One of the effects of progressive muscle diseases like cerebral palsy is muscle stiffness. There are drugs and therapies that are supposed to help but gauging their effectiveness is challenging. Now there’s a high-tech way that may help provide relief for patients. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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A small outbreak of Ebola virus in Democratic Republic of the Congo is causing alarm among public health officials. A new study outlining containment strategies may help prevent an epidemic similar to the one that engulfed a number of western African countries two years ago.  

In the timely report, published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, an international team of researchers culled 37 studies for the most effective containment strategies.

           

Pennsylvania State University biology professor Katriona Shea, co-author of the study, said, “The best strategy that we found out of the five that we looked at were funeral containment and public information campaigns [for the] sort of care in the community.”

Ebola virus is spread through coming into contact with the bodily fluids of infected individuals.

Shea said investigators found the No. 1 way to prevent transmission was for loved ones to avoid washing bodies of the deceased prior to burial.  

Shea said that information is best conveyed through public health campaigns that also stress the importance of handwashing, personal hygiene and self-quarantine in high-transmission areas.

Don’t wait to get treatment

People suspected of being infected with Ebola, the report found, should also not hesitate to go to the hospital or clinic for evaluation and treatment. But researchers concluded building more hospitals in response to an epidemic to be the least effective way to prevent spread of Ebola within communities.

Shea said investigators undertook the study in response to the Ebola epidemic of 2014-2015, when 28,646 people became infected. Of these, 11,323 people died in Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone died as of March 2016, according to the report.

Forty cases of the disease were also reported in the DRC.

Using the prevention strategies outlined in the study and the incidence data from the epidemic, researchers estimated that there would have been a reduction of 3,266 cases of Ebola and 1,633 lives saved.

No consensus on containment

At the height of the epidemic, Shea said there was no consensus on the best ways to contain the Ebola epidemic, and that’s why researchers decided to look into the matter.

“We really wanted to try to do something. Many of us have children, and were moved by stories, individual horrors and so forth,” she said. “Others of us felt something we did scientifically might contribute to making the future outbreaks less horrific.”

There are now three confirmed Ebola deaths in a remote part of the DRC. Public health officials are reportedly investigating a total of nine suspicious cases of the deadly viral infection.

With the virus once again threatening to become a public health menace, Shea said it’s not too early to begin taking aggressive measures to prevent another Ebola epidemic.
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Florida’s Indian River lagoon is considered the most biologically diverse estuary in the Northern Hemisphere. But it is facing a serious threat to the plants and animals in its waters. The water’s surface is increasingly dotted with thousands of dead fish, manatees, birds and other creatures. Faiza Elmasry has more about the problem, the cause and the solution. VOA’s Faith Lapidus narrates.
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The World Health Organization (WHO) confirmed on Sunday a second case of Ebola in Democratic Republic of Congo after an outbreak this week of 17 other suspected cases.

Health officials are trying to trace 125 people thought to be linked to the cases identified in the remote northeastern province of Bas-Uele province in northeastern Congo near the border with Central African Republic, WHO’s Congo spokesman Eugene Kabambi said.

Three people have so far died among the 19 suspected and confirmed cases, he added.

It was not immediately clear how the first victim, a deceased male, caught the virus, although past outbreaks have been linked to contact with infected bush meat such as apes.

The outbreak comes just a year after the end of an epidemic in West Africa killed more than 11,300 people mostly in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

However, Congo, whose dense forests contain the River Ebola near where the disease was first detected in 1976, has experienced many outbreaks and has mostly succeeded in containing them without large-scale loss of life.

The GAVI global vaccine alliance said on Friday some 300,000 emergency doses of an Ebola vaccine developed by Merck could be available in case of a large-scale outbreak and that it stood ready to support the Congo government on the matter.
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Dr. David Nabarro says he wants to rid the world of two diseases that are close to being eradicated: polio and guinea worm. Polio exists mainly on the Pakistani-Afghan border and in northern Nigeria. Both are conflict zones, where vaccine workers risk their lives to immunize children.

“The last part of eradicating any disease is always the hardest part,” Nabarro said during a visit to VOA. “If you don’t do it, you lose everything. To do it, you’ve got to really bring all the energy and commitment you can to bear.”

The World Health Organization has worked to eliminate polio for more than 30 years. Nigeria was to be declared polio-free this year, meaning the country had no cases for three continuous years, but then the disease returned.

“We must remain vigilant and focused until we are certain that the last case has been found and that we have got everybody protected,” Nabarro said.

Watch: WHO to Vote on New Director-General; David Nabarro Wants the Job

Guinea worm

Nabarro also wants to rid the world of Guinea worm, a disease that starts when people drink water containing fleas infected with guinea worm larvae. The larvae grow in human intestines. And while it is not life-threatening, it is painful when the worm emerges.

In 1986, about 3.5 million people had Guinea worm disease. Last year, 25 people had it. This was the result of efforts by United Nations agencies, the Carter Center, which was founded by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Nabarro wants to make more inroads in ending malaria, a disease that threatens nearly half the world’s population. Even through malaria can be prevented and cured, the WHO says it caused nearly half a million deaths in 2015.

