by, Bruce Brittain, ChangingAging ContributorTweet5Share9ShareEmail14 Shares
For the great majority of Baby Boomers, financial planning for retirement is a minefield of unknowns. Even the best efforts to predict basic living expenses, healthcare expenses and retirement leisure activity costs accurately are difficult. The answers are often, “It depends.” It depends on the stock market, it depends on interest rates, it depends on changes in government policy, it depends on one’s health; it depends on anything that puts money in or takes it out of the calculations.Too often, however, one expense that doesn’t get adequate consideration is the cost of caring for a dependent relative over the age of 50; someone who needs help with some or all of the crucial activities of daily living (ADL): dressing, eating, walking, toileting and hygiene. Folks like these need a care giver.Currently in the U.S. there are an estimated 46,500,000 family care givers for those who are dependent and over 50. This number will rise dramatically as the Baby Boom ages. Today, it is Boomer women who account for the great bulk of this hidden workforce. As time ticks by, these same women and/or their significant others will become the care receivers as they age and their daughters or nieces and (less often) sons and nephews, have to take up the care giving role.According to an updated AARP study, 65% of family care givers are women. The typical care giver is 49 years old and works outside the home; she spends 20 hours a week providing unpaid care to her mother and this care period lasts 5 years. Data analysis suggests that if this amount of care, provided by all similar unpaid care givers, were bought on the open market, the annual value would be $540 billion, nearly as large as Medicare’s entire $588 billion budget for 2013.Eye-popping as these estimates are, they don’t address the out-of-pocket costs that care givers face when taking on the responsibility of giving care. In addition, these estimates do not include the “opportunity costs” incurred when a care giver retires early, quits a job or works fewer hours because of care giving responsibilities. Neither the out-of-pocket expenses nor the opportunity costs can be ignored when one is planning for retirement.Much of what needs to be done for Mom or Dad or Uncle Dave or Grannie isn’t in the elder’s budget. Neither is there much government money for the everyday services that these family members require: companionship, meal preparation, bill paying, personal care, grooming, medication management, transportation, household maintenance or health care advocacy.Although the focus of this article is on the financial costs experienced by care givers, the non-financial toll can also be substantial: fatigue, mental and physical health problems, family dysfunction and work stress. But these are subjects for another day.According to a National Alliance for Caregiving study published in 2007, the average care giving household spends $5,531 of its own money every year providing care. That expense swells to $8,728 if the care is long distance, requiring travel of more than 50 miles. These cost estimates have not been updated since 2007 though so we can safely assume that even with modest inflation these figures are higher in 2013, likely approaching $6,300 and $9,800 respectively.For those who must cut back on work hours, quit working altogether or retire early in order to meet their care giving duties, the opportunity costs are high. There is loss of income, reduced Social Security benefits, possibly the loss of paid health insurance and reduction of pension or retirement program benefits. A recent analysis of MetLife Mature Market Study data, which was updated in 2011, estimates that the average lifetime opportunity costs for those who cut back, quit work or retire early to take on care giving responsibilities is $303,880. This figure is higher for women, $324,044, than for men, $283,716.Retirement planning cannot ignore these kinds of numbers if care giving is likely a part of one’s future.As a society, we recognize the expense of raising children and make allowances for that in our complex tax code. However, unless a dependent elder is living in the care giver’s home, there are no tax credits or deductions available. Unpaid family care givers relieve tax payers of significant Medicaid expense for nursing home care that might otherwise be used. This, plus the out-of-pocket and opportunity cost burden for these families should obviate the need for legislative action to modify the tax code and create programs to moderate the burden. Obvious though it may be, the current political winds around this issue are head winds.A 2011 AARP document lists 13 suggested policy initiatives to address the burdens placed on family care givers, eight of which require additional tax payer spending. In the current political environment, additional spending for social programs seems unlikely.As an example, one potentially helpful program, already approved and signed into law, is the Lifespan Respite Care Act of 2006. The program was originally designed to spend $289 million over the first five years. This money was to be used for state and local grants across the country to create and encourage respite care programs for over-burdened care givers. But, the program received no funding until 2009 when congress finally agreed to $2.5 million. It has been funded at this same paltry amount in subsequent years. Among care giver advocates, an expectation for more realistic funding in the future is very low. Examples like this illustrate the need to minimize one’s expectations for substantive government help, financial or otherwise, in the retirement planning process when care giving is factored in.In summary, retirement planning must include the potential financial realities of care giving lest the burden arrive as a surprise, altering a household’s financial situation. For reasons that are obvious, retirement is not the time to financially re-engineer one’s future.Related PostsBoomers Say They’re Ill-Prepared for RetirementMany boomers expect to be less financially secure than their parents were in retirement, a new study finds.4 Health-Care Questions Every Boomer Needs to AskA new survey finds that 37% of baby boomers say that unexpected expenses like health and medical costs are the most worrisome aspect of retirement. Here’s what you need to know to deal with your health care costs in retirement.3 Simple Steps for Calculating Retirement CostsiStockPhoto How much savings will I need to retire? That’s the $64,000 question these days, and to be quite frank, there isn’t an exact answer. But there are some ways to figure out your expenses during retirement that will get you closer. While nearly 50% of Americans 45 and older…Tweet5Share9ShareEmail14 SharesTags: AARP baby boomers caregiving retirement
Researchers use human and worm data to explore mutational causes of cancer
Source:https://www.ebi.ac.uk/about/news/press-releases/new-insights-origins-cancer-gerstung May 2 2018Researchers at the European Bioinformatics Institute (EMBL-EBI), the University of Dundee and the Wellcome Sanger Institute have used human and worm data to explore the mutational causes of cancer. Their study, published today in Genome Research, also shows that results from controlled experiments on a model organism – the nematode worm C. elegans – are relevant to humans, helping researchers refine what they know about cancer.Enigmatic DNA mutation and repairCancer is caused by DNA mutations which can be triggered by a range of factors, including UV radiation, certain chemicals and smoking, but also errors occurring naturally during cell division. A cell recognizes most of these mutations and corrects them through multiple repair mechanisms. However, DNA repair is not perfect, so it can leave certain mutations unrepaired or repair them incorrectly leading to changes in DNA. Understanding the footprints of these mutational processes is an important first step in identifying the causes of cancer and potential avenues for new treatments.”The DNA mutations we see in cancer cells were caused by a yin and yang of DNA damage and repair,” explains Moritz Gerstung, Research Group Leader at EMBL-EBI. “When we study a patient’s cancer genome, we’re looking at the final outcome of multiple mutational processes that often go on for decades before the disease manifests itself. The reconstruction of these processes and their contributions to cancer development is a bit like the forensic analysis of a plane crash site, trying to piece together what’s happened. Unfortunately, there’s no black box to help us.Controlled experiments in model organisms can be used to mimic some of the processes thought to operate on cancer genomes and to establish their exact origins.”Related StoriesResearchers identify potential drug target for multiple cancer typesNew research links “broken heart syndrome” to cancerResearchers use AI to develop early gastric cancer endoscopic diagnosis systemWhat worms can tell usPrevious research has shown that one of the first DNA repair pathways associated with an increased risk of cancer is DNA mismatch repair (MMR). The current study uses C. elegans as a model system for studying MMR in more detail.”Dr Bettina Meier in my team initiated this project by assessing the kinds of mutations that arise when C. elegans is defective for one specific DNA repair pathway,” says Professor Anton Gartner, Principal Investigator in the Centre for Gene Regulation and Expression at Dundee. “As it only takes three days to propagate these worms from one generation to the next, the process of studying how DNA is passed on is greatly expedited. DNA mismatch repair is propagated for many generations and this allowed us to deduce a distinct mutational pattern. The big question was if the same type of mutagenesis also occurred in human cancer cells.”To address this question, EMBL-EBI PhD student Nadia Volkova compared the C. elegans results with genetic data from 500 human cancer genomes.”We found a resemblance between the most common signature associated with mutations in MMR genes in humans and the patterns found in nematode worms,” explains Volkova. “This suggests that the same mutational process operates in nematodes and humans. Our approach allows us to find the exact profile of MMR deficiency and to understand more about what happens when DNA repair goes wrong.”These findings could lead to a better understanding of the causes of cancer and potentially help to identify the most appropriate treatment.
