like private insurance and that they dislike the government-run versions of the programs.
Kennedy is seeking to lead the Department of Health and Human Services, an agency with a $1.7 trillion budget that oversees, among other things, vaccine recommendations, food inspections, hospital oversight, and funding for hundreds of community health clinics.
In sometimes heated exchanges Wednesday, Kennedy denied that he is anti-vaccine. But Kennedy, who pointed out that his children are vaccinated, acknowledged he has asked “uncomfortable questions” about vaccinations.
“I believe that vaccines play a critical role in health care,” Kennedy told the Senate Finance Committee.
Republicans did not ask Kennedy about his vaccine views during the first hour of the hearing.
But Democrats did, with Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon pointing out that Kennedy has previously claimed there’s “no safe” vaccine, initiating a back-and-forth between him and Kennedy. Wyden also quoted from Kennedy’s books, which say that parents have been “misled” on the measles vaccine.
“You have spent years pushing conflicting stories about vaccines,” Wyden said.
Over many years, Kennedy has expressed his beliefs about vaccines in dozens of interviews, podcasts and social media posts.
He’s led a nonprofit that has sued the government over its authorizations of vaccines. He has said there is “no vaccine that is safe and effective” and repeatedly has called for further study of routine childhood vaccinations, despite decades of research and real-world use that prove they’ve safely prevented disease.
Republicans focused on questions about agriculture, food and the abortion pill, which many women access via telemedicine systems.
Kennedy tried to assure senators that he would not seek widespread bans on vaccines or food, saying he wants to provide more information to people.
“I don’t want to take food away from anybody,” he said. “If you like a cheeseburger – a McDonald’s cheeseburger and a Diet Coke, like my boss — you should be able to get them.”
Kennedy hails from one of the nation’s most storied political families and is the son of the late Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy and the nephew of President John F. Kennedy.
He first challenged President Joe Biden for the 2024 Democratic presidential nomination. He then ran as an independent but abandoned his bid over the summer after striking a deal to endorse Trump, a Republican, in exchange for a promise to serve in a health policy role during a second Trump administration.
Trump selected Kennedy in November, shortly after he won the presidential election, saying Kennedy would “end the Chronic Disease epidemic” and “Make America Great and Healthy Again!” With Kennedy being one of the most prominent anti-vaccine activists in the world, his nomination immediately alarmed some public health officials.
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ISLAMABAD — A senior World Health Organization official cautioned Wednesday that the eradication of polio in Afghanistan and Pakistan, the only countries where the paralytic virus persists, is threatened by the suspension of funding from the United States.
In an online news conference, Hanan Balkhy, regional director for the Eastern Mediterranean, emphasized the crucial role of U.S. financial contribution to the organization’s surveillance efforts for polio and all other communicable diseases, particularly within her region.
Last week, U.S. President Donald Trump ordered an unprecedented 90-day suspension of almost all foreign aid to give his administration the time to evaluate whether to continue funding the numerous humanitarian, development and security programs that receive U.S. assistance.
On his first day back in the White House, Trump announced he was withdrawing the United States from WHO.
His executive order accused the United Nations agency of mishandling the COVID-19 pandemic and other global health crises, as well as failing “to adopt urgently needed reforms, and its inability to demonstrate independence from the inappropriate political influence of WHO member states.”
Balkhy referred to Trump’s announcement to withdraw from WHO as “very unfortunate” and highlighted that the U.S. has been a “major” supporter of her organization’s work in the Eastern Mediterranean region for decades.
“The U.S. funding was indeed decisive in fighting polio, eradicating polio. Currently, we are in the last round of eradicating polio in the last two countries in the world: Afghanistan and Pakistan,” the Saudi physician said through an interpreter.
“We hope that our collaboration with our partners will enable us to achieve our goal of fully eradicating polio in these countries during this final stage,” she added.
Balkhy emphasized WHO’s dedication to safeguarding the world against the resurgence of polio.
In 2024, Pakistan reported 73 cases of the paralytic poliovirus, while Afghanistan reported 25 cases. Although there have been no additional polio cases in Afghanistan so far, Pakistani officials confirmed the first poliovirus infection of 2025 last week.
Balkhy attributed efforts led by WHO to contain what she described as the “inevitable” spread of polio in Gaza due to the destruction of its sewage and sanitation services.
She stated they are prepared to discuss the reforms the United States plans to propose and carry out necessary internal assessments to help advance the organization’s work.
“Funding shortfalls in 2024 have already led to devastating cuts to lifesaving health operations. We ask for your support in amplifying our message — help us save lives, restore health systems and bring hope to millions,” Balkhy said.
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Russian disinformation narratives about illicit organ harvesting and biological experiments in Ukraine have no basis in fact. Russia intentionally distorts Ukrainian law intended to support vital medical procedures.
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WASHINGTON — The CIA now believes the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic most likely originated from a laboratory, according to an assessment released Saturday that points the finger at China even while acknowledging that the spy agency has “low confidence” in its own conclusion.
The finding is not the result of any new intelligence, and the report was completed at the behest of the Biden administration and former CIA Director William Burns. It was declassified and released Saturday on the orders of President Donald Trump’s pick to lead the agency, John Ratcliffe, who was sworn in Thursday as director.
The nuanced finding suggests the agency believes the totality of evidence makes a lab origin more likely than a natural origin. But the agency’s assessment assigns a low degree of confidence to this conclusion, suggesting the evidence is deficient, inconclusive or contradictory.
Earlier reports on the origins of COVID-19 have split over whether the coronavirus emerged from a Chinese lab, potentially by mistake, or whether it arose naturally. The new assessment is not likely to settle the debate. In fact, intelligence officials say it may never be resolved, due to a lack of cooperation from Chinese authorities.
The CIA “continues to assess that both research-related and natural origin scenarios of the COVID-19 pandemic remain plausible,” the agency wrote in a statement about its new assessment.
Instead of new evidence, the conclusion was based on fresh analyses of intelligence about the spread of the virus, its scientific properties and the work and conditions of China’s virology labs.