Ebola epidemic

During the Ebola epidemic, Nabarro visited the West African countries ravaged by the disease as the U.N. special envoy on Ebola. It took the world a long time to put together an effective response to the epidemic, and before it was over more than 11,000 people died.

The WHO was heavily criticized for the way it handled the pandemic. Nabarro wants to make sure a tragedy of this magnitude does not happen again because of a lack of preparedness.

“I want to be sure the world as a whole helps nations to respond quickly when there’s a threat of infection. Usually, that means that the problem doesn’t get out of control,” he told VOA.

Life of public health service

Nabarro has spent his life working in public health. He worked in Iraq with Save the Children in 1974. He continued to work in public health positions until he joined the World Health Organization in 1999 and has worked at the WHO and for the U.N. since then. Nabarro has worked on malaria programs.

Now, he hopes to be elected director-general of the World Health Organization when the World Health Assembly meets in Geneva May 23.

This is the first time candidates will be elected to become director-general of WHO by member nations.
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Dr. David Nabarro says he wants to rid the world of two diseases that are close to being eradicated: polio and guinea worm. During a visit to VOA, he also said he wants to work to end malaria if he becomes the next head of the World Health Organization. This is the first time candidates will be elected to become director-general of WHO. VOA’s Carol Pearson has more.
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Democratic Republic of Congo Ebola Outbreak

On May 13, the World Health Organization declared an Ebola outbreak in Bas-Uele province, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, after a person tested positive for the Ebola virus.

The last Ebola outbreak in Congo happened in 2014 and killed more than 40 people.

In 2013, an Ebola crisis began in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia.

Congo’s outbreaks have all been in areas not linked to the West African cases.

2013-16 Western Africa Ebola Outbreak

Where: Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone

Began: December 2013

Ended*: March 2016

* WHO declared the outbreak in West Africa a public health emergency in August 2014. It declared the end of the transmission of Ebola in Guinea in December 2015, Liberia in January 2016 and in Sierra Leone in March 2016.

Even after the last transmission, WHO warned the countries were still at risk of sporadic transmission of Ebola because of the presence of the virus in some survivors.

WHO noted flare-ups of Ebola cases in Guinea in March 2016 and Liberia in June 2016.

2013-16 West Africa Ebola Outbreak, Death Tolls*

Guinea                 3,814 cases         2,544 deaths

Liberia                10,678 cases        4,810 deaths

Sierra Leone      14,124 cases        3,956 deaths

Total                      28,616 cases       11,310 deaths

Source: U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

* The 2013-16 West Africa Ebola outbreak was the largest in history.

Ebola Symptoms

Symptoms of the virus may include:

Fever

Severe headache

Muscle pain

Weakness

Fatigue

Diarrhea

Vomiting

Abdominal (stomach) pain

Unexplained hemorrhage (bleeding or bruising)

* Symptoms may appear anywhere from two to 21 days after exposure to Ebola, but the average is eight to 10 days.

Prevention

Avoid areas of known outbreaks

Wash hands frequently

Avoid bushmeat

Take precautions and avoid direct contact with infected people

* There is no known treatment for Ebola. Symptoms of Ebola and complications are treated as they appear.
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The World Health Organization says the Democratic Republic of the Congo is again facing an outbreak of the contagious and deadly Ebola virus.

Congolese Health Minister Oly Ilunga announced Saturday that three people had died of the virus in the northeast of the country.

Ilunga urged people not to panic and said officials had taken all necessary measures to respond to the outbreak.

The World Health Organization said it was working with Congolese authorities to deploy health workers in the remote area where the three deaths occurred, all on April 22. Eleven other cases are suspected in the area.

WHO’s regional director for Africa, Matshidiso Moeti, went to the Congolese capital, Kinshasa, on Friday to discuss disease response.

The remoteness of the affected area, 1,300 kilometers from Kinshasa, means word of the outbreak was slow to emerge. WHO said specialist teams were expected to arrive in the area, known as the Likati health zone, within the next day or two.

This was the first outbreak of the virus in DRC since 2014, when 49 people died of Ebola.

Larger outbreak

Experts say the 2014 DRC outbreak was not linked to a much larger outbreak that killed 11,000 people in Guinea, Sierra Leone and Liberia, beginning in 2013. They say active virus transmission for that outbreak was halted last year.

In December 2016, The Lancet, a medical journal, published results of a WHO-led trial  showing that the world’s first Ebola vaccine provides substantial protection against the virus. Among more than 11,000 people who were vaccinated in the trial, no cases of Ebola virus disease occurred.

Reports say the vaccine is now awaiting formal licensing clearance.

Ebola, named for the Congolese river near where it was first identified in 1976, begins with a sudden fever, aching muscles, diarrhea and vomiting. It is a hemorrhagic fever, marked by spontaneous bleeding from internal organs and, in most cases, death. It can be transmitted by close contact with infected animals or people, usually through blood or other bodily fluids.

People can contract the virus through direct contact with victims’ bodies at funerals. Caretakers, nurses and doctors treating Ebola patients also are at high risk.
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Violence in the southeastern part of the Central African Republic, where five U.N. peacekeepers were killed this month, has made it tougher for HIV-positive residents in the remote, lawless region to get treatment.

