WHO Chief: ‘We Are Still at War’ With Ebola

The head of the World Health Organization (WHO) on Tuesday cautioned against declaring victory too early in Congo’s Ebola epidemic, despite encouraging signs that it may be brought under control.

“The outbreak is stabilizing, but still the outbreak is not over,” WHO chief Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus told journalists on a visit to Democratic Republic of Congo’s capital Kinshasa. “We are still at war, and we need to continue to strengthen our surveillance and … be very vigilant.”

WHO officials on Friday expressed cautious optimism that the epidemic of the deadly virus was stabilizing, partly owing to the swift deployment of vaccines.

But a day earlier, Congo’s health ministry reported its first confirmed case of Ebola in over a week, in the rural community of Iboko.

Ghebreyesus said 2,200 people had been vaccinated, and that case management and tracing contacts of victims had gone well.

But he said: “It’s not over until it is over. Even if one case crosses into Congo (Republic) and gets to an urban area, that could trigger another epidemic.”

The hemorrhagic fever has killed 27 people since the outbreak began in April, and there have been 62 cases, 38 of which were confirmed in a laboratory. A further 14 are probable Ebola cases, and 10 more people are suspected of having Ebola.

In contrast to past Ebola outbreaks health workers have moved quickly to halt Congo’s latest epidemic. Ebola killed at least 11,300 people in 2013-16 in West Africa and during that outbreak WHO was criticized for not taking it seriously enough in its early stages.

Frustrated AMA Adopts Sweeping Policies to Cut Gun Violence

With frustration mounting over lawmakers’ inaction on gun control, the American Medical Association on Tuesday pressed for a ban on assault weapons and came out against arming teachers as a way to fight what it calls a public health crisis.

At its annual policymaking meeting, the nation’s largest physicians group bowed to unprecedented demands from doctor-members to take a stronger stand on gun violence — a problem the organizations says is as menacing as a lethal infectious disease.

The action comes against a backdrop of recurrent school shootings, everyday street violence in the nation’s inner cities, and rising U.S. suicide rates.

“We as physicians are the witnesses to the human toll of this disease,” Dr. Megan Ranney, an emergency-medicine specialist at Brown University, said at the meeting.

AMA delegates voted to adopt several of nearly a dozen gun-related proposals presented from doctor groups that are part of the AMA’s membership. They agreed to:

 — Support laws that would require licensing and safety courses for gun owners and registration of all firearms.

 — Press for legislation that would allow relatives of suicidal people or those who have threatened imminent violence to seek court-ordered removal of guns from the home.

 — Encourage better training for physicians in how to recognize patients at risk for suicide.

 — Push for eliminating loopholes in laws preventing the purchase or possession of guns by people found guilty of domestic violence, including expanding such measures to cover convicted stalkers.

Many AMA members are gun owners or supporters, including a doctor from Montana who told delegates of learning to shoot at a firing range in the basement of her middle school as part of gym class. But support for banning assault weapons was overwhelming, with the measure adopted in a 446-99 vote.

“There’s a place to start and this should be it,” Dr. Jim Hinsdale, a San Jose, California, trauma surgeon, said before the vote. 

Gun violence is not a new issue for the AMA; it has supported past efforts to ban assault weapons; declared gun violence a public health crisis; backed background checks, waiting periods and better funding for mental health services; and pressed for more research on gun violence prevention.

But Dr. David Barbe, whose one-year term as AMA president ended Tuesday, called the number of related measures on this year’s agenda extraordinary and said recent violence, including the Parkland, Florida, school shooting and the Las Vegas massacre, “spurred a new sense of urgency … while Congress fails to act.”

“It has been frustrating that we have seen so little action from either state or federal legislators,” he said. “The most important audience for our message right now is our legislators, and second most important is the public, because sometimes it requires public pressure on the legislators.”

While it is no longer viewed as the unified voice of American medicine, the AMA has more clout with politicians and the public than other doctor groups. It counted more than 243,000 members in 2017, up slightly for the seventh straight year. But it represents less than one-quarter of the nation’s million-plus physicians.

AMA members cited U.S. government data showing almost 40,000 deaths by gun in 2016, including suicides, and nearly 111,000 gun injuries. Both have been rising in recent years. 

By comparison, U.S. deaths from diabetes in 2016 totaled almost 80,000; Alzheimer’s, 111,000; and lung disease, 155,000. The leaders are heart disease, with 634,000 deaths in 2016, and cancer, about 600,000.

Malaria Drug May Fall Short for Children, Pregnant Women

The most widely used antimalarial therapy may not fully treat some children and pregnant women, according to a new study.

These patients’ bloodstreams contained lower concentrations of one active ingredient compared to adults who aren’t pregnant.

The research may explain why standard doses of artemether-lumefantrine combination therapy (ACT) sometimes fail to cure these sensitive groups. It suggests a change in the treatment regimen may help raise cure rates and prevent resistance.

But experts say this study alone is not enough to warrant changing treatment recommendations.

Treatment failures

Malaria cases have fallen by 60 percent since 2000, thanks to an intensive, multibillion-dollar global campaign of prevention and treatment. But the disease still claims more than 400,000 lives per year, mostly young children in sub-Saharan Africa.

Pills combining artemether and lumefantrine are the most commonly used antimalarial treatment worldwide. The 3-day treatment is generally safe and effective.

However, most drug trials have not included children and pregnant women, who may absorb or metabolize drugs differently than others.

Some studies have found they are more likely than others to contract malaria again within weeks of ACT treatment. Results vary, but some research found failure rates as high as 20 percent.

Lower blood levels

Writing in the journal PLOS Medicine, researchers combined data from 31 studies including more than 4,000 patients. They looked at concentrations of lumefantrine in the blood seven days after treatment began.

Lumefantrine is the longer-lasting part of the drug combination. It is intended to prevent relapses.

The study found lumefantrine levels were 20 percent lower than average in pregnant women’s blood, and 15 to 25 percent less in children.

“This is pretty important,” said lead author Frank Kloprogge at University College London. Drug levels that far below average “can really make a difference.”

Treatment failure is not the only risk. Malaria parasites exposed to lower levels of the drug may survive treatment and produce resistant strains. “And this is, of course, a longer term, potentially, really big problem,” he said.

The scientists developed a model that suggests taking the pills for 5 days would be more effective than the current 3-day schedule.

More information needed

The study is “very well done and important,” said Andrea Bosman, Malaria Prevention, Diagnosis and Treatment Coordinator at the World Health Organization.

However, Bosman added, “it is still a modeling study, and we do not generally make recommendations based on modeling studies alone. We require clinical data.”

Changing therapies is complicated, he notes. The longer treatment lasts, the less people stick to it. That, too, raises the risk that treatment will fail and resistance will develop.

Also, he adds, the bigger issue is poor-quality drugs, which are widespread in much of the malaria-prone world.

Opinions are split over how big a problem the reports of treatment failure in children and pregnant women are.

Earlier this year, the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention analyzed 21 studies. “They thought we should keep the regime exactly where it is,” noted molecular biologist Brian Grimberg at Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine.

Sleepy parasites

Scientists are still debating why treatment fails. The parasites may have developed resistance, or they may be what Grimberg calls “sleepy parasites.”

“They’re not resistant to the drug. They just go to sleep,” he said. “If it’s true that they’re sleepy, then maybe a longer duration of the treatment regime would be helpful.”