Lawmakers have pressured America’s spy agencies for more information about the origins of the virus, which led to lockdowns, economic upheaval and millions of deaths. It’s a question with significant domestic and geopolitical implications as the world continues to grapple with the pandemic’s legacy.
Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Saturday he was “pleased the CIA concluded in the final days of the Biden administration that the lab-leak theory is the most plausible explanation,” and he commended Ratcliffe for declassifying the assessment.
“Now, the most important thing is to make China pay for unleashing a plague on the world,” Cotton said in a statement.
China’s embassy in Washington did not immediately return messages seeking comment. Chinese authorities have in the past dismissed speculation about COVID’s origins as unhelpful and motivated by politics.
While the origin of the virus remains unknown, scientists think the most likely hypothesis is that it circulated in bats, like many coronaviruses, before infecting another species, probably racoon dogs, civet cats or bamboo rats. In turn, the infection spread to humans handling or butchering those animals at a market in Wuhan, where the first human cases appeared in late November 2019.
Some official investigations, however, have raised the question of whether the virus escaped from a lab in Wuhan. Two years ago, a report by the Energy Department concluded a lab leak was the most likely origin, though that report also expressed low confidence in the finding.
The same year then-FBI Director Christopher Wray said his agency believed the virus “most likely” spread after escaping from a lab.
Ratcliffe, who served as director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term, has said he favors the lab leak scenario, too.
“The lab leak is the only theory supported by science, intelligence, and common sense,” Ratcliffe said in 2023.
The CIA said it will continue to evaluate any new information that could change its assessment.
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WINDHOEK, NAMIBIA — The cervical cancer rate in Namibia is 37.5 for every 100,000 women, about three times higher than the rate worldwide. Cervical cancer is one of the most preventable cancers and doctors in Namibia are advocating greater access to healthcare and the HPV vaccine to reduce the prevalence of the disease.
November 2009 was a turning point in the life of Barbara Kamba-Nyathi. At the tender age of 29, she was diagnosed with stage three cervical cancer.
Her doctors recommended radiation therapy as opposed to chemotherapy, because at that time she had not yet had children and radiation therapy would help her avoid premature menopause.
But that was not her only struggle. Kamba-Nyathi, who lived in Windhoek at the time, said she faced stigma for cervical cancer’s association with HIV and the human papilloma virus.
“One of the challenges that come with having a diagnosis like cervical cancer is that our African society its usually taboo to talk about things of our reproductive organs, you know, our reproductive system is taboo,” said Kamba-Nyathi. “We don’t talk about such things and in the end, we tend to normalize pain and even things that don’t feel right in our bodies we tend to normalize them and they become part of our identity.”
Rolf Hansen, the chief executive officer of the Cancer Association of Namibia, said a lack of education and a lack of access to healthcare prevent many women from getting tested or being treated for cervical cancer or HPV, which is the second-leading cause of cancer among sub-Saharan women.
“Like I said, HIV and HPV work hand in hand to fuel the cervical cancer pandemic,” said Hansen. “Now, in our country as well we see that in our low-income setting as well as our rural setting, we have high HPV prevalence, high cervical cancer so a lot of work needs to be done at a grassroots level so that we can actually combat this disease.”
Doctors Simon and David Emvula provide health services to underprivileged communities, together with the Be Free/Break Free program — an initiative of former first lady Monica Geingos — in Namibia’s largest township of Katutura. They are advocating for the rollout of the HPV vaccine for girls between the ages of 9 and 14, before they become sexually active.
Emvula said that during one screening in Windhoek on Saturday, they treated more than 100 patients, screening girls and women for HPV, cervical cancer, fibroids and other sexually transmitted infections and sexually transmitted diseases.
Emvula spoke to VOA at his practice in Windhoek.
“The turnout was actually beyond what we expected and once again it was an eye-opener … that there is definitely a need for that,” said Emvula.
Emvula said HPV vaccination is among the most effective ways to prevent cervical cancer but the government of Namibia is lagging.
HPV vaccines have been introduced in 129 countries worldwide and the Namibian government has endorsed the rollout of the vaccines for girls ages 9 to 14. Despite promises made as reported by VOA last year, the vaccines have not yet been made available.
Namibia’s executive director of health, Ben Nangombe, could not be reached for comment.
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In the Southwest United States, bird migrations are shifting as global temperatures warm. Gustavo Martіnez Contreras takes us to the Bosque del Apache National Wildlife Refuge in the state of New Mexico.
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After President Joe Biden announced a ban on oil and gas drilling off most of the U.S. coastline in early January, President-elect Donald Trump quickly vowed to reverse it after he takes office on January 20. But there is one section of the California coast that has gained more permanent protection from drilling – a new national marine sanctuary. Genia Dulot takes us underwater for a look.
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Labels on wine, distilled spirits and malt beverages in the U.S. would be required to list alcohol content and nutritional information per serving, plus notification of potential allergens, under two new rules proposed Thursday by the Treasury Department.
The department’s Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau is seeking public content on proposals to require an “alcohol facts” box — similar to nutrition labels on food — that would list alcohol content, calories, carbohydrates, fat and protein per serving. A second rule would require labels to declare top allergens, including milk, eggs, fish, shellfish, tree nuts, wheat, peanuts, soybean and sesame.
The changes are consistent with the bureau’s mandate “to ensure that labels provide consumers with adequate information about the identity, quality and alcohol content of alcohol beverages,” according to a notice published in the Federal Register.
Similar rules were first proposed nearly two decades ago and later championed in petitions submitted by advocacy groups, including the Center for Science in the Public Interest.
“The proposals represent a momentous step toward ensuring consumers have access to the information they need to make informed choices, follow health guidelines and avoid allergic reactions,” CSPI officials said in a statement.
Companies have been allowed to provide the information voluntarily for several years. In August 2021, a survey from the Beer Institute indicated that 95% of beer volume sold by several top producers contained nutrition information provided voluntarily, the bureau noted. Advocates, however, maintained that a limited number of companies used voluntary labels, “underscoring the need for a mandatory policy.”