The prevalence rate of HIV in southeastern C.A.R. is 13 percent, nearly three times the national average.

The migration of people between the bordering areas of South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo contributes to the spread of the disease in all three countries.

“Here, it’s a crossing where everything converges. It’s why the level of HIV is high,” said Bienvenu Sapioko, a government nurse who works at the only hospital in Zemio. He said the rebels and refugees in the area also increase the high prevalence.   

An internal U.N. report obtained by VOA found HIV rates increased following the arrival of the Ugandan security forces in the C.A.R. in 2009. The Ugandan and American forces tasked with tracking down Joseph Kony and his Lord’s Resistance Army ended their mission in April and are heading home.

With prostitution, polygamy and effectively no state authority in the area, weak education contributes to the problem.  

Stigma, superstition

“People believe in the power of nature and traditional doctors. So bush doctors, shamans are also very common in the community,” said Olivier Pennec, the Doctors Without Borders project coordinator in Zemio.

Stigma compounds the problem.

“Before, the people didn’t treat themselves. The people would hide the microbes, this disease,” said Marcel Elonga, a community leader. They would hide and “speak about this parasite, parasite, parasite.”

HIV-positive people in local communities can also find themselves shunned by their peers.

“They don’t want him in the community,” community leader Pierre Yakanza said, describing how some people here see an HIV-positive person. “They don’t want to be close to him. ‘Leave him over there. We don’t want to associate with him or have him in the community meetings or give him a job.’ He’s rejected.”

Local health workers spread information about safe sex, but even access to condoms remains a challenge.

Treatment available

More than 1,500 people now come to Zemio’s hospital from nearby and as far away as Uganda, South Sudan and the Democratic Republic of the Congo for the free HIV treatment offered by Doctors without Borders.

Hospital officials said previously one person would die every month or so from the disease, but they haven’t registered a death since 2014.  

In 2012, Agnes Davouragouni said she used to be sick all the time.  

“When I did the test and found out I was positive, my husband said he doesn’t have HIV, so he left me the same day,” said the 35-year-old woman, who now lives alone with her three children, selling wood and charcoal to get by.

Once a year, Davouragouni walks 45 kilometers to Zemio over the course of two days in order to get a checkup as part of her treatment.  She walks mostly at night and sleeps under a tree along the way.   

“The roads are very insecure. I don’t have a motorcycle or the money to pay to get here,” she said. “There’s a lot of fear to travel on these roads.”

Bandits and rebel groups, including the remnants of the Lord’s Resistance Army, all move around the area. The security void will worsen with the departure of Ugandan and American forces in the next few months.

Group efforts

Recognizing the challenges of getting medication, Doctors Without Borders developed a new community approach in which HIV-positive patients work in groups to bring back antiretroviral drugs in bulk every six months, reducing travel time, costs and exposure to risk.

Farmer Moïse Ouele picks up the antiretroviral drugs for his group of about 30 people and drives them  two hours down the road to his village Kitesa, about 50 kilometers away.

“It was really tiring for me to come each month to the hospital,” Ouele said. “But now, this program helps a lot with this problem, despite the insecurity of the LRA that is growing.”

Doctors Without Borders is transitioning out of the area at the end of the year and is handing over the administration of the program to the Ministry of Health.
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Postpartum hemorrhaging is the leading cause of maternal deaths. An estimated 127,000 women bleed to death after giving birth. But there are hopeful signs that a widely available drug could save a third of those who hemorrhage after birth. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Among the first executive actions at the White House this year, President Donald Trump reinstated a law that bans any U.S. aid to international organizations that support the practice of abortion.

Trump’s memorandum on the “Mexico City policy” reversed one aspect of U.S. foreign aid policy that had been in effect under former President Barack Obama. It changed the way U.S. financial assistance is distributed internationally, and most likely will affect the lives of many women in developing countries.

The “Mexico City policy” dates to 1984, when then-President Ronald Reagan declared it at a population conference in the Mexican capital. Opponents call the U.S. prohibition on aid to groups that perform or actively promote abortion as a method of family planning a “global gag rule.”

U.S. foreign aid practices have switched back and forth several times since 1984; aid was barred to pro-abortion-rights groups whenever a Republican president was in power, then was reinstated when a Democrat controlled the White House.

WATCH: Reaction to Trump’s ‘Global Gag Rule’

Abortion stance affects aid

The political divide between the two major U.S. political parties is based on a fundamental issue: Republicans consider abortion an assault on human life, and most pledge to resist it in every way possible; Democrats say a woman should have the right to choose whether to terminate a pregnancy, for financial or personal reasons, and that the decision should not be directed by government.

The deep ideological divide over abortion affects many aspects of American politics, and certainly permeates considerations about U.S. foreign aid.

“The guiding principle for our policy,” said Melissa Israel of the conservative Heritage Foundation, “really needs to be rooted in the respect for the most important fundamental human right of all, and that’s the right to life.”

Restoring the “Mexico City policy” was expected when a Republican administration took over this year, following eight years of Democratic control of the White House. What was not expected was how vigorously Trump would expand the scope of the anti-abortion rule.