Fewer women meet eligibility criteria for clinical trial of heart failure drugs
May 28 2018Clinical trial enrolment favors men, according to a study presented today at Heart Failure 2018 and the World Congress on Acute Heart Failure, a European Society of Cardiology congress. The study found that fewer women meet eligibility criteria for trials of heart failure medication.Helena Norberg, author of the study, junior lecturer and PhD student, Umeå University, Sweden, said: “One of the gold standard requirements for participating in a clinical trial of heart failure medication is that patients must first reach a fixed target dose of the currently recommended treatment. This excludes many women, particularly older ones, meaning we don’t gain knowledge in this group.”This study investigated the reasons why just 21% of patients enrolled in the PARADIGM-HF trial were women. The PARADIGM-HF trial compared the effectiveness of an angiotensin receptor neprilysin inhibitor (ARNI) versus standard treatment with an angiotensin-converting-enzyme (ACE) inhibitor in patients with heart failure and an ejection fraction of 35% or less (the proportion of blood the heart is capable of pumping out of the left ventricle). To participate in the trial, patients had to first tolerate target doses of an ACE inhibitor or angiotensin receptor blocker (ARB).To conduct the current study, the researchers applied the trial criteria to 1,924 community-based heart failure patients in Sweden, of whom 43% were women. When the requirement to have an ejection fraction of 35% or less was applied there were 401 patients remaining, of whom 28% were women. After applying the other participation criteria of the trial, 246 patients were excluded because they failed to reach the target dose of an ACE inhibitor or ARB and 60 were excluded for other reasons.2 That left 95 eligible patients, of which just 15 were women (16%).The requirement to reach the target dose of an ACE inhibitor or ARB disproportionately excluded women. In the community-based heart failure population, just 26% of women with heart failure and a reduced ejection fraction could reach the target dose compared to 43% of men.Related StoriesResearchers completely eliminate all traces of HIV from infected miceAntibiotic combination effective against drug-resistant PseudomonasVirus killing protein could be the real antiviral hero finds studyWhen the researchers compared the characteristics of women and men in the study with heart failure and reduced ejection fraction, they found that women were significantly older (81 versus 75 years on average) had lower body weight (69 versus 85 kg), worse kidney function (estimated glomerular filtration rate of 49 versus 70 ml/min), and higher systolic blood pressure (127 versus 123 mmHg). When they examined which of those variables were significantly associated with women’s failure to achieve the target dose of an ACE inhibitor or ARB, they found it was their older age and worse kidney function.Mrs Norberg said: “These target doses were calculated from trials conducted primarily in men with heart failure, who tend to be younger and have better kidney function. Future trials in heart failure should use achievement of maximum tolerated doses, rather than fixed target doses, as entry criteria to ensure that women are more represented.”Mrs Norberg noted that the ARNI has been approved for clinical use by the US Food and Drug Administration and the European Medicines Agency. However, it is contraindicated in pregnant or breastfeeding women, and should be used cautiously in patients with severe renal impairment due to the risk of hyperkalemia. It should not be used at the same time as an ACE inhibitor or ARB.Carlos Aguiar, ESC spokesperson on heart failure, said: “Controlled clinical trials are widely regarded as the gold standard for evaluating the efficacy of a treatment. Yet, when study design imposes rigorous criteria for participant eligibility, the findings may not generalize to other individuals. This analysis by Norberg and colleagues identifies factors that may help increase the representativeness of the results of heart failure trials in the large female population suffering from this condition.” Source:https://www.escardio.org/The-ESC/Press-Office/Press-releases/clinical-trial-enrolment-favours-men
Human insulin as safe and effective as expensive insulin analogs for patients
Jun 27 2018Patients with Type 2 diabetes who were treated with the newer generation of insulin analog drugs did not have substantially better outcomes than those treated with less costly human insulin, according to a study by Yale School of Medicine researchers and colleagues at Kaiser Permanente.The study is published in the June 23 issue of Journal of the American Medical Association.”We compared the newer and older types of insulin in a large and diverse population of Kaiser Permanente type 2 diabetes patients who were newly prescribed insulin,” said lead author Kasia J. Lipska, M.D., assistant professor of medicine at Yale School of Medicine. “The study was conducted under real-world conditions with uniquely detailed data about possible confounding factors and long-term outcomes.””We found that for patients with type 2 diabetes in usual practice, the use of the more expensive insulin analogs did not appear to result in better safety — at least as defined by hospital or emergency visits for hypoglycemia — or better blood sugar control compared with NPH insulin,” Lipska added. “This suggests that many people with type 2 diabetes should consider starting with NPH insulin, instead of insulin analogs, especially if cost is an issue for them.”For the estimated 29 million Americans with diabetes, treatment of type 2 diabetes typically begins with lifestyle modifications and metformin, a pill that lowers the amount of sugar in the blood. However, up to 25% of diabetes patients eventually require additional insulin injections to control their blood sugar.”For decades, people initiating insulin treatment were prescribed human insulin,” said Andrew J. Karter, senior research scientist with the Kaiser Permanente Division of Research. “Then in the 2000s, a new generation of long-acting insulin analogs emerged that were designed to mimic human insulin.”Related StoriesDiabetes patients experiencing empathy from PCPs have beneficial long-term clinical outcomesUTHealth researchers investigate how to reduce stress-driven alcohol useUranium toxicity might have caused obesity and diabetes in Kuwait, finds new studyLike human insulin, long-acting insulin analogs can be prescribed as daily or twice-daily injections to help provide predictable levels of blood sugar throughout the day. In clinical trials, insulin analogs modestly reduced the risk of nocturnal hypoglycemia, or low blood sugar during sleep, compared with human insulin.”The problem is that insulin analogs are much more expensive than human NPH insulin,” said Lipska. A vial of insulin analog now costs about $200 to $300, while a vial of NPH insulin costs just $25. The cost of analog insulin has tripled nationally between 2002 and 2013. Dr. Karter’s research has shown that high out-of-pocket cost of medications, especially at the time of initiation, are linked to poorer adherence, which directly affects outcomes for diabetes patients.”To compare insulin analogs with NPH insulin, Lipska, Karter and their colleagues followed the new insulin users with type 2 diabetes for an average of 1.7 years. During this time, they examined emergency department visits or hospitalizations related to severe hypoglycemia, as well as changes in their blood sugar (hemoglobin A1c) control. They found that insulin analogs were not associated with a reduced risk of emergency department visits or hospital admissions for severe hypoglycemia, nor did they control hemoglobin A1c levels better than NPH insulin.”The cost differential between analog and NPH insulins is huge, up to a 10-fold difference,” Karter said. “Some people with type 2 diabetes may find the potential benefits of insulin analogs worth the additional cost. But we found no population-level evidence to suggest that the extra expenditure is warranted for most people with type 2 diabetes, particularly when the high cost could prevent some of them from getting the treatment they need or divert resources away from other, potentially beneficial clinical interventions.” Source:https://news.yale.edu/2018/06/26/human-insulin-safe-and-effective-costlier-insulin-analogs
Okayama University research could improve prognosis of diabetic kidney disease
4 types of promising glycans which could be useful prognostic indicators of DKD.Our results suggest that higher levels of urinary excretion of Siaα2-6Gal/GalNac, Galβ1-4GlcNAc, and Galβ1-3GalNAc and lower levels of urinary excretion of GalNAcα1-3GalNAc could indicate poor renal prognosis in patients with type 2 diabetes. One of the complications of diabetes is diabetic kidney disease (DKD), a condition in which the kidneys do not filter blood correctly and, eventually, fail — DKD is one of the most common causes of kidney failure and affects around 40% of patients with diabetes. DKD is normally diagnosed by checking for proteins, in particular albumin, that leak from the blood into the urine as a consequence of the malfunctioning filtering; these proteins are used as biomarkers to monitor the progression of DKD and predict the renal prognosis at the early stages of disease. However, new biomarkers that could help to identify the onset of DKD earlier and to predict the renal prognosis more accurately would be very beneficial to help patients with a rapid deterioration of renal function.Related StoriesArtificial intelligence can help accurately predict acute kidney injury in burn patientsNew research links “broken heart syndrome” to cancerLow dose of endotoxin could have protective effect on men at risk of acute kidney injuryRecently it has emerged that glycans — complex molecules made of interlocking sugar molecules — and their enzymatic modification (glycosylation) have a role in diabetes and in the progression of DKD. Because of their complicated structure, glycans are technically difficult to quantify in urine samples, and few studies exist about the role of glycosylation in DKD. However, a method previously introduced by Professor Jun Wada, Dr.Koki Mise and colleagues at the University of Okayama in Japan, authors also of the present study, enables high-throughput quantification of the binding of glycan to 45 different proteins, opening up the investigation of the association between the glycosylation profile in the urine and the renal prognosis in patients with diabetes.The study that the authors report in the newly published paper started in 2012 and involved 688 patients with type 2 diabetes, who were monitored over a period of 4 years, and 134 control patients with neither diabetes nor DKD. The results suggest that levels of glycans are significantly associated with the evolution of renal function, and that changes in the glycosylation of a particular protein occur in the early stages of DKD, before other detectable signs of deterioration of renal function develop. Because the indexes for glycans are associated with the renal prognosis independent of other indicators commonly used, adding the combined glycan index to other indicators of the progression of disease can significantly improve the prediction of the renal outcome. The results of the current study are also of fundamental interest, as they provide insight in how glycosylation changes in DKD. Jul 17 2018Researchers at Okayama University report in the journal Diabetes Care their findings on measurements of ion concentration in solutions for clinical and environmental research. The results are expected to improve prognosis of diabetic kidney disease.
Source:http://www.okayama-u.ac.jp/
Pioneering research takes major step forward in the fight against cystic fibrosis
Aug 2 2018The fight against cystic fibrosis (CF) has taken a major step forward, with pioneering research by University of Adelaide scientists showing that cells causing the debilitating genetic disorder could be successfully replaced with healthy ones.The research published in the journal Stem Cell Research and Therapy applies cell transplantation therapy, normally used in bone marrow transplants to treat immunodeficiency disorders.”There are 70,000 people worldwide living with CF for which there is currently no cure, and disease in the lungs is the major cause of poor health and a significantly shortened life span,” says Dr Nigel Farrow, a Post-Doctoral Research Fellow from the University of Adelaide’s Robison Research Institute, who conducted the study alongside Associate Professor David Parsons head of the research team based in the Women’s and Children’s Hospital.In Australia, one in every 2,500 babies has CF, and one in 25 people carry the defective gene. Even though carriers are not affected by the disorder, they may pass the gene to their children. If both parents are carriers, each of their children has a 1 in 4 chance of being born with the disorder.”Our research which applies stem cell transplantation, involves harvesting adult stem cells from the lungs of CF patients, correcting them with gene therapy, and then reintroducing those cells back into the patient,” says Dr Farrow.”The new transplanted adult stem cells pass on their healthy genes to their ‘daughter cells’ providing a constant means to replenish the airways with healthy cells, and thereby combating the onset of cystic fibrosis airway disease,” he said.Related StoriesResearch sheds light on sun-induced DNA damage and repairCancer stem cells elude the body’s immune cells by deactivating danger detectorAlternate cell growth pathway could open door to new treatments for metastatic cancersWorking in mouse airways, the group successfully tested their new transplantation method, using a marker gene in place of the corrective CF gene in initial studies.”The key to these successful transplantations was our innovative method; we first eliminated the existing surface cells, which then created the space required to introduce the new cells,” says Dr Farrow.CF affects a person’s lungs and digestive system causing a build-up of mucus that seriously impairs their breathing and significantly increases the chances of chest infections.Patients such as Nathan Rae are required to undergo a range of regular therapies to help to alleviate the symptoms of CF.”I have intensive daily physiotherapy to clear my airways, eat a nutritious high-fat, high-calorie diet with lots of extra salt and vitamins, and take drugs that help me digest my food,” says Nathan.”Exercise is really important, but as I regularly get chest infections, I have frequent hospital admissions, which inhibits my ability to exercise as much as I’d like,” he says.This pioneering research demonstrates that, in principle, human airway stem cells can be transplanted into the lining of the lungs.”If we can perfect this technique, it will accelerate this exciting research which could significantly improve the lives of those living with cystic fibrosis and potentially combat this chronic life-limiting illness,” says Dr Farrow. Source:https://www.adelaide.edu.au/news/news101662.html
New research confirms link between DDT exposure and autism
By Kate Bass, B.Sc.Aug 15 2018The results of a national birth cohort study published today provide the first biomarker evidence that the insecticide, DDT, increases the risk of autism for the first time in history. Image Credit: Nazarova Mariia / ShutterstockAutism is the term generally used to describe a spectrum of related disorders that affect an individual’s capacity for social interaction and communication.It typically begins in early childhood and presents as lack of interest and difficult behaviour.Although in many cases the symptoms may be mild and not prevent the affected individual from living independently, some sufferers have severe disabilities that necessitate life-long care and support.Autism commonly has a negative impact on educational and social attainments, which can limit employment opportunities.Globally 1 in 160 children has a disorder on the autism spectrum and epidemiological studies conducted over the past 50 years indicate that the prevalence of autism is increasing.Scientific evidence has implicated a range of environmental and genetic factors in the risk of a child developing autism.A recent study conducted in Finland is the first to connect the banned insecticide DDT with increased risk for autism.The team followed more than a million pregnant women and their offspring from 1987 to 2005. They identified 778 cases of childhood autism. Each child with autism along with the mother was matched with a control mother-child pair that was not affected by autism.Mothers with high levels of a DDT metabolite in their blood were more than twice as likely to have a child with autism including intellectual disability compared with controls.The odds for the offspring developing any type of autism were nearly one-third higher among offspring exposed to elevated maternal levels of the DDT metabolite. No association between maternal PCB insecticide exposure and autism was observed.Although the use of DDT and PCBs was widely banned in Finland, and many other countries, over 30 years ago, they still persist in the environment due to the slow rate at which they are broken down. Along with genetic and other environmental factors, our findings suggest that prenatal exposure to the DDT toxin may be a trigger for autism.”Professor Alan S Brown, Lead Author The researchers hypothesise that maternal exposure to DDT, but not PCBs, increases the risk of autism due to its inhibitory affects on birth weight and androgen receptor binding.Studies have shown that both of these are risk factors for autism.Source:Columbia University’s Mailman School Of Public Health. Press release 16 August 2018.