The Wine Institute, a trade group, said it would support digital labels that contained the required information. “Given the unique nature of winemaking, the most accurate and least burdensome approach to providing nutrition information to consumers would be to allow the option of off-label disclosure via QR code or other electronic means,” the group said.
The Distilled Spirits Council of the United States also suggested QR codes or website references.
Comments will be accepted through April 16. The rules would take effect five years from the date of final approval.
The move is the second major change for alcohol labels announced in the waning days of the Biden administration. On Jan. 5, U.S. Surgeon General Vivek Murthy called for new warnings about the link between alcohol and cancer.
The new proposals come as the government is updating dietary guidelines, including those around alcohol, that will form the cornerstone of federal food programs and policy. The updated guidelines are expected later this year.
The current guidelines recommend women have one drink or fewer per day while men should stick to two or fewer.
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PHUKET, THAILAND — Plastic bottles and empty beer cans roll on the sea floor in the waters around Phuket in southern Thailand, while ever more garbage piles up on the island itself, a tourist hotspot better known for its pristine beaches and stunning sunsets.
In one corner of the island, trucks and tractors trundle back and forth moving piles of trash around a sprawling landfill, the final destination for much of the more than 1,000 tonnes of waste collected on Phuket every day.
In a matter of months, the landfill has grown so large it has replaced the previous serene mountain view from Vassana Toyou’s home.
“There is no life outside the house, (we) just stay at home,” she said. “The smell is very strong, you have to wear a mask.”
To cope with the stench, Vassana said she keeps her air conditioner and air purifiers switched on all the time, doubling her electricity bill.
Phuket, Thailand’s largest island, has undergone rapid development due to its tourism sector, a major driver of the Thai economy as a whole. Of the country’s 35.5 million foreign arrivals in 2024, about 13 million headed to the island.
“The growth of (Phuket) city has been much more rapid than it should be,” said Suppachoke Laongphet, deputy mayor of the island’s main municipality, explaining how a tourism and construction boom has pushed trash volumes above pre-COVID levels.
By the end of year, the island could be producing up to 1,400 tonnes of trash a day, overwhelming its sole landfill, he said.
Authorities are pushing ahead with plans to cut waste generation by 15% in six months, expand the landfill and build a new incinerator, he said, as the island strives to become a more sustainable tourist destination.
But increasing capacity and incinerators is only part of the solution, experts say.
“If you just keep expanding more waste incinerators, I don’t think that would be just the solution,” said Panate Manomaivibool, an assistant professor in waste management at Burapha University.
“They need to focus on waste reduction and separation.”
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BLANTYRE, MALAWI — Malawi’s government launched a plan Thursday to stop cholera outbreaks by 2030.
Officials say that if the government and international partners can effectively cooperate, they can greatly reduce the prevalence of cholera in the southern African country, where it has killed at least 1,700 people over the past three years.
Partners include the World Health Organization, or WHO, and UNICEF.
Minister of Health Khumbize Kandodo-Chiponda said, “The goal of the plan is to reduce the annual cholera rate by 90% and achieve the case fatality rate of less than 1% by the year 2030, as recommended by WHO.”
Kandodo-Chiponda said there are several ways to achieve the goal, all of which involve the government, development partners, civil society organizations and other stakeholders supplying expertise and funding to support prevention and control efforts.
She said those efforts will be “to increase access to safe water and sanitation facilities and promote improved hygiene practices; to raise awareness and promote community-led initiatives to prevent and to respond to outbreaks.”
Malawi has experienced cholera outbreaks over the past three years, with the most severe occurring in 2022, resulting in over 1,700 deaths nationwide.
During Thursday’s event, the Malawian government launched an oral cholera vaccine campaign targeting four districts — Mzimba, Karonga, Balaka and Machinga — to address a recent resurgence of cholera there.
Statistics from the Presidential Task Force on Cholera show the disease has caused 14 deaths since September.
Shadrack Omol, UNICEF’s representative in Malawi, said the 2024 resurgence of cholera shows that root causes of the infectious bacterial disease persist.
“Health interventions … are complimentary in support,” Omol said. “The key to addressing the root causes is in provision of safe drinking water across our country, improving sanitation and improving hygiene practices.”
Malawi’s public health experts say goals to eradicate the disease within five years will depend on stakeholder commitments.
George Jobe, executive director of the Malawi Health Equity Network, said, “If financial investments [and] technical investments from partners are done, we believe we can win this battle. It should not be a document that should grow dust on the shelves.”
Kandodo-Chiponda said the operational plans will be reviewed at least once every year to keep ahead of any possible cholera outbreaks.
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WASHINGTON — Hours after Jeff Bezos’s Blue Origin nailed its first-ever orbital mission, SpaceX seized back the spotlight on Thursday as its latest test of Starship, its gargantuan next-generation mega rocket, ended with the upper stage dramatically disintegrating over the Atlantic.
In terms of sheer excitement, Elon Musk’s company didn’t disappoint, underscoring its technical prowess by catching the first stage booster in the “chopstick” arms of its launch tower for a second time.
But the triumph was short-lived when teams lost contact with the upper stage vehicle. SpaceX later confirmed it had undergone “rapid unscheduled disassembly,” the company’s euphemism for an explosion.
A taller, improved version of the biggest and most powerful launch vehicle ever built blasted off from the company’s Starbase in Boca Chica, Texas, at 4:37 p.m. (2237 GMT) for its seventh test.
The gleaming prototype rocket is key to Musk’s ambitions of colonizing Mars, while NASA hopes to use a modified version as a human lunar lander.
Around seven minutes after liftoff, the Super Heavy booster decelerated from supersonic speeds — generating sonic booms — before descending gracefully into the launch tower’s waiting arms, prompting an eruption of applause from ground control teams.
The maneuver was first successfully executed in October, but not November, when Super Heavy made a controlled splashdown in the Gulf of Mexico instead.