Trump policy affects $9.5 billion

He broadened the policy to affect about $9.5 billion in U.S. global health aid, said Amanda Klasing of Human Rights Watch — funds that would have been destined for programs to combat HIV/AIDS, to promote maternal and child health and to prevent childhood diseases.

Organizations working on AIDS, malaria, or maternal and child health will have to make sure that none of their programs involves so much as an abortion referral.

The Heritage Foundation’s Israel disagrees with the notion that Trump’s action has greatly expanded the effect of Republicans’ anti-abortion principles.

“We are not cutting funding for family planning services or for women’s health,” she said. “We are saying that if you want to partner with the United States, then there are some fundamental things you have to agree to as a condition to receiving these funds.”

Ban on abortion information, too  

Not-for-profit groups hoping to get U.S. funds to support their work around the world must not perform abortions or provide any information about them, even if they use their own funds, from nongovernment sources, for abortion services.

Opponents say this will have a chilling effect on women’s health.

“It means,” said Klasing of Human Rights Watch, “that when a doctor sits down with a woman, if she has a health complication and she’s entitled under her local law to access a safe abortion, that doctor cannot give her a referral, or provide her information she needs to take care of herself.”

In rural areas of developing countries, a physician often takes care of a variety of medical needs, including providing information about reproductive health. Such medical practices would be proscribed from receiving any U.S. assistance. Advocates cite research that has shown family planning services result in fewer unplanned pregnancies, fewer maternal deaths and fewer abortions.

56 million abortions worldwide each year

The World Health Organization estimates that approximately 56 million abortions take place every year worldwide. More than half of those are in developing countries.

“Trump’s global gag rule will have a direct and devastating effect in Kenya and sub-Saharan Africa in several ways,” said Liza Muringo Kimbo, the director in Kenya for Ipas Africa Alliance, a nonprofit group whose principal goal is advocating for safe abortion and reforming laws that harm women.

The current U.S. policy “will lead to more unwanted pregnancies,” Muringo Kimbo said. “It will lead to more unsafe abortions, increased deaths of women and young women, and even increased numbers of newborn deaths.”

Muringo Kimbo noted that her predictions have been borne out in the past, whenever a Republican administration in Washington reinstated the “Mexico City policy.”

Other countries have begun their own initiatives to counter the impact of U.S. anti-abortion policies. The Dutch have created the “She Decides Initiative,” and in Britain, an upcoming conference, “Family Planning 2020,” will try to bring together donor and recipient countries.
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Former U.S. first lady Michelle Obama has criticized the new Trump administration’s directives on school lunches during her first high-profile public appearance since leaving the White House.

Obama, who led a nationwide effort to reduce childhood obesity while first lady, told an annual health conference Friday in Washington that more nutritious school lunches are important because millions of children receive federally subsidized meals at school.

The Trump administration recently said it would delay federal rules promoted by Obama aimed at trying to make school lunches healthier.

Without mentioning the Trump administration by name, Obama urged parents to think about the new government directives and the motives behind them.

“I don’t care what state you live in, take me out of the equation — like me, don’t like me — but think about why someone is OK with your kids eating crap. Why would you celebrate that?” she said during the keynote speech.

She said healthier school lunches should not be a political issue.

“You have to stop and think, ‘Why don’t you want our kids to have good food at school?’ What is wrong with you? And why is that a partisan issue? Why would that be political? What is going on?’ ” she asked.

In one of his first major actions, Sonny Perdue, Trump’s new agriculture secretary, said the department will delay some school lunch rules, including reducing sodium in the meals and increasing whole wheat.

“If kids aren’t eating the food and it’s ending up in the trash, they aren’t getting any nutrition … undermining the intent of the program,” Perdue said earlier this month. The secretary said he appreciates what Obama wanted to do, but he said his department wants to adjust the program to make the healthier food more appetizing.

Under the 2012 Healthy Hunger-Free Kids Act, schools that wanted federal meal subsidies would have to put limits on salt and fat in lunches, and add more fruit, vegetables and whole grains to the menus.

Health experts say U.S. children do not exercise enough and that one child in six is overweight.
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The killing of five U.N. peacekeepers in the Central African Republic this month points to the continued insecurity in the southeastern part of the country. That violence has had an impact on public health with the southeast reporting a rate of HIV infection that is three times the national average and HIV-positive residents struggle to get treatment. For VOA, Zack Baddorf has the story from the town of Zemio.
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An exoplanet located 437 light years away could shed light on the different ways planets form around their stars.

HAT-P-26b, which astronomers call a “warm Neptune,” has a “primitive” atmosphere made almost entirely of hydrogen and helium. Its atmosphere is not cloudy and has a “strong water signature,” astronomers say.

They say the planet, which was first spotted in 2011, is like Neptune and Uranus on mass, but that HAT-P-26b probably formed closer to the star it orbits, or at some point later in the development of the system – or both.

“Astronomers have just begun to investigate the atmospheres of these distant Neptune-mass planets, and almost right away, we found an example that goes against the trend in our solar system,” said Hannah Wakeford, a post-doctoral researcher at NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and lead author of the study published in the May 12, 2017, issue of Science. “This kind of unexpected result is why I really love exploring the atmospheres of alien planets.”