Endocrine Society announces winners of prestigious 2019 Laureate Awards
Reviewed by Kate Anderton, B.Sc. (Editor)Sep 6 2018The Endocrine Society today announced it has chosen 13 leading endocrinologists as winners of its prestigious 2019 Laureate Awards, the top honors in the field.Endocrinologists are scientists and medical doctors who specialize in unravelling the mysteries of hormone disorders to care for patients and cure diseases. These professionals have achieved breakthroughs in scientific discoveries and clinical care benefitting people with hundreds of conditions, including diabetes, thyroid disorders, obesity, hormone-related cancers, growth problems, osteoporosis, and infertility.Established in 1944, the Society’s Laureate Awards recognize the highest achievements in the endocrinology field, including groundbreaking research and innovations in clinical care. The Endocrine Society will present the awards to the winners at ENDO 2019, the Society’s 101st Annual Meeting & Expo, March 23-26, 2019 in New Orleans, La.The Endocrine Society’s 2019 Laureate Award winners are: Source:https://www.endocrine.org/news-room/2018/2019-laureate-awards Edward M. Brown, M.D. – Fred Conrad Koch Lifetime Achievement Award. The Society’s highest honor, this annual award recognizes lifetime achievements and exceptional contributions to the field of endocrinology. A Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School and Senior Physician at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, Mass., Brown identified and then cloned a novel receptor that mediates the actions of calcium, known as calcium-sensing receptor or CaSR. His discovery led to improved understanding of inherited and acquired forms of hyper- or hypocalcemia, including familial hypocalciucric hypercalcemia, an inherited condition that causes abnormally high levels of calcium in the blood. His work also identified the molecular target of the calcimimetic drug, cinacalcet, which is used in treating various forms of hyperparathyroidism. Helen H. Hobbs, M.D. – Gerald D. Aurbach Award for Outstanding Translational Research. This annual award recognizes outstanding contributions to research that accelerate the transition of scientific discoveries into clinical applications. Hobbs is a Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator and is Director of the McDermott Center for Human Growth and Development at the University of Texas Southwestern in Dallas, Texas. Her work created a paradigm shift by demonstrating how rare and low frequency genetic variants contribute to cardiometabolic health and disease. She identified low frequency genetic variants in PCSK9 that led to new treatments for high cholesterol levels. Hobbs has directed the Dallas Heart Study, a phenotypically well-characterized, multiethnic, population-based study in Dallas. She was elected to the Institute of Medicine in 2004 and the National Academy of Sciences in 2007. She was awarded the Breakthrough Prize in Life Sciences in 2015, the Passano Award (with Jonathan Cohen) in 2016, and the Harrington Prize for Innovation in Medicine in 2018. Ana Claudia Latronico, M.D., Ph.D. – International Excellence in Endocrinology Award. This award is presented to an endocrinologist who has made exceptional contributions to the field in geographic areas with underdeveloped resources for hormone health research, education, clinical practice, or administration. Latronico is Professor of Medicine and Head of the Endocrinology and Metabolism Division at the University of Sao Paulo in Sao Paulo, Brazil. She has helped build an internationally recognized center for the identification of novel gene mutations associated with endocrine diseases. She developed a pioneer study on the genetic causes of familial central precocious puberty in children, which resulted in the identification of a new inhibitor factor linked to premature sexual development. She previously won the Society’s Richard E. Weitzman Award. Wiebke Arlt, M.D., D.Sc., F.R.C.P., F.Med.Sci. – Outstanding Clinical Investigator Award. This annual award honors an internationally recognized clinical investigator who has contributed significantly to understanding the pathogenesis and therapy of endocrine and metabolic diseases. Arlt is the William Withering Chair of Medicine and Director of the Institute of Metabolism and Systems Research at the University of Birmingham in Birmingham, U.K. Arlt’s work has furthered our understanding of and improved outcomes for people with a variety of adrenal conditions. She identified the importance of dehydroepiandrosterone (DHEA) in women and demonstrated the benefits of DHEA replacement therapy for many women with primary and adrenal insufficiency. She described new forms of androgen excess that contribute to conditions such as a form of congenital adrenal hyperplasia, and she has pioneered the concept of urinary steroid metabolomics likely to change the clinical diagnostic work up process for adrenal disorders and tumors. James W. Findling, M.D. – Outstanding Clinical Practitioner Award. This annual award recognizes extraordinary contributions by a practicing endocrinologist to the endocrine and/or medical community. Findling is Director of Community Endocrinology Services and Clinical Professor of Medicine at the Medical College of Wisconsin in Milwaukee, Wisc. As an acknowledged international expert on Cushing’s syndrome, Findling receives referrals from all over the country to consult on challenging cases. He developed inferior petrosal sinus sampling for the differential diagnosis of ACTH-depending Cushing’s syndrome. He championed the use of late-night salivary cortisol for the screening and surveillance of patients with Cushing’s syndrome, which is now an integral part of the Endocrine Society’s Clinical Practice Guideline. He currently serves on the Journal of the Endocrine Society’s editorial board. Kenneth D. Burman, M.D. – Outstanding Educator Award. This annual award recognizes exceptional achievement as an educator in the discipline of endocrinology and metabolism. As the Chief of the Division of Endocrinology at Medstar Washington Hospital Center and the Director of the Integrated Endocrine Training Program at Georgetown University and Medstar Washington Hospital Center in Washington, D.C., Burman has trained more than 140 endocrinologists. He has instilled a passion for endocrinology, research and medicine in his students. Burman also serves as Professor of Medicine at Georgetown University and the Uniformed Services University of Health Sciences in Bethesda, Md. He was Deputy Editor of The Journal of Clinical Endocrinology & Metabolism, and he served as President of the American Thyroid Association. John J. Kopchick, M.S., Ph.D. – Outstanding Innovation Award. This award recognizes endocrinologists who have demonstrated innovation and entrepreneurship to further endocrine research or practice in support of the field of endocrinology, patients, and society at large. An internationally-renowned expert in the field of growth hormone research, Kopchick is a Goll-Ohio Eminent Scholar and Distinguished Professor of Molecular Biology in The Department of Biomedical Sciences at the Heritage College of Osteopathic Medicine and in the Edison Biotechnology Institute at Ohio University in Athens, Ohio. He discovered and characterized the molecular aspects of growth hormone receptor antagonists, which led to the development of the acromegaly drug Somavert (Pegvisomant for injection). Based on this and other discoveries, he created gene-deletion mice that include the growth hormone receptor knock-out and demonstrated the important role of the growth hormone/insulin-like growth factor-1 axis in longevity. William F. Young, Jr., M.D., M.Sc. – Outstanding Leadership in Endocrinology Award. This annual award recognizes outstanding leadership in fundamental or clinical endocrinology. Young is Professor of Medicine and holds the endowed Tyson Family Endocrinology Clinical Professorship at the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine in Rochester, Minn. Young has pioneered a new paradigm to detect and successfully manage primary aldosteronism-;the world’s most common cause of curable hypertension. As Endocrine Society President (2012-2013), he founded the Highlights of ENDO program that brings presentations to professional meetings in Asia, the Americas and Europe. He also served the endocrine community as the inaugural chair of the Endocrinology Specialty Board at the American Board of Internal Medicine (2014-2018). Dolores J. Lamb, Ph.D., H.C.L.D. – Outstanding Mentor Award. This annual award recognizes a career commitment to mentoring and a significant positive impact on mentees’ education and career. Lamb is the Vice Chair for Research in the Department of Urology, Director of the Center for Reproductive Genomics, and the Dow Professor of Urology at Weill Cornell Medical College in New York, N.Y. She has served as the primary mentor for ten Ph.D. students, 17 post-doctoral and nearly 100 clinical research fellows working in diverse areas of the endocrine control of male reproductive development and function. Nine of Lamb’s trainees are now department chairs in the United States and abroad. She also serves as the principal investigator for training grants to support research career development and male reproductive health research. Ian D. Hay, M.D., Ph.D. – Outstanding Scholarly Physician Award. This annual award recognizes outstanding contributions to the practice of clinical endocrinology in academic settings. Since 1983, Hay has been a consultant in the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes, Metabolism, and Nutrition at the Mayo Clinic in Rochester, Minn. He is the Doctor Richard F. Emslander Professor of Endocrine Research and a Professor Medicine in the Mayo Clinic College of Medicine. An icon in the thyroid cancer field for the past three decades, Hay has made enormous contributions with his work on outcome prediction in papillary thyroid carcinoma (PTC). His studies have examined patient outcomes and identified patient and tumor prognostic variables relevant to postoperative tumor recurrence and cause-specific mortality. In 2018, he published an eight-decade study of 4,432 PTC patients, which demonstrated that advances in biochemistry and imaging introduced to practice since 1976 have not improved outcomes in either children or the 85 percent of adult patients who have low-risk PTC treated during 1976-2015, when compared to an earlier cohort treated during 1936-1975. Patrick Seale, Ph.D. – Richard E. Weitzman Outstanding Early Career Investigator Award. This annual award recognizes an exceptionally promising young clinical or basic investigator. As Associate Professor of Cell and Development Biology at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia, Pa., Seale has established