Soon after the latest booster catch, however, announcers on a live webcast confirmed the upper stage vehicle had been lost following a propulsion anomaly.
The FlightAware tracker showed several planes in the Atlantic altering course near the Turks and Caicos Islands, while users on X shared dramatic footage purportedly capturing the spaceship breaking apart in a fiery cascade during atmospheric reentry.
“Success is uncertain, but entertainment is guaranteed!” Musk wrote on X, sharing one of the clips. He added the cause of the explosion appeared to be an “oxygen/fuel leak” and that the company would take corrective steps.
A Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) spokesperson said the agency “briefly slowed and diverted aircraft around the area where space vehicle debris was falling.”
Well wishes
Ahead of the SpaceX launch, Blue Origin’s massive New Glenn rocket reached orbital space for the first time, marking a potential turning point in the commercial space race.
SpaceX has long dominated orbital launches with its Falcon 9 rocket, securing contracts from private companies, the Pentagon and NASA.
In contrast, Blue Origin had been limited to short hop suborbital flights with its smaller New Shepard rocket — but could now look to erode SpaceX’s market share.
Although the two tech titans have had a contentious past, Musk congratulated Bezos “on reaching orbit on the first attempt,” and Bezos returned the goodwill a few hours later.
“Good luck today @elonmusk and the whole spacex team!!” the Amazon founder wrote on X.
NASA’s outgoing chief Bill Nelson meanwhile offered his congratulations to SpaceX for the booster catch, adding: “Spaceflight is not easy.”
For this flight, SpaceX announced it had made numerous upgrades, and increased Starship’s size to 123 meters tall. New Glenn stands 98 meters tall.
While its Falcon rockets remain steadfast workhorses, SpaceX has made clear it sees Starship as its future.
The first three test flights ended in dramatic explosions, resulting in the loss of vehicles. However, SpaceX has rapidly iterated on its design, reflecting its “fail fast, learn fast” philosophy.
Musk is now aiming to drastically ramp up the frequency of tests, requesting permission from the FAA to carry out 25 in 2025, compared to just four in 2024.
The agency is holding public meetings on potential environmental and regulatory concerns, amid accusations that SpaceX has harmed ecologically sensitive areas and violated wastewater regulations.
But with Musk now part of Trump’s inner circle, the billionaire may find a smoother path under the incoming administration.
Meanwhile, Bezos and fellow tech mogul Mark Zuckerberg are set to attend the president-elect’s inauguration on Monday, signaling warming ties.
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People hospitalized for flu should be tested for bird flu within 24 hours, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention said on Thursday, in an expansion of the agency’s efforts to tackle increasing infections in humans.
The advisory is intended to prevent delays in identifying human cases of avian influenza A (H5N1) viruses amid high levels of seasonal influenza.
The risk to the general public from bird flu is low, and there has been no further evidence of person to person spread, the agency said.
Still, influenza A-positive patients, particularly those in an intensive care unit, should be tested ideally within 24 hours of hospitalization to identify the viral subtype and determine whether they have bird flu, the agency said.
Prior to Thursday’s guidance, hospitals generally sent batches of samples to labs for subtyping every few days.
Faster testing also aims to help doctors identify how people became infected and provide their close contacts with testing and medicine more quickly, if needed, said Nirav Shah, the agency’s principal deputy director, on a call with reporters.
The CDC does not believe it has been missing bird flu infections in people, Shah said. No surveillance system detects 100% of cases, he added later.
“The system is working as it should,” said Shah, adding that health officials want results sooner in case any public health action is needed. “What we need is to shift to a system that tells us what’s happening in the moment.”
Nearly 70 people in the United States, most of them farmworkers, have contracted bird flu since April, as the virus has circulated among poultry flocks and dairy herds. Three people have tested positive without a clear source of exposure to the virus, according to CDC.
Most infections in humans have been mild, but one fatality was reported in Louisiana last week.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture has more than 300 personnel working on its bird flu response and has spent $1.5 billion on its efforts to curb the spread among poultry and dairy cattle, said Eric Deeble, a deputy undersecretary at the agency.
The USDA last week said it would rebuild a bird flu vaccine stockpile for poultry.
USDA officials have met several times with the transition team of the incoming Donald Trump administration to try to ensure a smooth handoff on agency actions to curb the spread of the virus, including a tabletop exercise at the White House on Wednesday, Deeble said.
Officials at the Department of Health and Human Services, which encompasses CDC, also have repeatedly met with the transition team on Zoom calls and have shared their bird flu playbook, officials said on the press call.
HHS said on Thursday it plans to put $211 million toward mRNA-based vaccine technology to better respond to emerging infectious diseases such as bird flu.
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GENEVA — The World Health Organization appealed Thursday for $1.5 billion for emergency operations this year, warning that conflict, climate change, epidemics and displacement had converged to create an “unprecedented global health crisis.”
The U.N. health agency estimated that health crises would leave 305 million people in need of urgent humanitarian assistance this year.
“WHO is seeking $1.5 billion to support our lifesaving work for the emergencies we know about and to react swiftly to new crises,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said as he launched the appeal.
The agency’s emergency request, which was for the same amount as last year’s request, outlined the critical priorities and resources needed to address 42 ongoing health emergencies.
“Conflicts, outbreaks, climate-related disasters and other health emergencies are no longer isolated or occasional — they are relentless, overlapping and intensifying,” Tedros said in a statement.
He pointed to the emergency health assistance provided in conflict zones ranging from the occupied Palestinian territories to the Democratic Republic of Congo to Sudan, as well as its work conducting vaccination campaigns, treating malnutrition and helping control outbreaks of diseases like cholera.
“Without adequate and sustainable funding, we face the impossible task of deciding who will receive care and who will not this year,” Tedros said at Thursday’s event.
“Your support helps to ensure that WHO remains a lifeline, bridging the gap between sickness and health, despair and hope, life and death for millions of people worldwide.”
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ARUSHA, Tanzania — The World Health Organization said Wednesday an outbreak of suspected Marburg disease has killed eight people in a remote part of northern Tanzania.