Kloprogge and colleagues are applying for funding to conduct a clinical trial of the 5-day treatment schedule. It will be several years before results are available.

High-Profile Suicides Could Influence Students, Teens

The recent suicides of high-profile celebrities lead experts to worry that young people will copy the act of taking their own lives.

“They think, ‘Well, OK, that person hung themselves from a banister using 10-foot rope,’ then that might be something that they want to emulate,” said Blaise Aguirre, M.D., a psychiatrist specializing in mood and personality disorders in adolescents at McLean Hospital outside Boston. 

“The sensationalism can make this option seem attractive,” comedian Bridget Phetasy, who has struggled with suicidal thoughts, wrote in a New York Post op-ed. “In all these cases, I’ve heard more details about their deaths than I care to know, and I can’t help but feel like the way we’re covering these deaths isn’t helping.” 

Suicide is the second-leading cause of death among 15- to 29-year-olds around the world, according to the World Health Organization (WHO) in Geneva, and has more than doubled in the past decade. Only road traffic fatalities top suicide as the primary cause of adolescent deaths, with boys accounting for 77 percent of those deaths worldwide. 

Experts say they are frustrated by the attention given to celebrity suicides, such as travel TV host Anthony Bourdain and fashion designer Kate Spade last week, and the impact on youths at risk. High-profile suicide can trigger contagion, which acts like a virus and may push others to take their lives. After the 2014 suicide of Robin Williams, a popular comedian and actor, researchers saw a nearly 10 percent increase in suicides. People grieving a suicide were 65 percent more likely to attempt to take their own life, a study from the University of London showed. 

No one is sure why the contagion effect exists, Aguirre said. He said he thinks that hearing or reading about a suicide “activates neurons that are correlated with suicide” and makes suicide more acceptable to those at risk. Contagion does not influence people who are not at risk, he said.

Many experts say media about suicide amplifies contagion. The popular show 13 Reasons Why, based on a young-adult novel by Jay Asher, follows 17-year-old Clay Jensen as he listens to tapes left by his deceased classmate Hannah, explaining why she killed herself. Asher’s novel was published in 2007 and made the American Library Association’s list of most banned books in 2012 and again in 2017, the year the Netflix show first aired.

Critics say the show and its explicit portrayal of Hannah’s suicide is irresponsible. The suicide is more graphic in the TV series than the book. 

“In a person who is not at risk, it’s not a dangerous show,” Aguirre said. “But in a person who is at risk, it’s a very dangerous show.”

Nic Sheff, who wrote the episode that portrays Hannah’s suicide, defended himself in a Vanity Fair op-ed.

“Facing these issues head-on — talking about them, being open about them — will always be our best defense against losing another life,” he wrote. “It overwhelmingly seems to me that the most irresponsible thing we could’ve done would have been not to show the death at all.”

The controversy remains fresh. Katrina Sheffield, a Florida mom, said the show inspired her daughter’s suicide attempt in May. Her daughter sent a text during her attempt, saying that it was “taking longer” than on 13 Reasons Why, and her method was similar to Hannah’s.

“I have told our daughter that instead of finding 13 reasons why — let’s find 14 on why not!” Sheffield wrote. In a Facebook video, she urged parents to talk to their children about suicide. 

Females are more likely to have suicidal thoughts, called ideation, although the suicide rate is almost four times higher in males. In the U.S., rates are increasing overall, reports the CDC. 

Research suggests that age and race are closely correlated with self-harm statistics. Black children aged 5 to 12 are twice as likely to commit suicide as their white peers, but black teens aged 13 to 17 are 50 percent less likely to do so than white teens. 

Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and other (LGBTQ+) students are also at high-risk — they’re more than twice as likely to consider suicide and over three times more likely to attempt it than their heterosexual peers. Nearly 45 percent of transgender respondents to a Canadian survey reported that they had planned an attempt at least once. 

Facebook has released a program intended to spot users at risk of suicide or self-harm based on their posts, even if no one reports it. 

The World Health Organization offers a guide on reporting suicide, advising the media to be cautious “in reporting celebrity suicides.” 

“Don’t place stories about suicide prominently, and do not unduly repeat such stories,” WHO advised. It discourages describing suicide details, such as method or location.

“The more detail that you give legitimizes that way of doing it. Why not just say the person died by suicide and have that be its own talking point?” Aguirre said. Describing the suicide in detail “doesn’t tell you about the underlying mental health.”

American mental health advocacy groups called for increased attention to and funding for mental health issues following news last week of the death of Bourdain and Spade.

“Too many people in America do not have access to mental health services, and too often we neglect the impacts of traumatic events that sometimes fester for decades before taking people’s lives,” Paul Gionfriddo, president and CEO of Mental Health America, said in a statement.

“With all of us working together, and by collectively making a massive investment in suicide prevention research, resources and quality mental health care, we can, and we will, reverse the rising suicide rate,” the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention wrote.

“Suicide Prevention is a social justice Issue,” tweeted mental health advocate Jacob Griffin. 

South African law student, writer and activist Luke Waltham called for action.

“Actively make your spaces brave ones where people, including yourself, can speak about your feelings and experiences,” Waltham tweeted.

National Suicide Prevention Lifeline: 1-800-273-TALK (8255)

European Central Bank to Weigh End to Stimulus Program

The European Central Bank will on Thursday weigh when and how to end its bond-buying stimulus program — an exit that will have far-reaching consequences across the economy, from long-suffering savers to Europe’s indebted governments.

 

The bank, which sets monetary policy for the 19 countries that use the euro, has been buying 30 billion euros ($35.5 billion) a month in government and corporate bonds from banks. The purchases are slated to run at least through September, and longer if necessary.

 

Analysts say that decisions on the exit path, which could include several intermediate steps, might come Thursday or at the July 26 meeting. Scenarios include reducing the purchases past September, and then stopping them at the end of the year.

 

An end to the stimulus would be part of a major shift in the global economy. The ECB would be joining the U.S. Federal Reserve in withdrawing the massive monetary stimulus deployed to combat the Great Recession and its aftermath. The Fed is expected to raise rates at its meeting Wednesday.

 

The ECB’s bond purchases, which started in March 2015, pump newly printed money into the economy, which in theory should help raise inflation toward the bank’s goal of just under 2 percent. Inflation was an annual 1.9 percent in May, but the bank needs to be able to say that inflation will stay in line with its target even after the stimulus is withdrawn.

 

Market participants pricked up their ears last week when top ECB official Peter Praet said Thursday’s meeting would be an occasion to consider when to wind down the program. Praet supervises economics at the ECB as a member of its six-member executive board and in that capacity proposes monetary policy moves for debate and decision by the 25-member governing council. That gives his words extra weight.

 

The impact of the ECB’s bond-buying stimulus has been felt across the economy.

 

It has pushed up the prices of assets like stocks, bonds and real estate but also lowered returns for savers. It has helped keep borrowing costs low for European governments as the ECB purchases have driven bond prices up and yields down. Yields and prices move in opposite directions.

 

For example, the Italian government, which is burdened with the second-highest debt load in the eurozone after Greece at 132 percent of gross domestic product, pays only 2.79 percent annually to borrow for 10 years. That’s less than the 2.96 percent yield on 10-year U.S. Treasurys.

 

The ECB meeting will be held in Riga, Latvia, as one of the ECB’s occasional road meetings away from its Frankfurt headquarters to underline its role as a pan-European institution. A bribery investigation is expected to keep the head of the host central bank, Ilmars Rimsevics, from attending the meeting and news conference with ECB President Mario Draghi.