himself as a leading investigator in the area of adipocyte biology and metabolic disease. His studies have answered fundamental questions about the developmental origins of different types of adipocytes, transcriptional mechanisms of cell fate regulation, and the role of various adipocyte developmental programs in conditions such as aging, obesity and type 2 diabetes. His work has identified critical transcriptional mechanisms that control brown fat development and function. Cheryl Lyn Walker, Ph.D. – Roy O. Greep Award for Outstanding Research. This annual award recognizes meritorious contributions to research in endocrinology. Walker holds the Alkek Presidential Chair in Environmental Health at Baylor College of Medicine. Her studies have focused on elucidating mechanisms by which gene-environment and epigenome-environment interactions cause disease. She has made major contributions to our understanding of how environmental exposures, especially to endocrine-disrupting chemicals (EDCs), disrupt the epigenome and increase risk for hormone-dependent (and other) cancers. One of her most important contributions was the identification of a molecular mechanism for EDC-induced reprogramming of the epigenome of developing tissues to increase disease susceptibility later in life, a process known as developmental reprogramming. She is the founder of both the Center for Translational Environmental Health Research at Texas A&M University and the Center for Precision Environmental Health at Baylor College of Medicine, which she currently directs. In 2016, she was elected to the National Academy of Medicine. Carole R. Mendelson, Ph.D. – Sidney H. Ingbar Distinguished Service Award. This award recognizes distinguished service to the Endocrine Society and the field of endocrinology. Mendelson is Professor of Biochemistry and Obstetrics-Gynecology and Director of the North Texas March of Dimes Birth Defects Center at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center, Dallas, Texas. She has worked continuously and tirelessly for the Endocrine Society for more than 30 years, serving on the leadership Council and as Vice President, Basic Science. She served as chair and member of the Annual Meeting Steering Committee, the Education Committee, the Publications Committee, and the Nominations Committee. She was a member of the editorial boards of Endocrine Reviews and Molecular Endocrinology. She served as President of Women in Endocrinology when its mentorship program was created. Mendelson is involved with the Federation of America Societies for Experimental Biology (FASEB), currently serving on the Training and Career Opportunities subcommittee.
Healthcare budget cuts contribute significantly to resurgence of measles
Reviewed by Alina Shrourou, B.Sc. (Editor)Sep 12 2018Recent trends show that primary reason for the measles outbreak, affecting several European countries, is the decline in vaccination coverage, for which mainly the ‘spread of anti-scientific theories’ can be blamed. However, it turns out it is not the only one.A new study conducted by Bocconi scholars Veronica Toffolutti, Alessia Melegaro and David Stuckler, with Martin McKee (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine) and Walter Ricciardi (President, Istituto Superiore di Sanità) shows that cuts in public health expenditure also play an important role, with measles, mumps, rubella (MMR) vaccination coverage decreasing 0.5 percentage points for each 1% expenditure cut. The research is published in the European Journal of Public Health.The scholars compare MMR vaccination coverage at 24 months of age in 20 Italian regions with the respective per-capita annual real public health expenditure for the period 2000-2014, once considered the strength of the anti-vax movement.Related StoriesU.S. measles outbreak worst in 25 yearsHealthcare solutions of the future: Boehringer Ingelheim relies on digitalizationMeasles vaccination associated with health, schooling benefits among children”We observed that public health expenditure in Italy steadily rose from 2000 to 2009 at an average rate of 3.5% per year, while it dropped by about 2% per year between 2010 and 2014. Similarly, MMR coverage rose from 74.1% in 2000 to 90.6% in 2012, and then reversed its course, falling to 85.1% in 2014, far from the 95% herd immunity level”, Veronica Toffolutti says.Since the cuts varied across regions, the authors can compare the effects of different variations and find that the regions that suffered the greatest budget cuts also recorded the largest decrease in vaccination coverage, while the regions that managed to increase their healthcare budgets were even able to improve their MMR coverage. Valle d’Aosta, for instance, suffered a 6% drop in healthcare spending and a 11% decrease in MMR coverage, while Sardinia, with a 2% increase in spending, recorded an immunization increase of 3.8%.On average, a 0.5 percentage point decline in MMR coverage corresponds to a 1% cut in spending.”Our analysis suggests that austerity measures adopted in Italy contributed significantly to the resurgence of measles”, the authors write. “Italy is now addressing its low vaccination rate, by a combination of legislation and budgetary increases. It will be important to monitor these developments, not only to inform policy in Italy but across Europe where many countries now face similar problems”.Source: https://www.knowledge.unibocconi.eu/notizia.php?idArt=19888
Top stories Reversing autismlike symptoms quantum computers and fisheating spiders
The D-Wave computer, marketed as a groundbreaking quantum machine that runs circles around conventional computers, solves problems no faster than an ordinary rival, a new test shows. But D-Wave argues that the computations used in the study were too easy to show what its novel chips can do.Evidence mounts against new stem cell methodThe STAP controversy continues. Investigators have already documented plagiarism, image falsification, and other problems with two papers reporting that simply stressing adult cells could turn them into powerful stem cells called STAP cells. Now, genetic analysis of the cells has cast fresh doubts on the research and found potential evidence of inadvertent or deliberate switching of cellular material.Fossils put a new face on the ancestors of NeandertalsThe analysis of 17 430,000-year-old-skulls discovered in a Spanish burial pit is helping us uncover the murky origins of Neandertals, our closest cousins. The findings suggest that distinctive features we attribute to Neandertals evolved piecemeal and that some of these features were apparent a half-million years ago.BICEP2 paper published—with big caveatWhat was supposedly the biggest discovery in cosmology in a decade has finally been published—with one big caveat. In March, researchers working with BICEP2, a specialized telescope at the South Pole, reported finding the big bang’s “smoking gun.” But now, they admit that their results could be explained away by signals emanating from the dust within our galaxy.Fish-eating spiders more common than thoughtFish-eating spiders sound like something out of a nightmare, but until recently, scientists were pretty sure only a few species could do it. Now, with a little help from Google, we’ve discovered that at least 26 species of spiders know how to fish—and they live on every continent except Antarctica.Bear in NIH tree sets Twitter aflutterBudget cuts. Infectious disease. Bioterrorism. Just when the U.S. National Institutes of Health thought it had faced just about every conceivable problem, a black bear took shelter in one of the pine trees on its sprawling campus in Bethesda, Maryland. After setting Twitter and the local scientific community aflutter, the bear was eventually tranquilized and relocated. Sign up for our daily newsletter Get more great content like this delivered right to you! 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Required fields are indicated by an asterisk (*) Century-old drug reverses signs of autism in miceA single dose of a century-old drug has eliminated autism symptoms in adult mice with an experimental form of the disorder. The finding raises the hope that some hallmarks of autism may not be permanent, but could be correctable even in adulthood.Quantum computer runs no faster than a normal PC Email
Work focusing on the health of humans and of rivers nets 2015
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Country Email All three winners, appearing here today, thanked Japan Prize officials and the selection committees. But they all also expressed hope that the awards will highlight ongoing challenges in their respective fields. For gene therapy, “the path from concept to reality has not been straightforward and easy,” Friedmann said.The setbacks have included poor results from initial trials in the 1990s. And in 1999, a patient enrolled in a gene therapy trial in the United States died. It took several years for researchers in the field to address resulting safety and ethical questions. Fischer also suspended his gene therapy trials to solve safety issues. Research picked up again in the later 2000s, particularly with the use of new techniques for safely introducing the genes into the human body.At today’s press conference, both Friedmann and Fischer expressed confidence that their approach is on the cusp of mainstream clinical use. Recent advances “give us reasonable hope that gene therapy will enter the armamentarium” to treat genetic blood disorders, some cancers, and inherited diseases, Fischer said, adding: “We might be very close to approval by regulatory authorities.” He cautioned that the field still needs to prove itself. “The number of patients treated is limited and the follow-up short,” he said. Friedmann said he hopes the Japan Prize will “lead to greater awareness of the field.”As for his specialty, Takahasi said that although many lessons have been learned in watershed management, new challenges are emerging as global warming leads to changing rainfall patterns, more powerful typhoons, and other weather anomalies. He said he hopes Japan Prize recognition will get Japan and the world “to recognize the serious threat and come to grips with the new challenges.”The laureates will return to Tokyo in April for the ceremony. at which they will receive a certificate of recognition and a commemorative gold medal. Each prize category carries a cash award of approximately $420,000.Japan Prize topics are selected annually from within a range of disciplines gathered under two broad areas: physics, chemistry, and engineering; and life science, agriculture, and medicine. The categories for the 2016 prizes are “Materials and Production” and “Biological Production and Biological Environment.” The prize is intended to recognize individuals for scientific achievements that also promote peace and prosperity.