The analysis of HAT-P-26b’s atmosphere was done using both the Spitzer and Hubble space telescopes as the planet transits its star. That allows astronomers to peek into the planet’s atmosphere and analyze the light wavelengths that pass through the planet’s atmosphere.

“To have so much information about a warm Neptune is still rare, so analyzing these data sets simultaneously is an achievement in and of itself,” said co-author Tiffany Kataria of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California.

Astronomers were also able to use that data to determine the planet’s metallicity, as a measure of elements heavier than hydrogen and helium in the atmosphere. Metallicity can be used to determine how the planet formed.

For example, Jupiter has a metallicity about two to five times that of our sun. Saturn has about 10 times as much. Astronomers say those planets, referred to as gas giants, are almost entirely composed of hydrogen and helium.

The next two planets out, Neptune and Uranus, which are called ice giants, have metallicities about 100 times that of the sun.

Astronomers say that’s because Neptune and Uranus formed on the colder part of the disk of debris that circled our sun as the planets developed. They were likely bombarded by icy debris rich in heavier elements.

Jupiter and Saturn formed in a warmer part of the disc, meaning they weren’t hit by as many of those objects.

This pattern has been observed on two other exoplanets, HAT-P-11b and WASP-43b.

HAT-P-26b does not follow that pattern because despite being relatively close to its star, it has low metallicity, similar to Jupiter.

“This analysis shows that there is a lot more diversity in the atmospheres of these exoplanets than we were expecting, which is providing insight into how planets can form and evolve differently than in our solar system,” said David Sing of the University of Exeter and the second author of the paper. “I would say that has been a theme in the studies of exoplanets: Researchers keep finding surprising diversity.”
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A person has tested positive for the Ebola virus in the northern Democratic Republic of Congo.

A spokesman for the World Health Organization says officials declared an Ebola outbreak in Bas-Uele province after laboratory tests confirmed the presence of the virus.

The spokesman, Christian Lindmeier, tells VOA English to Africa that nine people in the area fell sick with what is currently listed as hemorrhagic fever. He said three people have died.

The WHO said on its Twitter feed it is working with Congo’s Ministry of Health to contain the outbreak.

The ministry says in a statement that teams of doctors, coordinators and specialists are headed to the remote area and should arrive by Saturday.

The last Ebola outbreak in Congo happened in 2014 and killed more than 40 people.

A much larger outbreak swept across Guinea, Liberia and Sierra Leone that year and killed more than 11,000.

 

 
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After several large-scale incidents at nuclear power plants around the globe, public pressure in some countries led to abandoning the technology. But manufacturers say the new generation reactors are much safer, and their use will dramatically lower the air pollution that causes global warming. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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The foreign ministers of the eight Arctic Council nations will meet to discuss climate change this week, amid news last month that temperatures in the pristine region are warming at twice the rate of the rest of the world.

A high-level meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson and his counterparts from Russia, Greenland, Canada, Norway, Finland, Sweden and Iceland begins Thursday in Fairbanks.

As Tillerson joins the talks, the Trump administration has not yet decided whether to remain a party to the 2015 U.N. Paris Agreement on responding to climate change.

Watch: Alaskan Natives Look to Arctic Council to Preserve Waters, Way of Life

Any changes to U.S. climate policy would directly affect the lives of Alaska Natives, who depend on the Arctic Sea to survive.

In recent reports, scientists said the temperatures in the Arctic were warming at twice the rate of the rest of the world, sea ice was at record lows and permafrost was thawing.

If current warming rates hold, the world could see an ice-free Arctic by 2040, researchers said.

Worrisome

The studies have alarmed Alaska Natives.

Gabe Tegoseak spoke to VOA about growing up in an Inuit household.

“To put that in perspective, I grew up with no running water most of my life,” Tegoseak said. “A very old-school tradition, my parents they favored it that way and it humbles me.

“I had to walk to a freshwater lake, break some ice on my sled — and this is a wooden sled I used to pull around and break it up — and then bring it home, and that was our drinking water, this big block of ice,” he said.

As the ice block melted, Tegoseak’s family first used it for drinking water, then to wash their faces and bodies, and then to clean the floor, not wasting a drop, he said.

Many people in Alaska, including indigenous people, depend on the oil and gas industry for a paycheck, he told VOA. But he said he thought an executive order signed this month by President Donald Trump to reverse Obama administration policy and open up Arctic waters to drilling was shortsighted.

“We’re trading our rights and our ability to subsistence hunt and live traditionally, which is over 10,000-plus years old, for a cash economy, which [is a] different mindset. So when we catch a whale, for instance, we share it all,” Tegoseak said.

“Our view is that everybody gets to [have] a piece of whale, and it doesn’t matter, creed or color. Everybody gets a fair share,” he stressed.

Tegoseak said he had asked many Alaska Natives on the North Slope about what they’d do if they had to choose between having their beloved whale meat, called muktuk, or an iPad. They responded that they’d choose muktuk, he said.