The ECB is continuing its slow progress toward withdrawing the stimulus despite turbulence in Italy, where the new populist government has questioned the spending and debt restrictions required of euro members. Concerns over Italian politics caused big swings in the country’s financial markets for several days last month, before easing.

 

Analysts Joerg Kraemer and Michael Schubert at Commerzbank said that the ECB may soon have to end its stimulus program anyway as it risks running out of bonds that are eligible for purchase. The ECB has limited itself to no more than one-third of any member country’s outstanding bonds to avoid becoming the dominant creditor of member states.

 

With the purchases widely expected to be stopped at the end of this year, they said, attention would now turn to how long the bank would wait after the bond-purchase exit before starting to raise its interest rate benchmarks.

 

“The ECB probably wants to ensure that the end of bond purchases does not unleash speculation about interest rate hikes,” they wrote in a research note. “The ECB Council… might declare that rates will not be increased for ‘at least’ six months after the end of purchases.”

 

Currently the short-term interest rate benchmark is zero, and the rate on deposits left by commercial banks at the ECB is negative 0.4 percent. The negative rate is a penalty aimed at pushing banks to lend that money instead of hoard it.

 

 

Vietnam Passes Sweeping New Cybersecurity Law

Vietnamese lawmakers have approved a new cybersecurity law that human rights activists say will stifle freedom of speech.

The law will require online content providers such as Google and Facebook to remove content deemed offensive by authorities within 24 hours, and store the personal data of its customers on servers based in Vietnam, and to open offices in the Communist-run country.

Clare Agar, Amnesty International’s director of global operations, issued a statement denouncing Tuesday’s passage of the law. Agar said “the online space was a relative refuge” within Vietnam’s “deeply repressive climate” where people could go to share ideas and opinions “with less fear of censure by the authorities.”

The new law now means “there is no safe place left,” Agar said.

The United States and Canada urged Vietnam to delay passage of the bill, citing concerns it could pose “obstacles to Vietnam’s cybersecurity and digital innovation future.” 

The Vietnam Digital Communication Association says the law could reduce the country’s gross domestic product by 1.7 percent, and wipe out 3.1 percent of foreign investment.

Vo Trong Viet, the head of the government’s defense and security committee, acknowledged that requiring content providers to open data centers inside Vietnam would increase their costs, but said it was necessary ensure the country’s cybersecurity.

Tired of Unemployment, Kashmir Women Decide to Open Their Online Business

The separatist campaign in Indian-administered Kashmir broke out into major violence in 1989. More than 60,000 people are estimated to have died and 10,000 to have disappeared in the disputed Himalayan region. That has pushed their families into poverty. For the region’s youth, earning a living has been a challenge, especially educated young women. However, one group of young entrepreneurs is taking matters into their own hands. Yusuf Jameel has more, in this report narrated by Bezhan Hamdard.

Young Entrepreneurs Motivated by Purpose, Not Just Profit

The new generation of global entrepreneurs is going into business motivated by purpose rather than just profit, according to research by the HSBC banking group released on Tuesday.

One in four entrepreneurs aged under 35 said they were more motivated by social impact than by moneymaking, compared to just over one in 10 of those aged over 55, according the results of the HSBC survey.

“Our research suggests this is a generational shift,” Stuart Parkinson, global chief investment officer of HSBC, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation. “Younger entrepreneurs are focused on environmental and social concerns and that’s because they see these values as being their own.”

The bank surveyed 3,700 entrepreneurs in 11 countries. One in five said their priority as a business owner was to deliver solutions to environmental and social challenges.

Parkinson said social media had brought greater scrutiny of businesses, while awareness of the social and environmental impacts of business practices had also increased.

“Social enterprise has taken off as this new formula for success, which is this combination of capitalism and doing good, and younger entrepreneurs are clearly leading this,” he said.

Social enterprises are businesses with a mission to benefit society or the environment as well as turn a profit and Britain is seen as a global leader in the innovative sector.

Last year it had about 70,000 employing nearly 1 million people last year, according to membership organization Social Enterprise UK, up from 55,000 businesses in 2007.

Zakia Moulaoui runs the social enterprise Invisible Cities, which employs homeless people as city guides in Edinburgh, and plans to expand the business to Manchester and Glasgow by the end of the year.

The 31-year-old said there was a greater awareness amongst her generation that being able to address social issues and earn an income was possible.

“People who thought they couldn’t do that because they needed to make a living for themselves might have just worked in a regular business and volunteered at the weekend, but now people know they can reconcile the two,” Moulaoui said.

Britain’s Confederation of British Industry (CBI), an employers’ group, has found that two thirds of 18- to 34-year-olds think companies should put society’s interest first.

“This is a view shared by employees, customers and communities. CEOs of firms of all sizes are clearer than ever before — purpose and profit go hand in hand,” said Josh Hardie, deputy director-general of the CBI.

New Disclosure Shows Growing Kushner Wealth, Debt

Financial disclosure forms released late Monday show that White House special adviser — and President Donald Trump’s son-in-law — Jared Kushner’s wealth and debt both appear to have risen over the year, an indication of the complex state of his finances and the potential conflicts that confront some of his investments.

 

Disclosures issued by the White House for Kushner and his wife, Trump’s daughter Ivanka, showed that Kushner held assets totaling at least $181 million. His previous 2017 disclosure had showed assets in at least the $140 million range. Kushner and Ivanka Trump, jointly held at least $240 million in assets last year.

 

The financial disclosures released by the White House and filed with the U.S. Office of Government Ethics routinely show both assets and debts compiled in broad ranges between low and high estimates, making it difficult to precisely chart the rise and fall of the financial portfolios of federal government officials.

 

The White House released the disclosures for Kushner and Ivanka Trump on a heavy news day, while the world’s media lavished attention on President Trump’s preparations to meet with North Korea’s Kim Jong Un for talks over nuclear weapons. The White House had released the president’s own financial report last month.

 

A spokesman for the couple said Monday that the couple’s disclosure portrayed both assets and debts that have not changed much over the past year — and stressed that Kushner and Ivanka Trump have both complied with all federal ethics rules.

 

“Since joining the administration, Mr. Kushner and Ms. Trump have complied with the rules and restrictions as set out by the Office of Government Ethics,” said Peter Mirijanian, a spokesman for the couple’s ethics lawyer, Abbe Lowell. “As to the current filing which OGE also reviews, their net worth remains largely the same, with changes reflecting more the way the form requires disclosure than any substantial difference in assets or liabilities.”

 

One of Kushner’s biggest holdings, a real estate tech startup called Cadre that he co-founded with his brother, Joshua, rose sharply in value. The latest disclosure shows it was worth at least $25 million at the end of last year, up from a minimum value of $5 million in his previous disclosure.

 

The bulk of Ivanka Trump’s assets — more than $50 million worth — was contained in a trust that holds her business and corporations. That trust generated over $5 million in revenue last year.

 

She reported a stake in the Trump International Hotel in Washington, D.C., worth between $5 million and $25 million. The hotel has been a focus of lawsuits against the president and ethics watchdogs who say Trump is violating the Constitution by profiting from his office as diplomats spend big money there.

 

The disclosure also showed that Kushner has assumed growing debt over the past year, both expanding his use of revolving lines of credit and taking on additional debt of between $5 million and $25 million as part of his family company’s purchase last year of a New Jersey apartment complex.