“We are aware of 9 cases so far, including 8 people who have died,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said in a statement. “We would expect further cases in coming days as disease surveillance improves.”
Like Ebola, the Marburg virus originates in fruit bats and spreads between people through close contact with the bodily fluids of infected individuals or with surfaces, such as contaminated bed sheets.
Without treatment, Marburg can be fatal in up to 88% of people who fall ill with the disease. Symptoms include fever, muscle pains, diarrhea, vomiting and in some cases death from extreme blood loss. There is no authorized vaccine or treatment for Marburg.
WHO said its risk assessment for the suspected outbreak in Tanzania is high at national and regional levels but low globally. There was no immediate comment from Tanzanian health authorities.
An outbreak of Marburg in Rwanda, first reported on Sept. 27, was declared over on Dec. 20. Rwandan officials reported a total of 15 deaths and 66 cases, with the majority of those affected healthcare workers who handled the first patients.
An outbreak in 2023 of Marburg in Kagera, which shares a border with Rwanda, killed at least five people.
China says HMPV infections in the northern part of the country are declining. News of increased respiratory illnesses in China kindled international concerns about another potential pandemic. But, as VOA’s Dora Mekouar reports, medical experts say HMPV is nothing like COVID-19. VOA Mandarin contributed to this report.
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Elon Musk said a third person has received an implant from his brain-computer interface company Neuralink, one of many groups working to connect the nervous system to machines.
“We’ve got … three humans with Neuralinks and all are working well,” he said during a recent wide-ranging interview at a Las Vegas event streamed on his social media platform X.
Since the first brain implant about a year ago, Musk said the company has upgraded the devices with more electrodes, higher bandwidth and longer battery life. Musk also said Neuralink hopes to implant the experimental devices in 20 to 30 more people this year.
Musk didn’t provide any details about the latest patient, but there are updates on the previous ones.
The second recipient — who has a spinal cord injury and got the implant last summer — was playing video games with the help of the device and learning how to use computer-aided design software to create 3-D objects. The first patient, also paralyzed after a spinal cord injury, described how it helped him play video games and chess.
But while such developments at Neuralink often attract notice, many other companies and research groups are working on similar projects. Two studies last year in the New England Journal of Medicine described how brain-computer interfaces, or BCIs, helped people with ALS communicate better.
Who’s working on brain-computer interface technology?
More than 45 trials involving brain-computer interfaces are underway, according to a U.S. database of studies. The efforts are aimed at helping treat brain disorders, overcoming brain injuries and other uses.
Many research labs have already shown that humans can accurately control computer cursors using BCIs, said Rajesh Rao, co-director of the Center for Neurotechnology at the University of Washington.
Rao said Neuralink may be unique in two ways: The surgery to implant the device is the first time a robot has been used to implant flexible electrode threads into a human brain to record neural activity and control devices. And those threads may record from more neurons than other interfaces.
Still, he said, the advantages of Neuralink’s approach have yet to be shown, and some competitors have eclipsed the company in other ways. For example, Rao said companies such as Synchron, Blackrock Neurotech and Onward Medical are already conducting BCI trials on people “using either less invasive methods or more versatile approaches” that combine neural recording with stimulation.
What are the benefits of BCIs?
Marco Baptista, chief scientific officer of the Christopher & Dana Reeve Foundation, called BCI technology “very exciting” with potential benefits to people with paralysis.
Through clinical trials, “we’ll be able to see what’s going to be the winning approach,” he said. “It’s a little early to know.”
Baptista said his foundation generally tries to support research teams financially and with expert help – though it hasn’t given any money to Neuralink.
“We need to really support high-risk, high-reward endeavors. This is clearly high-risk, high-reward. We don’t know how safe it’s going to be. We don’t know how feasible it’s going to be,” he said.
How are BCIs tested and regulated?
Neuralink announced in 2023 that it had gotten permission from U.S. regulators to begin testing its device in people.
While most medical devices go on the market without clinical studies, high-risk ones that undergo pre-market approval need what’s called an “investigational device exemption” from the Food and Drug Administration, said Dr. Rita Redberg, a cardiologist at the University of California, San Francisco, who studies high-risk devices.
Neuralink says it has this exemption, but the FDA said it can’t confirm or disclose information about a particular study.
Redberg said the FDA tends to be involved in all steps from recruiting patients to testing devices to analyzing data. She said this regulatory process prioritizes safety.
She also pointed to another layer of protection: All research involving people needs an institutional review board, or IRB. It can also be known as an ethical review board or an independent ethics committee. Members must include at least one non-scientist as well as someone not affiliated with the institution or organization forming the board.
The role of such boards “is to assume there is reasonable risk and reasonable chance of benefit and that patients are informed of those before they enroll,” said Redberg.
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SANTA FE, NEW MEXICO — The New Mexico Supreme Court on Thursday struck down abortion restrictions by conservative cities and counties, helping to ensure the state remains a go-to destination for people from other states with bans.
The unanimous opinion, in response to a request from state Attorney General Raúl Torrez, reinforces the state’s position as having some of the most liberal abortion laws in the country.
Attorneys representing the cities of Hobbs and Clovis and Lea and Roosevelt counties had argued that provisions of a federal “anti-vice” law known as the Comstock Act block courts from striking down local abortion ordinances.
But Justice C. Shannon Bacon, writing for the majority opinion, said state law precludes cities and counties from restricting abortion or regulating abortion clinics.
“The ordinances violate this core precept and invade the Legislature’s authority to regulate access to and provision of reproductive healthcare,” she wrote. “We hold the ordinances are preempted in their entirety.”
New Mexico Attorney General Raúl Torrez praised the court’s ruling Thursday, saying that the core of the argument was that state laws preempted any action by local governments to engage in activities that would infringe on the constitutional rights of citizens.
“The bottom line is simply this: Abortion access is safe and secure in New Mexico,” he said. “It’s enshrined in law by the recent ruling by the New Mexico Supreme Court and thanks to the work of the New Mexico Legislature.”