TOKYO—The winners of this year’s Japan Prizes are grateful for the awards, but also hope the recognition will further their scientific objectives in improving treatments for genetic disorders and reducing the toll from flood disasters. Theodore Friedmann of the University of California, San Diego, and Alain Fischer of the Imagine Institute in Paris and of the Collège de France will share the prize for “Medical Science and Medicinal Science.” Their winning work involved gene therapy, an experimental technique in which genes are inserted into patients to replace mutated genes that are causing disease. Friedmann is credited with originating the concept in the 1970s and furthering basic research. Fischer, in 2000, reported demonstrating the clinical efficacy of gene therapy for the first time, using blood stem cells to treat a fatal genetic disorder called X-linked severe combined immunodeficiency. “Gene therapy has become a reality in recent years with many cases of successful treatments; the field is flourishing,” said Hiroshi Komiyama, a chemical engineer and former president of the University of Tokyo who chaired the selection committee.Yutaka Takahasi, a professor emeritus of civil engineering at the University of Tokyo, convinced engineers and policymakers to look holistically at entire river basins and the hydrological cycle when attempting to control flooding, rather than simply building more dams and higher embankments, Komiyama explained. Takahasi is being recognized in the field of “Resources, Energy and Social Infrastructure.” Click to view the privacy policy. Required fields are indicated by an asterisk (*)
Dinosaurs may have danced like birds to woo mates
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LOCKLEY From their size and shape, Lockley thinks the traces were probably made by the meat-eating dinosaur Acrocanthosaurus, which lived about 110 million years ago and was one of the largest carnivores in the area at that time. It weighed as much as 6 metric tons, was up to 11 meters long, and sported a long, narrow skull and bony spines poking up from its vertebrae that probably supported a ridge made of tough muscle.Writing online today in Scientific Reports, the team argues that the scrapes closely resemble those made by ground nesting birds—such as the Atlantic puffin and some species of plovers and parrots—that engage in “very energetic” courtship displays, which include lots of prancing around and scratching the ground.“Birds seem to get in a frenzy of prenuptial, premating activity,” Lockley says, adding that the “bird literature actually speaks about peaks of emotional activity. It seems that [carnivorous] dinosaurs did the same.” Email Did meat-eating dinosaurs like Tyrannosaurus rex do a chicken dance to woo their mates? That’s the implication of a new study, which points to fossilized foot scrapes as evidence that a variety of dinosaurs pranced like parrots and puffins to impress the opposite sex. The finding adds further evidence that ancient dinos shared many of the same behaviors as their modern bird relatives.“Most or perhaps all of the behaviors present in birds today originated in nonbird dinosaurs,” says Darren Naish, a paleontologist at the University of Southampton in the United Kingdom. “If these scrape marks are really what the authors say they are, this study is pretty compelling support for that contention.”The scrape marks were uncovered at four sites in Colorado by a team led by Martin Lockley, a paleontologist at the University of Colorado, Denver. Three of the sites are in western Colorado, and one is in the east of the state. All contain sediments of the Dakota Sandstone, a geological formation laid down during the Cretaceous period, which stretched from about 145 million to 66 million years ago. The largest of the four sites, in western Colorado, features some 60 scrapes on a sandstone surface measuring about 50 meters long and 15 meters wide. Most of the scrapes are made up of parallel double gouges in the ground, and some also include the clear outlines of three-toed footprints. Co-authors Martin Lockley (right) and Ken Cart pose next to scrape marks made by meat-eating dinosaurs. Co-authors Martin Lockley (right) and Ken Cart pose next to scrape marks made by meat-eating dinosaurs. These included the possibility that the scrape marks were made while dinos were digging for food or water, while marking territory, or even while building nests or gathering in colonies. Only the courtship display hypothesis, the researchers concluded, was consistent with all of the features of the scrape marks, such as their abundance, spacing, and density on the ground.The traces “do not seem connected to nest building, burrowmaking, or finding food and water,” agrees Anthony Martin, a paleontologist at Emory University in Atlanta. “So wooing traces are a good explanation, especially when compared to modern bird traces. They also tell us how much energy dinosaurs put into wooing a potential mate, which they apparently did by feeling the earth move under their feet.”Naish adds that although he was “initially extremely skeptical” when he first started reading the paper, he now thinks that “they may well be on to something.” But he says he still wonders “if there’s an explanation the authors might have missed.”For example, the scrape marks could have been made when meat-eating predators, such as the mighty Acrocanthosaurus, scraped their powerful hind legs on the ground to make noise and warn other males—of either the same or a different species—to stay away, says Timothy Isles, a paleobiologist at the University of Portsmouth in the United Kingdom. An even bigger problem, he says, is that competitive displays by male birds seeking to mate with females are “only observed in a small number of species around the world.” That makes it less likely, he says, that the behavior was “widespread and ubiquitous” in their extinct dinosaur ancestors.
Six finalists to compete for Open Science Prize
Six teams of researchers each received $80,000 today for reaching the final stage of a competition to design tools to help scientists and citizens worldwide harness and process the increasingly vast quantities of biomedical data.“These innovations illustrate how new knowledge can be derived from existing data sources to advance our understanding of issues such as clinical trials, environmental exposures, and neuroscience,” said Philip Bourne, associate director for data science at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) in Bethesda, Maryland, which launched the Open Science Prize last fall in collaboration with the Wellcome Trust research charity in London.The six finalists—chosen from 96 entries from multinational teams—will have until 1 December to develop and refine prototypes of their projects. The public will then be invited to vote on them, and the winner will be announced early next year. The winner will receive $230,000. Click to view the privacy policy. Required fields are indicated by an asterisk (*) Sign up for our daily newsletter Get more great content like this delivered right to you! Country “These guys are examples of how research can be changed through the use of open data,” said NIH’s Elizabeth Kittrie, who is advising on the competition. Email
Making connections is at the heart of MyGene2, one of the six finalists. The idea was born out of the frustration that Mike Bamshad and Jessica Chong, genetics researchers at the University of Washington, Seattle, encountered among parents of children with rare genetic conditions and researchers studying those conditions. Because some genetic mutations can be found in only a handful of people in the world, and because medical privacy laws often prevent sharing identifying information, researchers looking to study rare genetic conditions can have difficulty forging alliances—and parents can be left without a diagnosis or support network.To ease the process of making connections, MyGene2’s website can “translate” parents’ descriptions of a condition’s symptoms into standard medical terminology, making it easier for parents and researchers to connect it to others on the site. “This is an attempt to democratize the process for families,” Bamshad said, describing MyGene2 as a spiritual successor to a previous NIH campaign that funded smaller genome research centers.Families are able to put as much or as little identifying information as they want on the site, which was developed together with Australia’s Garvan Institute of Medical Research in Darlinghurst. They also can choose whether to allow themselves to be contacted by researchers. More than 100 families have uploaded profiles since the site’s launch less than 2 months ago, and Chong anticipates many more families signing up as they become aware of it. “Some of the families have said repeatedly that there’s no one in the world who’s more devoted to finding an answer for their kid or themselves than themselves,” Chong said.With their $80,000 award, Bamshad, Chong, and their partners plan to add tools to MyGene2 for families who want to personally analyze their children’s genomes, and to join the Matchmaker Exchange, a collaboration of universities and foundations to match the genomes of people with rare diseases.Today’s other finalists include: OpenAQ, a project to build a hub for real-time air quality from around the world; OpenTrialsFDA, an effort to make the Food and Drug Administration’s drug approval evaluation packages more easily accessible to the public; a project to help doctors and researchers track outbreaks of Zika, Ebola, and other pandemics in real time; Open Neuroimaging Laboratory, a project to allow scientists to share and annotate brain imaging data from around the world; and Fruit Fly Brain Observatory, a project aiming to help researchers model neurological diseases better by linking data from experiments on fruit fly brains from around the world. 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Astronomers measure the mass of a star—thanks to an old tip from
Click to view the privacy policy. Required fields are indicated by an asterisk (*) But Einstein also predicted that if the source of the light and light-bending star are not in exact alignment, the bending will cause the source star to appear to move when viewed from Earth. The size of that shift tells scientists the light-bending star’s mass. The effect is so tiny and the likelihood of such a near-alignment so rare, Einstein thought it could never be done.But a team of astronomers from the United States, the United Kingdom, and Canada had a hunch that the keen-eyed view of the Hubble Space Telescope might be able to detect such a shift. They started by looking for stars that might be coming into alignment, and found that Stein 2051 B—a white dwarf just 18 light-years from Earth—was due to pass almost directly in front of another star in March 2014. When it did, the team captured the slightest shifts in position of the background star. That shift let the team calculate that Stein 2051 B’s mass is about two-thirds the mass of the sun, 0.675 solar masses, they report today in Science.But this was more than just a skillful demonstration of a new technique. Stein 2051 B is something of an enigma for specialists in white dwarfs, the husks left behind when stars have burned up all their fuel. (This fate awaits 97% of stars, including the sun.) From observations of its size, temperature, and the light it emits, researchers had estimated that Stein 2051 B was a particular variety of white dwarf that should weigh about 0.67 solar masses. But, using the method to measure mass through binary stars, other researchers had paired it with another nearby star, Stein 2051 A, and had calculated a weight of just 0.5 solar masses. The latest calculation puts Stein 2051 B’s mass exactly where it should be, and it also casts doubt on the idea that A and B are actually a binary pair. “It’s a nice addition to our understanding of white dwarf composition,” Barstow says.Astronomer Markus Hundertmark of the University of Heidelberg in Germany says that simply the detection of such a shift would have deserved publication in its own right. “Measuring the mass of a nearby white dwarf seems to make the result even better, and at first glance it is a surprising discovery.”The technique’s application seems limited at the moment, because the near-alignment of stars is so rare, but that will change next year when the second star catalog from the European Space Agency’s Gaia satellite is released, giving exact positions and motions of many thousands of stars. “It’s likely we’ll find many more examples to pursue,” Barstow says. The new result “seems to be a most curious effect,” says team member Martin Dominik of the University of St. Andrews in the United Kingdom, but it will “turn into a quite useful astrophysical technique sooner rather than later.” Country * Afghanistan Aland Islands Albania Algeria Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Indian Ocean Territory Brunei Darussalam Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia Comoros Congo Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Cook Islands Costa Rica Cote d’Ivoire Croatia Cuba Curaçao Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guatemala Guernsey Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard Island and McDonald Islands Holy See (Vatican City State) Honduras Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran, Islamic Republic of Iraq Ireland Isle of Man Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jersey Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Korea, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Republic of Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Lao People’s Democratic Republic Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macao Macedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Mexico Moldova, Republic of Monaco Mongolia Montenegro Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island Norway Oman Pakistan Palestine Panama Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Pitcairn Poland Portugal Qatar Reunion Romania Russian Federation Rwanda Saint Barthélemy Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Martin (French part) Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa San Marino Sao Tome and Principe Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Sint Maarten (Dutch part) Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands South Sudan Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syrian Arab Republic Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania, United Republic of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Vietnam Virgin Islands, British Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe By Daniel CleryJun. 7, 2017 , 11:15 AM Weighing a star is hard. In fact, binary stars are the only ones scientists can directly gauge, because their orbits around each other reveal their masses. Now, a team of astronomers has succeeded in measuring the mass of an isolated star using a technique first suggested by Albert Einstein in 1936. The method exploits the fact that a large mass, like a star, can bend the path of light. Although the effect is tiny, measuring the deflection can reveal the mass of the light-bending star. “This is a really elegant piece of work they’ve done,” says astronomer Martin Barstow of the University of Leicester in the United Kingdom, “and a nice echo of a century of general relativity.”Astronomers have seen many examples of gravity-bending light, including galaxies distorting images of even more distant ones, sometimes stretching them out into circular “Einstein rings.” In our own galaxy, when one star passes in front of another, astronomers see a brief brightening of the more distant one as the nearer star acts as a lens, bending more of its passing rays toward Earth. This effect, known as gravitational microlensing, has been used to detect exoplanets and search for dark matter, black holes, and brown dwarfs.