 

A series of interim financial reports last year showed that Kushner had increased lines of credit with Bank of America, New York Community Bank and Signature Bank, each from at least $1 million to $5 million. Such moves do not mean that Kushner has yet accumulated that debt, but has the ability to do so.

 

The new disclosure shows that Kushner did take on a new debt last year with Bank of America worth between $5 million and $25 million — but jointly with other investors in Quail Ridge LLC, a company used for his family firm’s purchase of Quail Ridge, a 1,032-unit apartment community in Plainsboro, N.J., near Princeton. The disclosures also showed that Ivanka Trump owns an interest in that purchase through a family trust.

 

The disclosure showed that Kushner reported making at least $5 million in income from the development since Kushner Companies bought the complex in September. The family business has made a splash with high-profile deals for buildings in New York City in the past decade, but lately has been returning to its roots by buying garden apartments in the suburbs.

 

Under an ethics agreement he signed when he joined the administration in early 2017, Kushner withdrew from his position as CEO of Kushner Companies. But even as a passive investor, he retains many lucrative investments — which ethics critics have warned could raise conflicts of interest.

Erdogan Seizes on Growth Figures to Persuade Skeptical Public 

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, who is campaigning for re-election, seized on the latest Turkish growth figures as a vindication of his economic policies in the face of skepticism from not only voters but international investors of the country’s economic strength.

The economy grew by 7.4 percent in the first quarter, beating expectations. “We continue to be one of the fastest-rowing countries in the world,” Erdogan said at an electoral rally in Istanbul. He also claimed victory against what he called “conspirators” whom he blamed for last month’s heavy falls of the Turkish lira.

In May, the currency fell more than 10 percent as international investors fled the Turkish market over concerns about double-digit inflation and a growing current account deficit. Financial order was only restored by a steep emergency increase in interest rates, which saw the lira recoup some its losses.

Fueling concerns

But analysts warn the strong growth figures will only fuel concerns that the government policy of priming growth by massive public expenditures is unsustainable.

“The current account deficit is more than 6 percent of GDP and inflation above 12 percent, the starting point for the rebalancing process is bad, and a prolonged commitment to a tighter policy mix after the elections will be necessary to avoid further market pressure,” economist Inan Demir of Nomura Holding wrote Monday.

Tighter economic policy usually means reduced government expenditure and higher interest rates.

Turkey’s robust economy has been the bedrock of Erdogan and his ruling AK Party’s 16 years of electoral success. But despite more than a year of sustained strong growth, opinion polls have recorded voter dissatisfaction over the government’s handling of the economy.

Fifty-one percent of voters polled cited the economy as a primary concern, according to the Metropoll polling firm. Last year, security worries topped voter worries. Other polls found that a majority of voters blamed the government for their economic concerns.

“It’s a tremendous liability for Erdogan,” analyst Atilla Yesilada of Global Source Partners said. “This is an economy that grows, but not in labor-intensive way. Employment has decreased in the second quarter (2019), and things have become more expensive, and nobody is investing into new factories because loans have increased in excess of 22 percent.

“And clearly the wealth is not trickling down, whatever wealth has been created is not be felt by people on the streets, so there is a lot of public discontent,” Yesilada added.

The unemployment rate remains about 10 percent, according to recent Turkish Statistical Institute data.

Payments ahead of elections

In May, Erdogan announced two payments of over $200 for pensioners to coincide with religious holidays. The first installment is due this week, and is part of a multibillion-dollar giveaway to voters ahead of elections.

But analyst Yesilada warned the benefits of the payments are being overshadowed by the financial pain of this month’s increase in interest rates.

“We all use loans, the middle class use loans to buy houses; businesses use loans to expand. Even before the latest (interest) hikes, they were already at a 10-year high. Banks have nearly stopped making new loans; we are going into a credit crunch. For me, the recession is inevitable,” Yesilada said.

The president’s challengers are focusing on economic fears.

“Erdogan can’t survive this economic crisis,” CHP Party candidate Muharrem İnce said during a rally in Istanbul Monday. “Turkey is heading to dark days. Don’t be surprised if the Turkish lira hits 8 or 10 to the (U.S.) dollar. When troubled days have come to countries around the world, they couldn’t get through them unless they changed leaders.”

In May, at the start of the presidential and parliamentary elections, the lira was less than four against the U.S. dollar. It now stands at over 4.5, peaking at nearly 5 against the U.S. dollar.

Erdogan’s public construction boom, including building one of the world’s biggest airports as well as some of the longest bridges and tunnels, is also now an electoral target.

“Turkey has resources, but they are in the pockets of thieves. (The government) ran up $453 billion in debt. They collected $2 trillion from your pockets. What happened in return? Did your son find a job?” İYİ (Good) Party presidential candidate Meral Aksener asked.

Critical elections

Analysts predict the two-pronged attack by Erdogan’s challengers over the economy is likely to intensify, as economic concerns are expected to continue to dominate the critical elections.

“This election cycle is happening against a background of a volatile economic environment with a lot of stress on the currency with uncertainty where the economy is heading. This is turning the election campaign into a less certain outcome,” said Sinan Ulgen, head of the Istanbul-based Edam think tank.

Opponents accuse the president of calling elections 18 months early in a bid to take advantage of the country’s strong growth. But many opinion polls now indicate Erdogan’s lead narrowing and being forced into an electoral runoff. Analysts warn the economy that was once the president’s most significant asset could ultimately be what ousts him from power.

Test of Ebola Vaccine Raises Hopes, Doubts in Congo

Irene Mboyo Mola spent 11 days caring for her husband as he died of Ebola in a hospital where she said nurses were too scared to get close. She helped him to the bathroom, picked up his feverish body when he lost his balance, and reinserted an IV that fell out of his bleeding arm.

“He told me all he could see was death,” recalls Mola, a 30-year-old mother of six, as she sat slumped on the floor in her small hut.

That close contact put Mola at high risk of getting a disease that has no cure and kills about half of those infected. But now, as Congo battles the most serious Ebola outbreak since the devastating 2014 epidemic in West Africa, health workers have something new to offer: a vaccine.

​Promising vaccine

With thousands of doses dispatched to front-line health workers, the world is watching to see if a promising but still experimental vaccine might help stop this terrifying disease faster than traditional measures doctors have tried since Ebola was identified 40 years ago.

Even if the vaccine helps, there are serious hurdles. The shots must be transported deep into forests with few paved roads without it spoiling in the heat. Health workers have to identify and track down anyone who’s had contact with a sick person. Hardest of all, they must persuade a scared and wary population that shots pushed by foreigners could save their lives.

“Communities themselves must be at the center of the response if the activities are going to be effective,” said Jonathan Polonsky of the World Health Organization, a surveillance coordinator in Mbandaka, a city of more than 1 million in northwestern Congo.

Mola’s six children have all been vaccinated. But she refused, telling government social workers and WHO workers that she didn’t believe her husband died from Ebola. She said the hospital never showed her records confirming he’d tested positive for the virus.

​Fear and opportunity

There’s no guarantee the long-sought vaccine will help stop the outbreak. But Congo’s health ministry and the WHO rushed in 7,500 doses, created by the Public Health Agency of Canada and owned by Merck.

It was deemed the best option because the vaccine was found highly promising in testing a few years ago, when the epidemic in West Africa, which killed more than 11,000 people between 2014 and 2016, was starting to wane.