New Mexico House Speaker Javier Martínez called access to health care a basic fundamental right in New Mexico.
“It doesn’t take a genius to understand the statutory framework that we have. Local governments don’t regulate health care in New Mexico. It is up to the state,” the Albuquerque Democrat said.
Opposition to abortion runs deep in New Mexico communities along the border with Texas, which has one of the most restrictive bans in the U.S.
But Democrats, who control every statewide elected office in New Mexico and hold majorities in the state House and Senate, have moved to shore up access to abortion — before and after the U.S. Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade in 2022, eliminating the nationwide right to abortion.
In 2021, the New Mexico Legislature repealed a dormant 1969 statute that outlawed most abortion procedures as felonies, ensuring access to abortion even after the Roe v. Wade reversal.
And in 2023, Democratic New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham signed a bill that overrides local ordinances aimed at limiting abortion access and enacted a shield law that protects abortion providers from investigations by other states.
In September, construction began on a state-funded reproductive health and abortion clinic in southern New Mexico that will cater to local residents and people who travel from neighboring states.
The new clinic is scheduled for completion by early 2026 to provide services ranging from medical and procedural abortions to contraception, cervical cancer screenings and education about adoptions.
In Thursday’s opinion, justices said they “strongly admonish” Roosevelt County, in particular, for an ordinance that would have allowed individuals to file lawsuits demanding damages of more than $100,000 for violations of the county’s abortion ordinance.
The provision would have created “a private right of action and damages award that is clearly intended to punish protected conduct,” the court said in its opinion.
Erin Hawley, a vice president at Alliance Defending Freedom, an Arizona-based Christian legal advocacy group, is an attorney who argued on behalf of Roosevelt County in the case. On Thursday, she criticized the court’s decision and emphasized its limitations.
“Roosevelt County and other New Mexico localities should be able to enforce ordinances that comply with federal law and protect the lives of their citizens,” said Hawley, the wife of U.S. Sen. Josh Hawley of Missouri. “We’re grateful that the New Mexico Supreme Court did not abandon common sense and find a so-called right to abortion in the state constitution.”
It was not immediately clear whether the ruling can be appealed in federal court or influence broader efforts to apply Comstock Act restrictions on abortion. The New Mexico Supreme Court opinion explicitly declined to address conflicts with federal law, basing its decision solely on state provisions.
Austin, Texas-based attorney Jonathan Mitchell, a former Texas solicitor general and architect of that state’s strict abortion ban, said he looked forward “to litigating these issues in other states and bringing the meaning of the federal Comstock Act to the Supreme Court of the United States.”
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CAPE CANAVERAL — A quarter of a century after its founding, Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin is finally ready for its maiden orbital voyage with a brand-new rocket the company hopes will shake up the commercial space race.
The launch initially scheduled for Sunday was pushed back a day due to “unfavorable” sea conditions, Blue Origin posted on X.
Named New Glenn after legendary astronaut John Glenn — the first American to orbit Earth in 1962 — the rocket stands 320 feet (98 meters) tall, roughly equivalent to a 32-story building — and is set to blast off from Cape Canaveral Space Force Station in a launch window that opens at 1 a.m. (0600 GMT) Monday.
“Pointy end up!” the company’s CEO, Dave Limp posted on X alongside photos of the gleaming white behemoth.
With the mission, dubbed NG-1, Bezos, the world’s second-richest man, is taking direct aim at the world’s wealthiest: Elon Musk, whose company SpaceX dominates the orbital launch market through its Falcon 9 and Falcon Heavy rockets.
These serve the commercial sector, the Pentagon, and NASA — including, crucially, ferrying astronauts to and from the International Space Station.
“SpaceX has for the past several years been pretty much the only game in town and so having a competitor… this is great,” G. Scott Hubbard, a retired senior NASA official, told AFP.
SpaceX, meanwhile, is planning the next orbital test of Starship — its gargantuan new-generation rocket — the same day, upping the sense of high-stakes rivalry.
If all goes to plan, shortly after launch, Blue Origin will attempt to land the first-stage booster on a drone ship named Jacklyn, in honor of Bezos’ mother, stationed about 620 miles (1,000 kilometers) downrange in the Atlantic Ocean.
Though SpaceX makes such landings a near-routine spectacle, this will be Blue Origin’s first shot at a touchdown on the high seas.
Meanwhile, the rocket’s upper stage will fire its engines toward Earth orbit, carrying a Defense Department-funded prototype spaceship called Blue Ring, which will remain aboard for the roughly six-hour test flight.
Limp emphasized that simply reaching orbit is the prime goal, while successfully recovering the booster would be a welcome “bonus.”
Blue Origin does have experience landing its New Shepard rockets — used for suborbital tourism — but they are much smaller and land on terra firma rather than a ship at sea.
Blue Origin has secured a NASA contract to launch two Mars probes aboard New Glenn. The rocket will also support the deployment of Project Kuiper, a satellite internet constellation designed to compete with Starlink.
Like Musk, Bezos has a lifelong passion for space. But whereas Musk dreams of colonizing Mars, Bezos envisions shifting heavy industry off-planet onto floating space platforms to preserve Earth, “humanity’s blue origin.”
He founded Blue Origin in 2000 — two years before Musk created SpaceX — but has adopted a more cautious pace, in contrast to his rival’s “fail fast, learn fast” philosophy.
“There’s been impatience within the space community over Blue Origin’s very deliberate approach,” Scott Pace, a space policy analyst at George Washington University and former member of the National Space Council, told AFP.
If New Glenn succeeds, Pace added, it will give the U.S. government “dissimilar redundancy” — valuable backup if one system fails.
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BANGKOK — Nearly all of the world’s 35,000 online pharmacies are being run illegally and consumers who use them risk getting ineffective or dangerous drugs, according to the U.S. Trade Representative’s annual report on “notorious markets.” The report also singled out 19 countries over concerns about counterfeit or pirated products.