Email Sign up for our daily newsletter Get more great content like this delivered right to you! Country Astronomers measure the mass of a star—thanks to an old tip from Einstein
Can this environmental engineer—now elected mayor—fix Mexico City
Can this environmental engineer—now elected mayor—fix Mexico City? Country * Afghanistan Aland Islands Albania Algeria Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Indian Ocean Territory Brunei Darussalam Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia Comoros Congo Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Cook Islands Costa Rica Cote d’Ivoire Croatia Cuba Curaçao Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guatemala Guernsey Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard Island and McDonald Islands Holy See (Vatican City State) Honduras Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran, Islamic Republic of Iraq Ireland Isle of Man Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jersey Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Korea, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Republic of Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Lao People’s Democratic Republic Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macao Macedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Mexico Moldova, Republic of Monaco Mongolia Montenegro Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island Norway Oman Pakistan Palestine Panama Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Pitcairn Poland Portugal Qatar Reunion Romania Russian Federation Rwanda Saint Barthélemy Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Martin (French part) Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa San Marino Sao Tome and Principe Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Sint Maarten (Dutch part) Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands South Sudan Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syrian Arab Republic Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania, United Republic of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Vietnam Virgin Islands, British Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe Hazel Cárdenas Click to view the privacy policy. Required fields are indicated by an asterisk (*) By Lizzie WadeJul. 2, 2018 , 10:50 AM “I just want to make a difference for the city I live in,” mayoral candidate Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo says. Update, 2 July 2018: Environmental engineer Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo won Mexico City’s mayoral election by a landslide on 1 July, earning nearly 50% of the vote in a field of 7 candidates. She will take office on 1 December. Here is our election preview story from 7 June:Este artículo está disponible en español.
Sign up for our daily newsletter Get more great content like this delivered right to you! Country MEXICO CITY—”Clau-dia! Clau-dia! Clau-dia!” The crowd swarms around the smiling woman, chanting her name as she makes her way from her car to the stage at a recent campaign rally in a ramshackle neighborhood of cinder block buildings. Voters jostle to clasp her hands, look in her eyes, and tell her about their troubles. Email The enthusiasm still astonishes Claudia Sheinbaum Pardo. “It’s like I’m an actress, or someone actually famous!” she says. Until 3 years ago, she worked quietly as an environmental engineer at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) here. Now, with a 20-point lead in the polls ahead of the 1 July elections, she seems set to become mayor of this city of nearly 9 million people. Sheinbaum Pardo considers herself a researcher first and foremost. Her work on energy science and engineering—with a focus on vehicle emissions and climate change mitigation—is respected both in Mexico and abroad, and she’s a member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences and a former member of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Many say she’s uniquely positioned to understand and tackle the myriad problems afflicting this megacity, especially its stuffed-to-the-gills public transportation, epic traffic snarls, and worsening water crisis. “I think she’s one of the few people who are aware of the major challenges of the city,” says David Bonilla, an economist who studies transportation at UNAM and the University of Oxford in the United Kingdom and has never collaborated with Sheinbaum Pardo. “I can’t think of somebody as knowledgeable as her in public policy [in Mexico].”Critics worry about Sheinbaum Pardo’s close ties with Andrés Manuel López Obrador, a leftist populist and the leading candidate in Mexico’s presidential election, also taking place on 1 July. She first entered government in 2000, when López Obrador was mayor of Mexico City and appointed her environmental minister. (They met through a family friend, and she shared his progressive politics.) When he founded the National Regeneration Movement in 2014, she followed him to the new party.Critics liken López Obrador to the late Venezuelan President Hugo Chávez and warn he will weaken Mexico’s economy by scaring away investment, but he remains wildly popular here. Sheinbaum Pardo speaks highly of his administrative experience and progressive policies. She acknowledges that voters here “see me as a reflection of him,” which partially explains her own popularity.Yet she has even deeper ties to science. Her mother is a chemist, now emerita at UNAM; her brother, a physicist, helped convince her to study physics as an undergraduate student at UNAM in the 1980s. She completed master’s and doctorate degrees in energy engineering, also at UNAM. The combination prepared her well for policymaking, she says. “Training in physics makes you always look for the root causes. Why is something happening? That’s fundamental for politics,” she says. “And then engineering is much more focused on the ‘how.’ How can I solve it?”Sheinbaum Pardo spent 4 years as a Ph.D. student at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in Berkeley, California, comparing energy consumption in Mexico and other industrialized countries. She “has always approached her academic research work with keen curiosity, intense motivation … and a commitment to use information and analysis to inform evidence-based public policy,” says Berkeley Lab energy scientist Lynn Price, with whom she has collaborated. In 1995, Sheinbaum Pardo joined the faculty at UNAM’s Institute of Engineering.After she became Mexico City’s environment minister 5 years later, she oversaw two major transportation projects: the introduction of the Metrobus, a rapid transit bus with dedicated lanes; and the construction of the second story of the Periférico, Mexico City’s ring road. When López Obrador narrowly lost the 2006 presidential election, Sheinbaum Pardo returned to UNAM. She published in top journals, co-authored sections of IPCC’s fourth and fifth assessment reports, and doubled down on researching what Adalberto Noyola Robles, a fellow UNAM environmental engineer, calls the “truly unimaginable” number of problems in Mexico City, which has a metropolitan population of more than 20 million people. She saw the city’s water crisis up close when she re-entered city politics in 2015 as the president of Tlalpan, a southern city district where taps routinely run dry.Now, Sheinbaum Pardo is making water and mobility centerpieces of her campaign. Mexico City occupies a former lake, drained by the Spanish during the colonial period. Today, urban sprawl has covered almost the entire former lakebed, and most of the city’s water is pumped from beneath it. “We’ve overexploited the aquifer, and as a result, the city is sinking,” Sheinbaum Pardo says.The unstable ground makes earthquakes more dangerous; during the destructive temblor on 19 September 2017, an elementary school collapsed in Tlalpan. Previous administrations have postponed tackling the problem, says Noyola Robles, a water expert. “Claudia understands the issue. I think her proposals will be solid and feasible.” She has proposed overhauling the distribution network to fix a plague of leaks, building treatment plants to recycle water, investigating sources of water outside the city, and subsidizing rainwater collection systems.Mexico City also lags in public transportation. Those who can afford it buy cars; 70% of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions come from vehicles, Sheinbaum Pardo says. She proposes investing in bus lines, light-rail trains, and even cable cars, while reducing use of overcrowded informal systems, such as collective vans; she also wants stricter emission standards for cars. Both her transportation and water plans, she says, aim to reduce inequality in access and services.Sheinbaum Pardo’s academic background comes through in her detail-heavy presentations and stump speeches. Competing candidates have called her “arrogant.” Besides assailing her close ties to López Obrador, they point to the school collapse and increasingly visible drug crime in southern Mexico City as failings of her administration in Tlalpan. Still, a recent poll found that 40% of those surveyed planned to vote for her; the second and third place candidates didn’t crack 20%.Will Sheinbaum Pardo parlay her likely stint as mayor into a national political career? She won’t say, but insists that she would be happy to return to her research at UNAM. She continues to advise a handful of graduate students, squeezing in the work on Sunday afternoons. “I’m not particularly attracted to a political career,” she says. “I just want to make a difference for the city I live in.”