The plan is called “ring vaccination,” to find and vaccinate everyone who’s had direct contact with a sick person — the first “ring” — and then the contacts of those people, too, to break the chain of infection.

Last month, 11-year-old German Umba and her 6-year-old brother lost their father to Ebola. Both were vaccinated. But a shot alone doesn’t end the worry. U.N. workers monitor the children several times a day for fevers, an early symptom, until the incubation period passes.

Standing in the yard outside her classroom at school the young girl suddenly bursts into tears. Surrounded by aid workers, classmates and teachers who are unable to touch and console her, she buries her face in her shirt. 

“I just miss my father,” she said.

​Crucial window

Success with the vaccination strategy hinges on the speed at which health workers can identify people at risk.

“If you detect cases late, you’re missing the opportunity to protect people,” said Dr. Iza Ciglenecki, who is working on the vaccination campaign with Doctors Without Borders.

Congo’s current outbreak has killed 14 people so far, according to the country’s Ministry of Health. There have been 38 confirmed infections.

Friday, WHO emergency response chief Peter Salama said many people vaccinated in Mbandaka received the shots more than 10 days ago, meaning they’re now protected — the vaccine has had time to kick in.

Finding people who need vaccination is much harder in the remote area of Iboko, where a new case was just reported. Shoddy infrastructure adds to the challenge.

“The roads are so bad that even if a person gets vaccinated it can be too late and they can still die,” said Rosy Boyekwa Yamba, a regional representative for the Ministry of Health in Mbandaka.

It can take days to travel just 100 miles (160 kilometers) to reach remote areas where Ebola still is spreading. The vaccine must be kept at a temperature of minus 76 to minus 112 degrees Fahrenheit (minus 60 to minus 80 degrees Celsius), and can only be kept in mobile freezers for up to seven days.

Yamba also worries that potentially infected people aren’t being found. Five such people came forward last week in Mbandaka after he pleaded with community members to “be honest with him” about whether they’d been in contact with someone who had the disease.

So far more than 2,000 people, including front-line health workers, have been vaccinated in Mbandaka and the rural villages of Bikoro and Iboko where confirmed cases have been found, says the Congo’s Ministry of Health.

​Distrust in the community

Mola’s refusal to believe that Ebola killed her husband is a common reaction in the region. While many in Mbandaka have taken to washing hands and avoiding physical contact amid the outbreak, many also remain skeptical. They often don’t trust a government they say is corrupt. Of the dozens of people The Associated Press spoke to on a recent visit, nearly all said they don’t believe Ebola exists and referred to it as witchcraft.

This is Congo’s ninth outbreak, but illnesses are usually in remote areas, not cities.

“Ebola is not here,” said local resident Aziza Monzu. “It’s a disease created by organizations to get money.”

Dr. Pierre Rollin, an Ebola expert with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, understands. 

“People die every day and everywhere but nobody’s interested. Suddenly because of Ebola people are interested and that makes you suspicious,” he said. “Why would they trust us?”

Mola seems to have escaped infection. The incubation period for Ebola is up to 21 days and her husband died three weeks ago. 

“I’m still here,” she said.

Still, WHO officials say three-quarters of those who have been approached have agreed to a shot since the campaign started two weeks ago. 

Once you’ve got people on board “you’ve tackled 90 percent of the problem,” said Dr. Alhassane Touré, the WHO coordinator for ring vaccination in Congo and Guinea.

Does the vaccine work?

Health experts say the next two weeks will be critical in determining whether the outbreak will be brought under control. The WHO is now shifting efforts to more remote areas to contain the outbreak. The organization has predicted there could be up to 300 cases of Ebola in the coming months.

“We could see is another introduction of someone that comes from Itipo (a village in Iboko) or somewhere else to see family (in Mbandaka),” said CDC’s Rollin. In the last few days there’s been a big push in Itipo, the epicenter of the outbreak with 24 confirmed cases, to retrace people and vaccinate contacts as well as health workers, he said.

No matter how the outbreak unfolds, Rollin says it will be nearly impossible to say whether the vaccine worked to stop the disease’s spread.

“We can say the vaccine plus all the other measures work, but you can’t say the vaccine by itself works,” he said. In order to do that a controlled test would have to be run where in one place only the vaccine is being used and in another it’s not being used at all.

Next year, Merck plans to seek approval of the vaccine from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, based on previous studies of the shots. While the vaccine isn’t being formally studied in the current Congo outbreak, regulatory authorities would want to know if unforeseen side effects crop up.

“If it’s fully approved, then in each outbreak it’ll be the first measure and could be used all over the region,” Dr. Jean-Jacques Muyembe, director general of the National Institute for Biomedical Research in Kinshasa told the AP.

In West Africa, a large study is underway that compares the Merck shot and a second vaccine candidate made by Janssen Pharmaceuticals to determine the best vaccination strategies and track how long protection lasts.

In the meantime, some recipients say the shot provided peace of mind.

Seated in a yard in the center of town, Mbandaka resident Marie Louise proudly slaps her vaccination papers on the table. She had cradled her grandson in her arms as he vomited blood on the hospital floor, and he later died. His case wasn’t officially confirmed as Ebola, but she knew she needed to get vaccinated. Tapping her arm where she was given the needle, the 68-year-old beams. 

“Give me the vaccine,” she said. “I get life with the vaccine.”

Climate Change May Boost Cost of Eating Your Greens

Keeping healthy could become more costly as climate change and water scarcity cause a huge drop in the global production of vegetables and legumes, scientists said Monday.

The amount of vegetables produced could fall by more than a third, especially in hot regions like southern Europe and swaths of Africa and South Asia, said researchers from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

By analyzing studies across 40 countries, with some dating as far back as 1975, they found that hikes in greenhouses gases, water scarcity and global temperatures lowered the amount of vegetables and legumes produced.

Such drastic changes could drive up the prices of vegetables, which would affect poorer communities the most, according to the study, which was published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“If we take a ‘business as usual’ approach, environmental changes will substantially reduce the global availability of these important foods,” said Alan Dangour, a co-author of the paper, in a statement.

Scientists have warned that world temperatures are likely to rise by 2 degrees to 4.9 degrees Celsius this century compared with pre-industrial times.

This could lead to dangerous weather patterns — including more frequent and powerful droughts, floods and storms — increasing the pressure on agriculture.

Food production itself is a major contributor to climate change.

Agriculture, forestry and changes in land use together produce nearly a quarter of global greenhouse gas emissions, making them the second-largest emitter after the energy sector, said the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization.

The volume of food transported around the world also is exacerbating global warming.

The global demand for food is expected to soar as the world’s population is projected to grow to 9.8 billion people by 2050, up from 7.6 billion today, according to the U.N.

Crops now take up 11 percent of the world’s land surface, and livestock grazing covers 26 percent of ice-free land, according to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

Farming accounts for about 70 percent of all water used globally, said the OECD.

Water scarcity already affects more than 40 percent of the world’s population, according to the U.N.

That number is expected to rise due to global warming, with one in four people projected to face chronic or recurring shortages by 2050, the U.N. said.

“Urgent action needs to be taken, including working to support the agriculture sector to increase its resilience to environmental changes,” said Dangour. “And this must be a priority for governments across the world.”

Proof-of-Concept Hyperloop to Open Soon

The Boring Company, based in California, is close to opening its first exciting venture – a 3.2 kilometer underground tunnel designed to convince Californians that traveling underground at high speed may solve their state’s ubiquitous traffic jams. It is the brainchild of Elon Musk, the U.S. billionaire who founded the electric car company Tesla and the rocket company SpaceX. VOA’s George Putic has more.