The report also named about three dozen online retailers, many of them in China or elsewhere in Asia that it said are allegedly engaged in selling counterfeit products or other illegal activities.
The report says 96% of online pharmacies were found to be violating the law, many operating without a license and selling medicines without prescriptions and safety warnings.
Their websites often look like legitimate e-commerce platforms, often with false claims that they are approved by the Food and Drug Administration, said the report, released Wednesday. The FDA and U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration have both issued warnings about risks of buying prescription medicines from such sources.
It cited a survey by the Alliance for Safe Online Pharmacies’ Global Foundation that found nearly one in four Americans who have used online pharmacies reported having encountered substandard, fake or harmful medicines.
Last year, federal prosecutors reported that a network of illegal drug sellers based in the U.S., the Dominican Republic and India had packaged potentially deadly synthetic opioids into pills disguised as common prescription drugs and sold millions of them through fake online drugstores, federal prosecutors said Monday. At least nine people died of narcotics poisoning between August 2023 and June 2024 after consuming the counterfeit pills, the indictment said.
Apart from the risks of using drugs that may contain inert ingredients or those that could cause allergies, the medicines are sometimes made in unsanitary conditions, said the report, which did not give annual statistics for those who may have died or otherwise been harmed.
Progress in fighting counterfeit and pirated goods
The USTR’s annual report cited examples from inside the United States, but and also mentioned risks of imported ingredients including fentanyl from China. Many of the illicit online pharmacies are based outside the U.S.
The “Notorious Markets List” did laud progress in fighting counterfeit and pirated goods.
In one case, U.S. authorities, industry groups and the police collaborated in shutting down a Hanoi, Vietnam-based piracy ring, Fmovies, and other related piracy sites, in July and August.
The report said the world’s then-largest pirated movies site had drawn more than 6.7 billion visits from January 2023 to June 2024.
In another Vietnam-linked case, two people operating pirate television platform BestBuyIPTV were convicted and ordered to pay fines and forfeit property.
The report also cited crackdowns on online piracy in Brazil and the United Kingdom and busts of sellers of counterfeit purses, clothing and shoes in Kuwait.
But problems remain with cyberlockers that thwart efforts to restrict piracy of movies and other content and of so-called “bulletproof” internet service providers, or ISPs, that promise people using them leeway for using pirate sites, it said.
One such ISP is Avito, a Russian-based ad platform that allegedly lets sellers advertise counterfeit products.
Baidu Wangpan, a cloud storage service of China’s largest search engine provider, Baidu, was named for allegedly failing to enforce or being slow to act on copyright protection.
The report also pointed to social-commerce site Pinduoduo and to Douyin Mall, a Chinese online platform owned by Tiktok owner ByteDance. It said the shopping platforms have sought to build up protections but that they still host many counterfeit goods.
It also named Shopee, a Singapore-based online and mobile e-commerce site, saying some country-focused platforms serving Southeast Asia and South American had better track records in fighting piracy than others.
IndiaMART, an big business-to-business marketplace in India, still offers a slew of counterfeit products, it said.
While a large share of theft of intellectual property has moved online, the report also highlighted real world locations notorious for selling counterfeit products, including markets in Turkey, bazaars in the United Arab Emirates and Saigon Square Shopping Mall in Vietnam’s Ho Chi Minh City.
The report said Bangkok’s MBK Center, a huge mall of about 2,000 stores, had actively cracked down on counterfeiting, though such products still can be found there.
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NEW YORK — The 13-year-old boy came to the clinic with a rapidly ballooning neck. Doctors were puzzled.
Testing ruled out their first suspicion. But further tests pinpointed what they — and the boy — had been missing: iodine.
A century ago, iodine deficiency affected kids across large swaths of the country. It essentially disappeared after some food makers started adding it to table salt, bread and some other foods, in one of the great public health success stories of the 20th century.
But today, people are getting less iodine because of changes in diet and food manufacturing.
Although most people are still getting enough, researchers have increasingly been reporting low levels of iodine in pregnant women and other people, raising concerns about an impact on their newborns. And there is also a very small, but growing, number of reports of iodine deficiency in kids.
“This needs to be on people’s radar,” said Dr. Monica Serrano-Gonzalez, a Brown University doctor who treated the boy in 2021 in Providence, Rhode Island.
What is iodine?
Iodine is a trace element found in seawater and in some soils — mostly in coastal areas. A French chemist accidentally discovered it in 1811 when an experiment with seaweed ash created a purple puff of vapor. The name iodine comes from a Greek word meaning violet-colored.
Later that century, scientists began to understand that people need certain amounts of iodine to regulate their metabolism and stay healthy, and that it’s crucial in the development of brain function in children.
One sign of insufficient iodine is a swelling of the neck, known as a goiter. The thyroid gland in the neck uses iodine to produce hormones that regulate the heart rate and other body functions. When there’s not enough iodine, the thyroid gland enlarges as it goes into overdrive to make up for the lack of iodine.
At the beginning of the 20th century, goiter was very common in children in certain inland parts of the United States, especially in a “goiter belt” that stretched from Appalachia and the Great Lakes to the northwest United States. Some of the kids were unusually short, deaf, intellectually stunted and had other symptoms of a syndrome once known as “cretinism.”
Adding iodine to salt
Public health experts realized they couldn’t solve the problem by feeding everyone seaweed and seafood, but they learned that iodine can essentially be sprayed on table salt. Iodized salt first became available in 1924. By the 1950s, more than 70% of U.S. households used iodized table salt. Bread and some other foods also were fortified with iodine, and iodine deficiency became rare.
But diets changed. Processed foods now make up a large part of the American diet, and though they contain a lot of salt, it’s not iodized. Leading bread brands no longer add iodine. In the case of the 13-year-old boy, he has mild autism and was a fussy eater, mostly only eating specific brands of bread and peanut butter.
And for people who do salt their food, the fashion now is to use kosher salt, Himalayan rock salt or other noniodized products.