Is this monkey the inspiration for Dr Seusss Lorax
Ironically, given The Lorax’s strong conservation message, environmental changes have reduced the patas monkey’s range by half since 1991. Their primary food source—the acacias—are disappearing because of drought and land clearance for agriculture. In what the study’s authors call “a prophetic example of life imitating art imitating life,” the animal Geisel may have chosen to “speak for the trees” could one day exist only on the pages of his book. Theodor “Dr. Seuss” Geisel’s beloved picture-book ode to environmentalism is set in a fictional land of thneeds and truffula trees, but The Lorax may have a real-world counterpart. The orange, mustachioed titular character (pictured on the left, above) may have been based on the now-threatened patas monkey (Erythrocebus patas, shown at right), scientists report today.Geisel wrote 90% of The Lorax while visiting the Mount Kenya Safari Club in Nanyuki, a region inhabited by patas monkeys. The researchers have no direct proof that the author encountered the animal during his stay, but his autobiography mentions that he likened the shape of Kenyan trees to his own style of illustration. He also included an illustration of what could be a whistling thorn acacia (Acacia drepanolobium) in The Lorax—a tree the patas monkeys depend on for more than three-quarters of their diet.To make a stronger case, the researchers created mathematical models for the faces of several species of Kenyan monkeys. Next, they used an algorithm to group the faces based on the similarity of their features. The Lorax’s face most closely resembled that of the patas monkey, the team reports today in Nature Ecology & Evolution, as well as the blue monkey, another local species. The researchers say the Lorax’s voice, described in the book as a “sawdusty sneeze,” resembles patas monkeys’ wheezing alarm yell. Is this monkey the inspiration for Dr. Seuss’s Lorax? Click to view the privacy policy. Required fields are indicated by an asterisk (*) By Frankie SchembriJul. 23, 2018 , 11:00 AM Sign up for our daily newsletter Get more great content like this delivered right to you! Country Email (Left to right): UNIVERSAL PICTURES/Album/Alamy Stock Photo; Ondrej Prosicky/shutterstock Country * Afghanistan Aland Islands Albania Algeria Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Indian Ocean Territory Brunei Darussalam Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia Comoros Congo Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Cook Islands Costa Rica Cote d’Ivoire Croatia Cuba Curaçao Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guatemala Guernsey Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard Island and McDonald Islands Holy See (Vatican City State) Honduras Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran, Islamic Republic of Iraq Ireland Isle of Man Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jersey Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Korea, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Republic of Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Lao People’s Democratic Republic Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macao Macedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Mexico Moldova, Republic of Monaco Mongolia Montenegro Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island Norway Oman Pakistan Palestine Panama Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Pitcairn Poland Portugal Qatar Reunion Romania Russian Federation Rwanda Saint Barthélemy Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Martin (French part) Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa San Marino Sao Tome and Principe Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Sint Maarten (Dutch part) Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands South Sudan Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syrian Arab Republic Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania, United Republic of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Vietnam Virgin Islands, British Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe
African swine fever keeps spreading in Asia threatening food security
REUTERS/Kham A man transports piglets in Thanh Hoa province in Vietnam, a country heavily affected by African swine fever where pork accounts for three-quarters of the national meat consumption. African swine fever keeps spreading in Asia, threatening food security Email Sign up for our daily newsletter Get more great content like this delivered right to you! Country By Dennis NormileMay. 14, 2019 , 2:45 PM
Country * Afghanistan Aland Islands Albania Algeria Andorra Angola Anguilla Antarctica Antigua and Barbuda Argentina Armenia Aruba Australia Austria Azerbaijan Bahamas Bahrain Bangladesh Barbados Belarus Belgium Belize Benin Bermuda Bhutan Bolivia, Plurinational State of Bonaire, Sint Eustatius and Saba Bosnia and Herzegovina Botswana Bouvet Island Brazil British Indian Ocean Territory Brunei Darussalam Bulgaria Burkina Faso Burundi Cambodia Cameroon Canada Cape Verde Cayman Islands Central African Republic Chad Chile China Christmas Island Cocos (Keeling) Islands Colombia Comoros Congo Congo, the Democratic Republic of the Cook Islands Costa Rica Cote d’Ivoire Croatia Cuba Curaçao Cyprus Czech Republic Denmark Djibouti Dominica Dominican Republic Ecuador Egypt El Salvador Equatorial Guinea Eritrea Estonia Ethiopia Falkland Islands (Malvinas) Faroe Islands Fiji Finland France French Guiana French Polynesia French Southern Territories Gabon Gambia Georgia Germany Ghana Gibraltar Greece Greenland Grenada Guadeloupe Guatemala Guernsey Guinea Guinea-Bissau Guyana Haiti Heard Island and McDonald Islands Holy See (Vatican City State) Honduras Hungary Iceland India Indonesia Iran, Islamic Republic of Iraq Ireland Isle of Man Israel Italy Jamaica Japan Jersey Jordan Kazakhstan Kenya Kiribati Korea, Democratic People’s Republic of Korea, Republic of Kuwait Kyrgyzstan Lao People’s Democratic Republic Latvia Lebanon Lesotho Liberia Libyan Arab Jamahiriya Liechtenstein Lithuania Luxembourg Macao Macedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic of Madagascar Malawi Malaysia Maldives Mali Malta Martinique Mauritania Mauritius Mayotte Mexico Moldova, Republic of Monaco Mongolia Montenegro Montserrat Morocco Mozambique Myanmar Namibia Nauru Nepal Netherlands New Caledonia New Zealand Nicaragua Niger Nigeria Niue Norfolk Island Norway Oman Pakistan Palestine Panama Papua New Guinea Paraguay Peru Philippines Pitcairn Poland Portugal Qatar Reunion Romania Russian Federation Rwanda Saint Barthélemy Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha Saint Kitts and Nevis Saint Lucia Saint Martin (French part) Saint Pierre and Miquelon Saint Vincent and the Grenadines Samoa San Marino Sao Tome and Principe Saudi Arabia Senegal Serbia Seychelles Sierra Leone Singapore Sint Maarten (Dutch part) Slovakia Slovenia Solomon Islands Somalia South Africa South Georgia and the South Sandwich Islands South Sudan Spain Sri Lanka Sudan Suriname Svalbard and Jan Mayen Swaziland Sweden Switzerland Syrian Arab Republic Taiwan Tajikistan Tanzania, United Republic of Thailand Timor-Leste Togo Tokelau Tonga Trinidad and Tobago Tunisia Turkey Turkmenistan Turks and Caicos Islands Tuvalu Uganda Ukraine United Arab Emirates United Kingdom United States Uruguay Uzbekistan Vanuatu Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of Vietnam Virgin Islands, British Wallis and Futuna Western Sahara Yemen Zambia Zimbabwe Click to view the privacy policy. Required fields are indicated by an asterisk (*) SHANGHAI, CHINA—The spread of African swine fever (ASF) in Asia is taking a worrisome turn. First reported in northeastern China in August 2018, the highly contagious, often fatal pig disease quickly swept through the country, causing the death or culling of more than 1 million pigs. In recent weeks, it has jumped borders to Vietnam, Cambodia, Mongolia, Hong Kong, and possibly North Korea. Animal health experts agree that the disease will inevitably spread farther. And many of the newly hit countries are even less prepared to deal with ASF than China, they say, which has so far failed to end its outbreaks.Vietnam and Cambodia “probably do not have the technical abilities to be able to control ASF,” says François Roger, an animal epidemiologist at the French Agricultural Research Center for International Development in Montpellier. He believes the virus will soon surface in Myanmar and Laos, which have “weak veterinary infrastructures and surveillance systems,” and it may become endemic in Southeast Asia. If so, it would pose a continuing threat of reintroduction into China, even if that country succeeds in controlling its own outbreaks. A reservoir of endemic disease could also pose a wider threat: ASF-contaminated pork products have already been confiscated from air travelers in South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and Australia.The crisis is not only causing economic hardship, but also threatens food security in the region. In Vietnam, where pork accounts for three-quarters of the meat consumption, more than 1.2 million pigs across the country—4% of the national herd—have now died or been killed, the Vietnamese government announced on 13 May. “This is probably the most serious animal health disease [the world has] had for a long time, if not ever,” says Dirk Pfeiffer, a veterinary epidemiologist at City University of Hong Kong. ASF is harmless for humans but spreads rapidly among domestic pigs and wild boars through direct contact or exposure to contaminated feed and water. Farm workers can unwittingly carry the virus on shoes, clothing, vehicles, and machinery. It can survive in fresh and processed pork products; it is even resistant to some disinfectants.Endemic in most of Africa, the ASF virus jumped to the nation of Georgia in 2007 and has since spread through Russia. It probably entered China in imported pork products last summer. Infected animals suffer high fever, internal bleeding, and, most often, death, and there is no treatment. “There are promising vaccines under development,” says Yolanda Revilla of the Severo Ochoa Center for Molecular Biology in Madrid, who co-authored a recent review on ASF vaccines—but they’re still at least 3 or 4 years away from the market. Until then, reducing transmission is the only option.But keeping the virus at bay is fiendishly difficult given how small holders in Asia raise their pigs. Swill feeding—giving pigs kitchen and table waste in which the virus can persist—is “a common practice, but very high risk,” says Juan Lubroth, chief veterinarian at the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations’s (FAO’s) headquarters in Rome. Studies of 68 outbreaks in China concluded that 34% were caused by swill feeding, 46% by contaminated vehicles and workers, and 19% by the transport of live pigs and products.The Chinese government has banned the use of nonheated swill and doesn’t allow swill feeding at all in provinces with ongoing outbreaks. But convincing farmers to drop this and other risky practices is a challenge, Lubroth says.To stem outbreaks, China also culls all pigs in a 3-kilometer zone around an infected herd, sets up inspection and disinfection stations to control farm traffic within a 10-kilometer buffer zone, and closes live pig markets in the affected region. But how well such measures are protecting the country’s more than 400 million domestic pigs is unclear. The monthly number of new outbreaks reported to the Paris-based World Organisation for Animal Health peaked in October 2018 at 34, dropped to just four in January, but has gradually climbed since then, hitting 10 in April.Many observers believe other outbreaks go unreported. “Given the limited effectiveness of control tools, it just cannot be that they have been able to contain the disease,” Pfeiffer says. Chinese media have reported cases of dead pigs dumped in rivers and ditches. And some provinces may be ignoring outbreaks because provincial governments are partly responsible for compensating farmers for culled pigs. To be convinced China is making progress, “We would need to see detailed surveillance data, and detailed reports on each of the ‘resolved’ outbreaks,” Pfeiffer says. Rather than deliberately misinforming international animal health organizations, Pfeiffer suspects China’s veterinary infrastructure is simply overwhelmed.Even if it’s unsuccessful, China’s response might be hard for neighboring countries to match. The Vietnamese government recently acknowledged that many of the 29 affected provinces didn’t respond adequately because of a lack of funds and space to bury dead pigs, according to a Reuters report this week. “The world and Vietnam have never faced such an extremely dangerous, difficult, complicated and expensive [animal] epidemic as this,” agriculture minister Nguyen Xuan Cuong said in a 13 May statement. The government said it would enlist the military to help control the outbreak. In Cambodia, too, “There is limited knowledge and experience on preventing, detecting, and responding to outbreaks,” says Alexandre Huynh, FAO’s representative in Cambodia. “Human, financial, and material resources” are lacking as well, he adds.Ultimately, containing ASF will probably require a long and challenging restructuring of the hog industry so that only operators large enough to invest in biosecurity remain, Pfeiffer says. Lubroth adds that such a restructuring helped Spain and Portugal eradicate ASF after it became established there in the early 1960s—but the process took 35 years. The transition might be faster in China, with its resources and a powerful central government. But it could take many decades for its Asian neighbors to build a safer pig industry.