New US Neutrality Rules Repealed; Supporters, Critics of Move Wonder What’s Next

The Federal Communications Commission’s repeal of the United States’ net neutrality rules — which mandated internet service providers to not discriminate in their handling of internet traffic — took effect Monday, reigniting fears from internet freedom advocates of potential manipulation of consumers’ internet access.

The FCC voted in December to overturn its net neutrality rule, first put in place by the Obama administration in 2015. With its repeal, the door is now open for internet service providers to block content, slow data transmission, and create “fast lanes” for consumers who pay premiums.

FCC Chairman Ajit Pai, a staunch critic of net neutrality, wrote Sunday that while he “support[s] a free an open internet,” the overturning of the Obama-era rule will allow the FTC [Federal Trade Commission] to “once again be able to protect Americans consistently across the internet economy.”

In 2004, then-FCC Chairman Michael Powell announced the commission’s support of what he called the “four internet freedoms,” including the freedom of consumers to access content. Since 2005, the FCC had enforced net neutrality rules in some regard, with the support of both Republican and Democratic chairmen. In 2015, the regulations were codified into law. 

“We’re actually in a brave new world where no protections for a free internet currently exist, whereas they have for the majority of the history of the internet,” Tim Karr, senior director of strategy and communications of media watchdog Free Press, told VOA on Monday. 

Karr said based on the prior actions of internet service providers, he feared we could see restrictions placed on such free internet access.

In 2007, the Associated Press reported that telecommunications giant Comcast was stifling connection to file-sharing websites such as BitTorrent. In 2011, fellow communication company Verizon blocked the download of Google Wallet, a payment app, on its mobile devices.

Verizon spokesman Rich Young told VOA that the company “strongly supports open internet rules,” and the recent FCC decision does not change the company’s support of full internet access.

Since the December FCC decision, two states — Washington and Oregon — have passed their own net neutrality laws, whereas governors of five other states — Hawaii, New Jersey, New York, Montana and Vermont — have issued executive orders mandating that internet service providers for government agencies abide by net neutrality regulations.

In May, the U.S. Senate voted 52-47 to reinstate the FCC’s 2015 net neutrality rules. Every Democratic senator voted for the proposal, as did three Republicans: John Kennedy of Louisiana, Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska.

The bill is now in the House of Representatives, where outgoing Speaker Paul Ryan, a Wisconsin Republican, has not yet announced any plans to bring the bill to the floor for a vote.

Congressman Mike Doyle, a Pennsylvania Democrat, filed a petition in May to force a vote on the matter. Doyle spokesperson Matt Dinkel said of the 218 signees for the petition needed to force a vote, the petition currently has 170.

“If enough representatives sign the discharge petition to bring the bill to the floor, odds are that it will pass,” Dinkel told VOA.

Vaccines Make Major Dent in Child Deaths from Pneumonia, Meningitis

A vaccine against bacterial pneumonia and another against meningitis have saved 1.45 million children’s lives this century, according to a new study.

The diseases the vaccines prevent are now concentrated in a handful of countries where the medications are not yet widely available or were only recently introduced, the research says.

Pneumonia is the leading cause of death among children worldwide. The bacteria targeted by the shots, Haemophilus influenzae type b (known as Hib) and Streptococcus pneumoniae (pneumococcus), are major causes of pneumonia and also cause meningitis. Together, the two bacteria claimed nearly 1.1 million lives in 2000, before the vaccines were widely available, according to the World Health Organization.

Vaccines against the bacteria are not new, but funding to provide them in low-income countries only became available recently.

To estimate their impact, the researchers started with country-by-country data from the WHO on pneumonia and meningitis cases and deaths, as well as vaccine coverage estimates. They factored in data from dozens of clinical studies on infections caused by the two bacteria to create estimates of illness and death from the diseases in 2000 and 2015.

They found deaths from Hib fell by 90 percent in 2015, saving an estimated 1.2 million lives since 2000. Pneumococcus deaths fell by just over half, accounting for approximately 250,000 lives saved.

The research appears in the journal The Lancet Global Health. 

“What was interesting was to see the rate at which some of these deaths have been prevented in the last several years,” said lead author Brian Wahl at Johns Hopkins University, “largely due to the availability of funding for these vaccines in countries with some of the highest burdens [of disease].”

The study estimates that 95 percent of the reduction in pneumococcal deaths occurred after 2010, when 52 low- and middle-income countries began receiving funding from Gavi, The Vaccine Alliance, to introduce the vaccine into their national immunization programs.

“The good news is that the numbers are moving in the right direction,” wrote Cynthia Whitney at the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in an accompanying editorial.

However, Whitney added, “far too many deaths — about 900 every day — are still being caused by these two infections.”

She notes that more than 40 percent of the world’s children live in countries where pneumococcal vaccine is not a routine childhood immunization.

Many of the countries with the largest number of deaths from these two bacteria have recently introduced the vaccines, but coverage is uneven.

India, Nigeria, China and South Sudan had the highest rates of death from Hib, the study says. All but China have introduced the vaccine in the past few years.

Half of the world’s pneumococcal deaths occurred in just four countries: India, Nigeria, the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Pakistan. All have recently introduced the vaccine, though in India it is a routine immunization in only three states.

Lowering the global burden of these diseases will depend on improving coverage in these countries, the study says.

Paraguay Declared Malaria-Free Amid Concerns Disease Rising Again

Paraguay is officially free of malaria, the World Health Organization (WHO) said on Monday, making it the first country in the Americas in 45 years to have wiped out the deadly disease which is back on the rise globally.

Nearly half a million people — most of them babies and children in Africa —  died in 2016 from mosquito-borne malaria, while at least 216 million were infected, an increase of five percent over 2015, WHO said.

With no recorded cases of malaria in five years, Paraguay became the first country in the region to have eliminated malaria since Cuba in 1973, the WHO said. It was the first country to be declared malaria free since Sri Lanka in 2016.

“It gives me great pleasure today to certify that Paraguay is officially free of malaria,” Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, head of WHO, said in a statement.

“Success stories like Paraguay’s show what is possible. If malaria can be eliminated in one country, it can be eliminated in all countries.”

While significant progress has been made over the past 20 years in reducing malaria cases and deaths, in 2016, for the first time in a decade, the number of malaria cases rose and in some areas there was a resurgence, the WHO said.

Health experts say this was partly to blame on a growing resistance to the sprays and drugs used to attack the mosquito that transmits the disease and the parasite that causes it.

They also say it is partly due to stagnant global funding for malaria since 2010. Climate change and conflict can also exacerbate malaria outbreaks.

“This is a powerful reminder for the region of what can be achieved when countries are focused on an important goal,” said Carissa Etienne, director of the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO), the WHO’s regional office.

“We are hopeful that other countries will soon join Paraguay in eliminating malaria,” she said in a statement.

In 2016 the WHO identified Paraguay as one of 21 countries with the potential to eliminate malaria by 2020.

The WHO said Algeria, Argentina and Uzbekistan are on track to be declared free from malaria later this year.

Trump Says Friends, Enemies Can’t Take Advantage of US on Trade

President Donald Trump tweeted out more criticism of U.S. trade partners Monday, including allies in Europe and Canada, adding to his declarations that the United States will no longer tolerate what he has called “trade abuse.”