“People have forgotten why there’s iodine in salt,” said Dr. Elizabeth Pearce of Boston Medical Center. She is a leader in the Iodine Global Network, a nongovernmental agency working to eliminate iodine deficiency disorders.
She noted a reported 50% drop in U.S. iodine levels in surveyed Americans between the 1970s and the 1990s.
How much iodine is enough?
Though iodine consumption is falling overall, most Americans are still getting enough through their diet, experts say. But doctors worry that’s not the case for women and children, who are most vulnerable to iodine deficiency.
The American Academy of Pediatrics and other medical societies recommend that all pregnant and breastfeeding women get 150 micrograms of iodine each day. You can get that from one-half to three-quarters of a teaspoon of iodized table salt.
In the last 15 years or so, U.S. researchers have increasingly reported seeing mild iodine deficiency in pregnant women. A Michigan State University study of about 460 pregnant women in the city of Lansing found about a quarter of them were not getting enough.
Many prenatal vitamins don’t contain iodine, noted Jean Kerver, the study’s lead author. That’s why doctors recommend that pregnant or breastfeeding women check labels to ensure they are taking multivitamins or prenatal supplements with iodine.
Some studies have linked even mild iodine deficiency to lower IQs and language delay in children, although there is debate about at exactly what levels problems start, Pearce said.
Experts say there hasn’t been enough research to establish what impact that iodine deficiency has actually been having on the U.S. population in recent years.
Serrano-Gonzalez said she and her colleagues have seen four other cases in children in their clinic in Providence.
“We’re concerned this may be increasing, especially in patients with restricted diets,” she said.
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Human Metapneumovirus (HMPV) has recently spread widely across China, overwhelming hospitals and evoking memories of the COVID-19 outbreak. HMPV is not a new virus; it has been known for years and typically has a low mortality rate. Nevertheless, epidemiologists are calling for greater transparency about the spread of the virus to help contain infections. While the health care system is under strain, experts stress that there is no need for panic. They recommend the public follow basic protective measures, particularly during the Spring Festival travel period, to help curb further spread of the virus.
Click here to read the full story in Mandarin.
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GENEVA — The World Meteorlogical Organization says that preventive action cannot avert natural disasters such as the wildfires raging across Los Angeles, but that it can help save lives and mitigate loss of property.
“Land management and prevention, regular clearing of underbrush play a key role in fire management, and evacuation plans are important in saving lives,” the WMO said Friday. “These are all part of effective early warning systems.”
In a briefing to journalists in Geneva, Claire Nullis, a WMO spokesperson, stressed the importance of preparing adequate evacuation plans and early warning systems to prevent some of the worst impacts from a natural disaster.
While acknowledging the staggering losses from the devastating wildfires sweeping across parts of Los Angeles in the United States this week, she said “The early warnings have, in this instance, been very, very good.
“You know, people have been evacuated. It has been impossible to save houses, and the loss of life is still too high, but it has been kept to a relative minimum,” she said.
Media reports say at least 10 people have been killed in this week’s Southern California wildfires, although more bodies are expected to be found once the fires have been contained and searchers can go through the debris.
More than 10,000 structures reportedly have burned, and 180,000 people are under evacuation orders.
While California is no stranger to wildfires, the WMO calls this catastrophic event “extraordinary” in that it is affecting one of the largest cities in the United States.
The WMO said that last year’s rainy season for the Los Angeles area as a whole was slightly above normal, but so far, this year it has been dry.
“The big compounding factor in this context is the winds. … They cause temperatures to rise, and they cause very low humidity, drying out the ground and vegetation,” Nullis said.
The WMO said destructive wildfires have been made worse by climate change.
“Climate change, including increased heat, extended drought and a thirsty atmosphere, has been a key driver in increasing the risk and extent of wildfires in the western United States during the last decades,” it said, citing data from the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
The WMO said wildfires require the alignment of a number of factors, including temperature, humidity and the lack of moisture in fuels such as trees, shrubs, grasses and forest debris.
“All these factors have strong direct or indirect ties to climate variability and climate change,” it said.
“Obviously, not every single weather-related disaster is due to climate change,” WMO spokesperson Nullis said. “Nobody would say that. But we get quite clear signals that climate change is exacerbating some of these disasters.”
In addition to the loss of life and destruction of homes and other infrastructure that could total billions of dollars in insured losses, the World Health Organization warns that wildfires can have a significant impact on human morbidity and mortality.
“Wildfire smoke, which is a mixture of air pollutants, of which particulate matter is of major concern as it can be full of PM 2.5. This is a very small particulate matter that gets right down into the lungs, and there certainly is a lot of it.” said Dr. Margaret Harris, a WHO spokesperson.
“A lot of it is associated with premature death in the general population,” she said. “It can cause and exacerbate diseases of lung, heart, brain, the nervous system” and other illnesses.
“It has been shown to lead to cognitive impairment and actually damage your intellectual capacity and lead to memory loss,” she said, adding that firefighters and emergency response workers “are most at risk from exposure to smoke.”
The WHO estimates 4.2 million deaths globally are linked to ambient or outdoor air pollution, with 99% of the global population exposed to air pollution levels that exceed the WHO guideline level for fine particulate matter (PM 2.5).
Harris said more research is needed to understand the long-term health effects of wildfire exposure on vulnerable populations, particularly children, older people, pregnant women and the chronically ill.
“We expect that we will see this over and over again if we do not get what we are doing to the planet under control,” she said.
Meanwhile, the World Meteorological Organization has officially confirmed that 2024 was the hottest year on record, “with a global mean temperature of more than 1.5 degrees above the 1850-1900 average.”
“We have just endured the hottest decade on record, with 2024 topping the list,” U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, noting that “blazing temperatures in 2024 require trailblazing climate action in 2025.”
“There is still time to avoid the worst of climate catastrophe. But leaders must act now,” he said.
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For the first time, a person in the United States has died after being infected with the bird flu. Louisiana health officials reported the death on Monday. The World Health Organization says the risk of infection for the general population remains low, but as VOA’s Dora Mekouar reports, some medical experts are still sounding the alarm.
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