Seen as shortsighted

Many environmental experts agree that drilling in the Arctic is risky and shortsighted, including Sally Yozell of the Stimson Center, a nonpartisan research center in Washington.

“I think it’s rather shortsighted for a number of reasons. You know the Arctic waters are cold, and it’s hard to — we have not figured out yet how to address an oil or gas calamity up there at all. I mean, the cold water, all one has to do to is to have witnessed what happened with the Exxon Valdez many years ago to see that that oil stayed in those waters for 20 years,” Yozell said.

The Valdez tanker struck a reef in Prince William Sound on March 24, 1989. Nearly 11 million gallons of oil was spilled.

Experts said the accelerated melting of Arctic Sea ice will most likely lead to more shipping, drilling and other economic activity in the region.

 

Mark Royce of Conservatives for Responsible Stewardship told VOA he was concerned.

“Unfortunately, the retreating ice, the diminution of the perpetual winters there, and the warming of their environment is giving rise to still more steam for plans for rapacious exploration and exploitative development,” Royce said. “It’s a vicious cycle. But what we’re seeing in the Arctic, in the very seas around Alaska, presents just a particularly virulent form of this at a crucial time.”

Tillerson’s remarks will most likely be followed closely by the other seven Arctic Council partners, who want to make climate change a focus of the final statement when the meeting concludes Thursday.
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Algae blooms happen when simple algae plants start growing out of control. The tiny plants are not usually toxic on their own, but the overabundance creates so-called dead zones because they suck all the oxygen out of the water. In Sweden, researchers have enlisted the aid of native fish that can slow down the out of control growth of algae. VOA’s Kevin Enochs reports.
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Autistic children are naturally sensitive to changes in their routines, including visits to the doctor or dentist. They may become agitated and uncooperative. When a dog trainer in Chile tried bringing dogs to the office to help the children relax, the experiment proved so successful that it evolved into a full-scale business. VOA’s George Putic reports.
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It’s no secret that the world’s coral reefs are at risk. Pollution, dredging, overfishing and, especially, acidic, warming waters are pushing these complex ecosystems to the brink of destruction, and marine scientists and researchers have been stymied in attempts to restore their health.

Saving them isn’t just the right thing to do, it’s a necessity if we want to keep our oceans healthy and viable. Coral reefs provide nurseries for nearly a quarter of the ocean’s fisheries, help protect shorelines from storms, and offer underwater wonders for snorkelers and divers.

Now, a project at San Francisco’s California Academy of Sciences offers hope for what marine biologist Bart Shepherd calls ‘one of the most magical and beautiful places on Earth’. “It’s this incredible city of organisms that all learn to live together.  All these animals are competing to try and take over space and try to get access to sunlight, to nutrients in the water.”

Shepherd is director of the Academy’s Steinhart Aquarium, and, with the Academy’s curator of ichthyology, Luiz Rocha, directs the appropriately-named Hope for Reefs initiative.

Reefs under stress

Human activity and increasingly warm and acidic ocean water are taking a heavy toll on the world’s coral reefs. A recent aerial survey found more than two-thirds of the coral in Australia’s Great Barrier Reef is experiencing “shocking” amounts of bleaching, and Rocha says human-induced climate change is devastating other reefs as well.

“When coral gets stressed, in most cases because of warm water, it expels the algae,” he explains. Algae have a symbiotic relationship with the coral polyps. The coral provides a protective environment for the algae, which provide corals with essential nutrients and their incredible colors. “So,” Rocha adds, “when the algae gets out, the coral gets bleached and becomes white.” That bleaching can lead to the coral’s death.

Restoring the reef

Various methods have been tried to bring back reefs. The most successful so far has been artificially accelerating a natural process called fragmentation. Researchers purposefully break off coral branches, allow the pieces to recover and grow, and then plant them back onto the reef.

But Shepherd points to a long-term problem with that approach. “You are producing thousands of identical genetic clones of the same coral from one parent colony. So, you’re really reducing the genetic diversity that’s out there on the reef and the ability of the coral to respond, perhaps, to things we don’t even know are going to happen.”

So, the Hope for Reefs crew turned to a unique method pioneered by the coral conservation group Secore International.  In 2011, it began using in vitro fertilization to restore the health of dying coral reefs. Endangered elkhorn coral off the coast of its field station in Curaçao was the test case. Shepherd says, “So, we actually have proven that you can go and collect gametes – sperm and eggs, fertilize them and grow them in a laboratory for a short period of time, plant that baby coral back out on the reefs and, within five years, it will grow up and spawn with its wild counterparts on the reef.”

A small window of opportunity

Corals only spawn once a year, at night around a full moon. During those couple of nights, millions of the corals’ sex cells float to the surface, but, Shepherd explains, more than 99 percent don’t make it.

“What we’re able to do is intercede at a point where most of the sperm and eggs will be eaten by fish. We put a net over the coral and we collect those sperm and eggs, bring them back to the lab, cross-fertilize them and go from there.”

Hope for Reefs doesn’t stop with restoration. Shepherd says educating local governments and community stakeholders to save their coral reefs is key to the success of the project — and time is crucial.