That was part of a string of messages in which the president asserted the United States “pays close to the entire cost of NATO” while other member countries take advantage of the U.S. on trade.

“We protect Europe [which is good] at great financial loss, and then get unfairly clobbered on Trade,” he said.”Change is coming!”

NATO members, in general, make direct financial contributions based on their economic output, and as a result of being the world’s biggest economy the United States does contribute a larger amount than other nations.Indirectly, NATO members contribute to the alliance through the size of their military budgets, and the United States also spends more on defense than any other nation.

Trump tweeted from Singapore where he traveled for a summit with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un after attending a meeting of G-7 leaders in Canada.

After Trump left, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called Trump’s decision to invoke national security grounds to impose new tariffs on aluminum and steel “insulting” because of the long history of Canadian troops supporting the United States in conflicts.

Trudeau also pledged to respond with equivalent tariffs on U.S. goods beginning July 1.

The European Union rebuked Trump Monday and defended Trudeau, saying it “stands fully behind” the joint statement on economic goals and other issues leaders from six other countries signed even as Trump ordered U.S. officials to not sign it.

“The European Union will continue to stand up for an international, rules-based, multilateral system,” an EU spokeswoman said, while also praising Trudeau’s “excellent preparation and chairing of this challenging summit.”

British Prime Minister Theresa May told parliament the Canadian meeting was “a difficult summit with, at times, some very candid discussions.”

But she rejected Trump’s go-it-alone plan for tariffs against allies to protect American workers.

“It cannot be done by taking unilateral action against your partners,” she said. “So at this summit, we expressed deep disappointment at the unjustified decision of the United States.”

While airborne after leaving the summit early, Trump ordered U.S. officials to refuse to sign the traditional end-of-summit communique and tweeted criticism of what he said were Trudeau’s “false statements at his news conference.”

Two key Trump aides, economic adviser Larry Kudlow and trade adviser Peter Navarro, assailed Trudeau on Sunday news talk shows.

Navarro said, “There’s a special place in hell for any foreign leader that engages in bad faith diplomacy with President Donald J. Trump and then tries to stab him in the back on the way out the door … that’s what bad faith Justin Trudeau did with that stunt press conference.”

Trump followed Monday with another tweet.

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo downplayed any rift in G-7 relations during a news conference Monday in Singapore.

“There are always irritants in relationships.I am very confident that relationships between our countries, the United States and those G-7 countries, will continue to move forward on a strong basis,” he said.

Trudeau did not respond to Trump’s attacks, instead declaring the summit a success.

“The historic and important agreement we all reached” at the summit “will help make our economies stronger and people more prosperous, protect our democracies, safeguard our environment, and protect women and girls’ rights around the world. That’s what matters,” Trudeau said.

The G-7 summit communique called for working together to stimulate economic growth “that benefits everyone,” and highlighted a commitment to a “rules-based international trading system” and “fight protectionism.”The document also supports strong health systems, advancing gender equality, ending sexual and gender-based violence, as well as efforts to create a more peaceful world and combat climate change.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel told ARD television that Trump’s withdrawal from the communique through a tweet is “sobering and a bit depressing.”

French President Emmanuel Macron attacked Trump’s stance, saying, “International cooperation cannot be dictated by fits of anger and throwaway remarks.”He called Trump’s refusal to sign the communique a display of “incoherence and inconsistency.”

Swiss Voters Reject Campaign to Radically Alter Banking System

A radical plan to transform Switzerland’s financial landscape by barring commercial banks from electronically creating money when they lend was resoundingly rejected by Swiss voters on Sunday.

More than three quarters rejected the so-called Sovereign Money initiative, according to the official result released from the Swiss government.

All of the country’s self-governing cantons also voted against in the poll, which needed a majority from Switzerland’s 26 cantons as well as a simple majority of voters to succeed. Concerns about the potential risks to the Swiss economy by introducing a “vollgeld” or “real money” system appear to have convinced voters to reject the proposals.

The Swiss government, which had opposed the plan because of the uncertainties it would unleash, said it was pleased with the result.

“Implementing such a scheme, which would have raised so many questions, would have been hardly possible without years of trouble,” Finance Minister Ueli Maurer said.

“Swiss people in general don’t like taking risks, and …the people have seen no benefit from these proposals. You can also see that our banking system functions…The suspicions against the banks have been largely eliminated.”

The vote, called under Switzerland’s system of direct democracy after gathering more than 100,000 signatures, wanted to make the Swiss National Bank (SNB) the only body authorized to create money in the country.

Contrary to common belief, most money in the world is not produced by central banks but is instead created electronically by commercial lenders when they lend beyond the deposits they hold for savers.

This arrangement, underpinned by the belief that most debts will be repaid, has been a cornerstone of the global capitalist system but opponents say it is unstable because the new money created could exceed the rate of economic growth, which could lead to inflationary asset bubbles.

If approved, Switzerland, famed for its banking industry, would have been the first country in the world to introduce such a scheme, leading opponents to brand the plan a dangerous experiment which would damage the economy.

The plan could have had repercussions beyond Switzerland’s borders by removing a practice which underpins most of the world’s bank lending.

Support for reform had grown in the wake of the 2008 economic crisis, with campaigners saying their ideas would make the financial system more secure and protect people’s savings from bank runs.

As well as the Swiss government, opposition came from the Swiss National Bank and business groups.

“We are pleased, this would have been an extremely damaging initiative,” said Heinz Karrer, president of business lobby Economiesuisse.

The SNB acknowledged the result, saying adoption of the initiative would have made it much harder to control inflation in Switzerland.

“With conditions now remaining unchanged, the SNB will be able to maintain its monetary policy focus on ensuring price stability, which makes an important contribution to our country’s prosperity,” it said in a statement.

Campaigners – a group of academics, former bankers and scientists – said they would continue to work on raising their concerns.

“The discussion is only just getting started,” said campaign spokesman Raffael Wuethrich. “Our goal is that money should be in the service of the people and not the other way around and we will continue to work on it.” 

Hurricane Bud Intensifying Off Mexico’s Pacific Coast

Tropical Storm Bud intensified late Sunday afternoon into a Category 1 hurricane some 254 miles (410 km) west of the Pacific coast of Mexico, the country’s weather service said.

With maximum sustained winds of 75 miles (121 km) per hour and gusts of 93 miles (150 km) per hour, Bud was moving northwest at 9.3 miles (15 km) per hour.

The storm is the second of the 2018 Pacific hurricane season after Tropical Storm Aletta, which is moving west away from land. On the Atlantic side, Subtropical Storm Alberto slammed into the Mexican Caribbean in late May, forcing the evacuation of oil workers in the Gulf of Mexico and killing almost 10 people in Cuba and in the U.S. Southeast.

Within hours, Bud was due to generate intense storms in the Mexican states that border the Pacific Ocean, such as Jalisco, Colima and Guerrero.

The Miami-based U.S. National Hurricane Center said Bud would start to weaken by late Tuesday or early Wednesday.

There are no oil installations on the Pacific side of Mexico.

Although authorities established a surveillance zone to follow the trajectory of the hurricane northward along Mexico’s western coast, there were no evacuations of tourist spots like Acapulco, Puerto Vallarta and Cabo San Lucas.

“People in the zones of the states with forecast of rains, wind and waves, including maritime navigation, are recommended to take extreme precautions and to comply with the recommendations issued by the authorities,” Mexico’s meteorological service said in a statement.