 

“We need communities that want to help manage their reefs, that are going to look at the environmental conditions and why they are the way they are and what we can do to improve them. Reducing sewage outflow, reducing sedimentation, reducing the fishing pressures on herbivores, and there’s a holistic approach to managing reefs that really needs to be in place in order for this to work.”   

And, says project co-director Luiz Rocha, that approach includes communication. “We don’t safeguard our results. We know that it is urgent. We know that we have to talk about it as soon as possible. So, we are working on our scientific publications that take quite a while to be published, but we also take to the field with us a media person, a science writer, a photographer that will be talking about our results in real time, most of the time.”

Looking ahead

Hope for Reefs has just finished the first year of its five-year project and everyone involved is optimistic.  The challenge is to scale up in vitro fertilization to restore endangered coral reefs worldwide before they are lost. The project hopes to seed one million global corals by 2021.

With a commitment of nearly $13-million from the California Academy of Sciences, and a new partnership with The Nature Conservancy, twenty new expeditions are planned. First up, the degraded reef at Secore International’s field station in Curaçao and, then, on to the Yucatan Peninsula and the Great Maya Reef.

 
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A widely used family of over-the-counter painkillers may increase the risk of having a heart attack, a new study suggests.

According to researchers at the University of Montreal Hospital Research Center (CRCHUM), non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) can raise the risk of heart attacks “as early as in the first week of use and especially within the first month of taking high doses of such medication.”

Common forms of NSAIDs include diclofenac, ibuprofen and naproxen.

“Given that the onset of risk of acute myocardial infarction occurred in the first week and appeared greatest in the first month of treatment with higher doses, prescribers should consider weighing the risks and benefits of NSAIDs before instituting treatment, particularly for higher doses,” the researchers said.

Prior studies had pointed to an increase in heart attack risk from using NSAIDs, but this study looked at timing, dose and the duration of taking the medicine.

For the study, the researchers looked at past studies on NSAIDs from Canada, Finland and the United Kingdom. there were 446,763 people studied, and 61,460 had a heart attack.

“The study found that taking any dose of NSAIDs for one week, one month, or more than a month was associated with an increased risk of heart attack,” researchers said in a statement.

The overall risk of heart attack was between 20 and 50 percent higher than those not using NSAIDs, the researchers said.

“To put this in perspective, as a result of this increase, the risk of heart attack due to NSAIDs is on average about one percent annually,” researchers wrote. “The type of analysis the researchers used allowed them to conclude with greater than 90 percent probability that all NSAIDs studied are associated with a heightened risk of heart attack.”

They added that the increased risk was higher with higher doses during the first month of use. The risk did not continue to increase over a longer treatment duration.

“It remains prudent to use NSAIDs for as short time as possible,” researchers wrote.

The researchers said the study did not consider other potential factors for increased risk of heart attack.

The study was published this week in BMJ.
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Any outbreak of measles is cause for concern, but the current outbreak in Minneapolis, Minnesota stands out for two reasons. One, almost none of the victims were vaccinated against the disease. Two, nearly all of the victims are ethnic Somalis.

Doctors say the situation is the result of the disproven, but persistent, belief the vaccine for measles, mumps and rubella (MMR) can cause a child to develop autism.

Dr. Mohamed Hagi Aden, an internal medicine specialist at Regions Hospital in neighboring St. Paul, says more than 50 percent of Somali-American children in the area never get the MMR vaccine, due to autism fears.

 

The result is seen in the measles outbreak statistics. As of Tuesday, the Minnesota Department of Health had recorded 50 cases of measles in the state. It said 45 of those infected were confirmed to be unvaccinated against measles, and 45 of the cases were Minnesotan Somalis (or Somali Minnesotans, as the department put it).

Dr. Aden says opposition to the MMR vaccine stems from a perceived high rate of autism within the local Somali-American community. A report by the University of Minnesota showed that in 2010, about one in 32 Somali children in Minneapolis between the ages of 7 and 9 was identified as having autism spectrum disorder (ASD).

“And while parents were looking for answer, they found a study by a British researcher that linked the autism and the MMR vaccine, and that has created fear and suspicion with the community,” Dr. Aden told VOA’s Somali Service.

The study he cites is real; it was published in the British medical journal The Lancet in 1998. But the journal retracted the finding 12 years later, saying it contained errors.

 

In the meantime, multiple studies have failed to find any evidence to back up the original study’s claims. One study of 95,000 American children found “no harmful association between MMR vaccine receipt and ASD,” even in cases where kids’ older siblings had been diagnosed with autism.

“There is no link between the MMR vaccine and autism,” says Dr. Aden.

Making the case for vaccination

As the outbreak grows, the Minnesota Department of Health is working to win back trust in vaccines.

 

It’s harder than it used to be, says the department’s infectious disease director, Kris Ehresmann.

 

“You used to be able to get up and say, ‘I’m a scientist and X percent of people did Y, and everyone said, ‘Oh yes, OK, we need to change our behavior,'” she said. Now, she says, “It’s a different world.”

And in the case of the Somali-American community, where a large number of people are immigrants and refugees who are less assimilated, “It’s more of getting the community to own the issue and own the solutions.”