Impossible Makes Plant-based, Meat Free Burger Possible

After years of research and 400 million dollars from investors, Impossible Foods has produced the hottest new item on the vegan market, meat-free burgers. The goal of the California-based start-up is to make an all-natural organic product that could deliver the pleasure people get from eating meat, but with no cholesterol, antibiotics, hormones, harmful bacteria… or meat. Faiza Elmasry has the story. Faith Lapidus narrates.

Study Discourages Chemotherapy for Some Breast Cancer Patients

The University of Hawaii Cancer Center is the leader in a groundbreaking national study that found that early-stage breast cancer patients with the most common form of the disease do not benefit from chemotherapy.

The center helped develop the largest breast cancer study, enrolling 172 Hawaii patients onto the TailorX clinical trial, which found that hormone therapy alone produced results as good as both chemotherapy and hormone treatment for 70 percent of women post-surgery, the Honolulu Star-Advertiser reported.

“We’re able now to spare a large group of women side effects of chemotherapy,” said Dr. Randall Holcombe, director of the University of Hawaii Cancer Center. “We now know with this study that women in this intermediate group will have the same chance of a cure by treating with a hormone pill alone. There are some side effects to hormone pills but a lot less than chemotherapy.”

It could significantly change the standard of care, he added.

The five-year survival rate was 98 percent for women who received hormone pills alone and 98.1 percent for those who received both therapies. At nine years, the rates were 93.9 percent and 93.8 percent, respectively.

The findings were based on 10,273 women who participated in the study from 2006 to 2010.

ECOG-ACRIN Cancer Research Group based in Philadelphia conducted the clinical trial, supported by the National Cancer Institute, a number of foundations and sales of the breast cancer research postage stamp, which provided more than $5 million.

New Italian Economy Minister Vows to Stay in Euro, Cut Debt Level

Italy’s new coalition government has no intention of leaving the euro and plans to focus on cutting debt levels, Economy Minister Giovanni Tria said on Sunday, looking to reassure nervous financial markets.

Italian government bonds have come under concerted selling pressure on fears the government will embark on a spending splurge that Italy can ill-afford and markets are wary that euro-skeptics within the coalition might try to push Italy out of the eurozone.

In his first interview since taking office a week ago, Tria told Corriere della Sera newspaper that the coalition wanted to boost growth through investment and structural reforms.

“Our goal is [to lift] growth and employment. But we do not plan on reviving growth through deficit spending,” Tria said, adding that he would present new economic forecasts and government goals in September.

“These will be fully coherent with the objective of continuing on the path of lowering the debt/GDP ratio,” he said.

The government, comprising the anti-establishment 5-Star Movement and far-right League, initially named as economy minister a man who had called the euro an “historic error”.

He was eventually handed a less important portfolio after the head of state refused to accept his nomination.

Tria, a little-known economics professor who is not affiliated to any party, said the coalition was committed to remaining within the single currency.

“The position of the government is clear and unanimous. There is no question of leaving the euro,” he said.

“The government is determined to prevent in any way the market conditions that would lead to an exit materializing. It’s not just that we do not want to leave, we will act in such a way that the conditions do not get anywhere near to a position where they might challenge our presence in the euro.”

Tria said he had spoken to his German counterpart and was looking for “fruitful dialogue” with the Europe Union, adding that Italian interests chimed with those of Europe.

“Basic choices”

The new government has promised to roll back pension reform, cut taxes and boost welfare spending, measures that are expected to cost tens of billions of euros. It also needs to find an estimated 12.5 billion euros ($14.8 billion) to stave off the threat of an automatic increase in sales taxes because of previously missed deficit targets.

Tria declined to say whether the coalition would hike the deficit target, but said he aimed to meet existing 2018 and 2019 debt reduction goals.

The previous center-left government had forecast a fall in debt to 130.8 percent of gross domestic product (GDP) this year and 128 percent next year against 131.8 percent in 2017.

Tria urged investors to look not just at the hard figures, but also study the content of the forthcoming 2019 budget.

“As part of the debt reduction and deficit reduction goals, the budget will reflect the basic choices on how and when to implement the [government] program,” he said.

“We have a program that focuses on structural reforms and we want it to also act on the supply side, creating more favorable conditions for investment and employment.”

The government has also promised to review a recent shake-up of mutual and co-operative banks, saying the changes risked penalizing domestic lenders. However Tria said the issue “is not the first problem we have to tackle”.

He also distanced himself from calls within the coalition for the government to issue securities to pay off individuals and companies owed money by the state.

“Stop-gap solutions solve nothing,” he said.

Half the World’s 152 Million Child Laborers Do Hazardous Work

The International Labor Organization reports 152 million children are victims of child labor, with nearly half forced to work in hazardous, unhealthy conditions that can result in death and injury.

Twenty years ago, hundreds of people, including children, participated in the Global March against Child Labor. They came to the International Labor Conference in Geneva demanding a Convention on the Elimination of the Worst Forms of Child Labor.

Basu Rai from Nepal was the youngest of the marchers. Now, a grown man he recalls clambering on table tops chanting slogans.

“Go, Go Global March. Stop, Stop Child Labor. We want education. No more tools in tiny hands. We want books and we want toys,” he said.

Rai was orphaned at age four. Homeless and without anyone to look after him, he became a street gangster, a rag picker, a delivery boy. He did anything to survive. Now, as an adult, he has become a Child Rights Activist.

“But, still I am afraid because I am a father to a two-month old daughter and then because the world is not safe for the children. So, this is our collective responsibility to work together for the sake of the childhood…But, still there are 152 million children who are languishing in a kind of slavery,” said Rai.

Kailash Satyarthi, an Indian children’s rights activist and Nobel peace prize laureate, led the 1998 Global March of enslaved and trafficked children. He said progress has been made since then, but much remains to be done.

“If the children are still trapped into the supply chain, if the children are still enslaved, if the children are still sold and bought like animals and sometimes for less than the price of animals to work in fields and farms, and shops and factories, or for household work as domestic help, this is a blot on humanity,” said Satyarthi.

The ILO reports nearly half of the child laborers are found in Africa and in the Asia and Pacific regions. Sub-Saharan Africa has the largest proportion with one in five children working.

It notes children typically enter the work force at the age of six or seven, getting involved in hazardous work as they get older. About 70 percent of hazardous work is concentrated in agriculture. Other forms include mining, construction, and domestic service.

ILO Director-General, Guy Ryder, said the world is facing an epidemic of occupational accidents and disease.

“Honestly, the annual toll is appalling — 2.78 million work-related deaths, 374 million injuries and illnesses. If these were the victims of a war, we would be talking a lot about it. Children and young workers are at greater risk and suffer disproportionately and with longer lasting consequences,” he said.

Ryder says legislation, labor inspection, and workplace labor relations and practices must be strengthened to stop this carnage.

 

Most child laborers are in the developing world. But, this shameful practice also occurs in some of the world’s richest countries. Zulema Lopez, a Child Rights Activist and Labor Relations student in the United States recalls her life as a child.

“At the age of seven, it was normal for me to wake up at five o’clock in the morning, put on my shoes, put on a T-shirt and go work in the hot sun, burning — my back was aching, 20-30 pounds of buckets of cucumbers next to me, trying to make ends meet,” said Lopez.

Lopez said people do not realize what is happening in their own backyard. She calls the exploitative work that robs children of their childhood unacceptable and said it must stop. She said children are the future and if people fail to protect the world’s children, then there is little hope for the future.