 

That means a lot more community outreach. In the past few years, the Department of Health has hired two Somali outreach workers. One visits mothers’ groups, day care centers and charter schools to talk about vaccines.

 

Another Somali worker talks to parents about autism and the resources available for special-needs children.

 

“The community does have very real concerns about autism,” Ehresmann said. “By saying, ‘Oh, vaccines don’t cause autism,’ that’s not sufficient.”

 

Some of the most important voices advocating for vaccines have been Somali doctors and other health professionals, and the imams from the hardest-hit areas, Ehresmann said.

 

“These folks are really stepping up to the plate and speaking out on the value of vaccines on their own. It is coming from within the community leadership. That is really important,” she said.

 
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Taiwan’s already precarious relations with old rival China took another step back this week after the self-ruled island said Beijing blocked it from the annual World Health Organization assembly, a move that may prompt Taipei to rethink how they treat the other side.

Officials in Taipei said Tuesday the deadline had lapsed to receive an invitation to the May 22-31 World Health Assembly in Geneva. They blamed China for using its clout in the World Health Organization (WHO) to block the invitation.

“If the other side overlooks our appeals and grave reminders, that is sure to severely hurt people’s feelings and spark a backlash in Taiwan public opinion, even causing cross-Strait (China-Taiwan) relations to drift further,” said Chiu Chui-cheng, spokesman for the Taiwan government’s Mainland Affairs Council.

“We want to appeal once more to the other side not to offend Taiwan public opinion,” Chiu said. “The Beijing authorities should reflect deeply on avoidance of old-fashioned, hawkish policy mentalities and actions that could cause huge harm to a resumption of cross-Strait relations.”

Beijing sees self-ruled Taiwan as part of its territory rather than a state entitled to membership in international organizations. The two sides have been separately ruled since the Chinese civil war of the 1940s, when Chiang Kai-shek’s Nationalists fled to Taiwan.

Taiwan is unlikely to retaliate in real terms over the WHO slight, but the flap brings a string of other China issues into sharper focus and may increase popular anger in Taiwan while prompting a new search for ways Taipei can work with Beijing without selling down local autonomy.

“Taiwan people will feel frustrated with the assertive response of China,” said Huang Kwei-bo, associate diplomacy professor at National Chengchi University in Taipei. “Beijing’s image will get worse.”

Over the past year, China sailed an aircraft carrier around Taiwan, scaled back Taiwan-bound tourism and, since March, has detained a Taiwanese activist without announcing any formal charges against him.

Under former Taiwanese President Ma Ying-jeou, Beijing let Taipei observe the World Health Assembly every year since 2009 as “Chinese Taipei,” implying a link to China.

A spokesman for the Communist government’s Taiwan Affairs Office said Monday Taiwan could not observe this year’s assembly, where the WHO sets policies and approves a budget, because current President Tsai Ing-wen has not endorsed the Beijing view that both sides belong to a single China – a term Ma accepted.

Tsai’s Democratic Progressive Party takes a guarded view of relations with China. Some party members want Taiwan to declare formal independence from Beijing.

China’s actions “will definitely push Taiwan people further and further away and severely destroy peace and stability between the two sides,” Tsai’s party said in a statement Tuesday. “The authorities in Beijing must reflect and correctly see this negative outcome.”

Taiwanese see the world health assemblies as opportunities to learn from the 192 WHO member states and share their own experience in infectious disease control, and improve medical services in developing countries.

Taiwan has just 21 diplomatic allies compared to more than 170 that recognize Beijing, making it hard for Taiwan to gain access to international bodies.

“The only barrier is politics and to speak more specifically, it’s just China,” ruling party legislator Yeh Yi-chin said Monday. “But where we’d like to appeal and remind everyone is, does the whole world want to let China, one country, destroy the global medical safety net?”

Beijing periodically uses its diplomatic connections and clout as the world’s second largest economy to block Taiwan from joining the United Nations, of which the WHO is a special agency. Last year Taiwan was rejected from observing a session of the U.N. International Civil Aviation Organization and from participating in the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Those barriers would keep affecting how Taiwanese see Beijing. “We need to see what happens next time at the United Nations,” Huang said.

Some Taiwanese may pressure Tsai to find a way of negotiating with China that lets the other side open doors again internationally without making Taiwan give up autonomy. Some scholars expect Tsai to propose a new formula for China relations in the second half of 2017.

The U.S. State Department backed Taiwan’s cause of joining the World Health Assembly this year, saying it supports the island’s “meaningful participation” in international bodies that require statehood.

“The United States remains committed to supporting Taiwan as it seeks to expand its already significant contributions to addressing global challenges,” a spokesperson said this week. “We encourage authorities in Beijing and Taipei to engage in constructive dialogue, on the basis of dignity and respect.”
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Pressure is mounting on the U.S. administration to remain committed to the Paris agreement on climate change. European Union leaders, a former United Nations chief and former U.S. President Barack Obama have joined the chorus of voices emphasizing the need for action to reduce greenhouse emissions worldwide. On Tuesday, the White House announced that President Trump is postponing his decision regarding the climate treaty for the second time. Zlatica Hoke has more.
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