Kamala Harris Calls Out Joe Biden On Race
“I do not believe you are a racist,” Harris said directly to the former vice president. But she said his words were “hurtful” and said Biden worked with the late Mississippi Sen. James O. Eastland, a Democrat who made no secret that he was in favor of segregation, and Georgia Sen. Herman Talmadge, to oppose bussing students. There was also a report in the New York Times earlier this month claiming that Biden has embellished his civil rights record for decades. That report came as Biden was also coming under fire for authoring the same 1994 crime bill that Hillary Clinton’s opponents called her out for referencing “super predators” in what many people have said was a nod to the Black people who were disproportionately affected by the law.Then, most recently, Biden fondly recalled two racist former U.S. Senators during a speech in New York City on June 18. Defending the late Mississippi Sen. James O. Eastland, a Democrat who made no secret that he was in favor of segregation, Biden told the audience at the fundraiser that Eastland “never called me ‘boy.’” The remark that lacked full context — for starters, Eastland probably never called Biden “boy” because Biden isn’t Black — was followed by another that extended the same sentiment of “civility” to former Georgia Sen. Herman Talmadge.Throughout it all, Biden has maintained a strong level of endorsements from the Black community. “Senior members of the Congressional Black Caucus leaped to former Vice President Joe Biden’s defense,” Politico reported, with House Majority Whip James Clyburn, the highest-ranking African American in Congress, being the most vocal.SEE ALSO:Michigan Woman Claims She Was Told To Give Up Her Seat At A Bar For Two White MenBlack Man Who Wore MAGA Hat And Nearly Killed A Mexican Man Is Convicted Kamala Harris called out Joe Biden during the second Democratic debate about his recent comments citing the “civility” of two segregationist senators. 
Sen. Kamala Harris discusses race and calls out Joe Biden for opposing busing. “It cannot be an intellectual debate among Democrats,” she says, “we have to take it seriously.” #DemDebate2 pic.twitter.com/43Nzspluio— CNBC (@CNBC) June 28, 2019Harris said that she was actually bussed to school as a child, sop his words resonated deeply with her. Kamala Harris went for Biden’s jugular, others are coming for him. pic.twitter.com/CvO2XA7NsV— Rich Opara (@ripplo) June 28, 2019
This is how the Kamala Harris (Educated and well spoken offense) vs the Joe Biden (I have black friends I’m not racist-friendly defense) went in a nutshell. #DemDebate2 #KamalaHarris2020 pic.twitter.com/yNbHSqNE5r— Fearless/Lessfear (@Quotemeorelse) June 28, 2019Biden came in leading all Democratic candidates in polling, with his next nearest challenger still seven percentage points away from the former vice president. But Barack Obama’s former number two has still had more than his fair share of controversy during his third campaign for the White House.Biden’s role as chair of the House Judiciary Committee when Clarence Thomas was being confirmed for the Supreme Court instantly came back to haunt him after he announced his 2020 candidacy. the elder statesman of the Democratic Party has a long history on Capitol Hill that will certainly be dissected during the campaign season. One of them is how he handled Anita Hill when she testified at Clarence Thomas‘ confirmation hearing.Hill’s 1991 sexual harassment case against her then-boss Clarence Thomas after he was nominated to the Supreme Court had a seismic effect on women’s civil rights. Many felt that Biden allowed Hill to be attacked by a flock of old white men and never calling other witnesses to testify. She has said he has never apologized and given the recent opportunity to do so, Biden declined (refused?) again. Where All The Presidential Candidates Stand On Reparations, In Their Own Words 2020 Election , Democratic Debate , Joe Biden , Kamala Harris “That little girl was me.” Kamala Harris addressing Joe Biden’s association with segregationists. Live video: https://t.co/cmfepXuTHI pic.twitter.com/LOqDGwn1ev— NBC Bay Area (@nbcbayarea) June 28, 2019Biden pushed back before willingly stopping speaking: “My time is up,” he told NBC moderator Chuck Todd.It was a heated moment during the lively debate.READ MORE: Black Women Play Major Role At First Democratic Debate Without Them Actually Being ThereThe second Democratic debate featured the ten candidates who didn’t participate in the first installment the night before in Miami. It featured Colorado Sen. Michael Bennet, South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Biden, New York Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, California Sen. Kamala Harris, former Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, Andrew Yang, Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders, California Rep. Eric Swalwell and Marianne Williamson. 
Concealed Evidence Reminds How Cops Are Killing Blacks
One of my [many, many] fears coming from the election of Donald Trump was that the noise it created and the sheer amount of chaos and pain he’d cause would drown out some of the concerns of the most marginalized people among us. That concerns about police brutality, for instance, would get hidden under the shroud of, say, a potential mushroom cloud forming over us at any minute. I was afraid that the hashtags and awareness would fall farther down the proverbial newspaper front page as more headlines center on the 24/7 barrage of apocalyptic updates and covfefe tweets. Dear White People: Make Your White Friends Watch ‘When They See Us’ Sadly, those worries have proven to be necessary. While movements and organizers are as determined and focused as ever, marches haven’t stopped. Protests haven’t stopped, either. You can look at the way topics like police and prison reform have already been featured prominently as talking points for hopeful 2020 candidates to see the on-the-ground impacts of Black activism in America. However, with the mainstream media’s reticence to highlight these stories, it’s easy to believe that police brutality and Black folks unjustly being killed at the hands of police aren’t as big of an issue anymore. That’s simply not true. And if you needed any reminder of the omnipresent danger Black folks continue to be in at the hands of police, just look at the new developments from the Sandra Bland and Oscar Grant cases. Black Lives Matter , Oscar Grant , Police Killings , Sandra Bland Sudan Is Burning But People Don’t Care Because It’s Not A Cathedral In 2015, Sandra Bland was pulled over for apparently failing to signal. Dashcam video footage showed the arresting officer, Brian Encinia, pointing a taser at her. Three days later, Bland was found hanged in her jail cell. Her death was ruled a suicide. Of course, there’s been suspicion about the circumstances of her death for four years. Just a few days ago, we finally got the point of view from Bland’s own cell phone. In the video we see that the officer was aggressive with her from the beginning, pointing his taser at her and threatening her, contradicting his own claims that he feared for his life.Sandra Bland should be alive. Oscar Grant should be alive. The new evidence of both of their deaths only illuminates those facts. The new evidence shows that these two innocent people were accosted and victimized by police. We have videos. We have testimony. We have the truth.I hope that the new information we have that affirms what we already thought about Grant and Bland and the circumstances surrounding their deaths, serve an important purpose of reminding us that Black lives are still in danger. And police are putting these lives in danger. Just because these cases aren’t headlining CNN anymore doesn’t mean they aren’t still happening at the same rate. Which means it’s on us – Black outlets, Black activists and Black readers – to be as loud as we can about these injustices.For instance, last week 21-year-old William Devaughn Smith was approached by police because he was a suspect in a robbery. Taking the ever-so-common (especially when Black folks are involved) approach of shooting first and asking questions later, the police fired into Devaughn’s car in broad daylight. As a result, three boys were shot. Their ages: five, four and one. Is this the first time you’re hearing about this story? We have to remember that mass murderers and domestic terrorists are constantly being taken into custody unscathed, let alone alive. Meanwhile, police are shooting Black babies when they approach Black suspects. It hasn’t changed since Sandra. Since Oscar. Since forever. So while we are gasping for air under a tidal wave of unending existential threats to our very existence, it’s always important to be reminded that the most central threat to black folks in the American experience – that being the fact so many white folks want us dead – has never gone away. And we have to believe that those who want us dead are more emboldened by the lack of headlines about killing us that pop up on TV as well as the unflinching support of a president who sides with their bigotry.Sandra Bland should be alive right now. Oscar Grant should be alive right now. And every day we add more Black folks to that list of people who would be alive if not for the American police forces. We can’t stop saying their names because if we don’t, no one else will.David Dennis, Jr. is a writer and adjunct professor of Journalism at Morehouse College. David’s writing has appeared in The Guardian, The Smoking Section, Uproxx, Playboy, The Atlantic, Complex.com and wherever people argue about things on the internet.SEE ALSO:‘Cancel Culture’ Is A Myth To Silence Marginalized VoicesWhere Are Black Writers Covering Game Of Thrones?
62 Black Men And Boys Killed By Police More By daviddtss Stop Telling Black Folks To Settle For A Candidate Just To Beat Trump In 2020 The newly surfaced video of Sandra Bland filming her own arrest was the final piece of proof for some people who say she did not commit suicide in jail.https://t.co/pWYJchkIBv— NewsOne (@newsone) May 9, 2019Oscar Grant was one of the first and most infamous cases of a Black man murdered by police in the social media era. The 2009 killing, immortalized the 2013 movie “Fruitvale Station,” was filmed on camera phones and quickly spread across the internet. In the video, we see a cop, Anthony Pirone, pinning Grant to the ground before another officer, Johannes Mehserle, fatally shoots him and point blank range. A report from the killing released last weekend revealed that Pirone lied about what happened in the incident. According to the report, Pirone called Grant the N-word. He also lied and said Grant kicked him and his partner. The details of Grant’s murder has now become even more devastating and nefarious than previously believed. 
Helicopter Crashes On Top Of NYC Skyscraper
Source: JOHANNES EISELE / GettyA helicopter crashed into the top of a skyscraper in New York City on Tuesday afternoon, evoking still raw emotions in a city that was still on edge following the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks nearly two decades ago. The midtown Manhattan building is located at 787 Seventh Avenue and the crash took place around 2 p.m. EDT. SUBSCRIBE NEW: Video shows helicopter flying erratically before crashing on the top of a high-rise building in New York City pic.twitter.com/Nd2w39up1Q— BNO News (@BNONews) June 10, 2019According to the Associated Press, the person who died was the helicopter’s pilot and it did not appear that anyone else was on board.“Gov. Andrew Cuomo told reporters that a fire began when the aircraft hit, but it is under control,” the AP reported. “Cuomo said it shook the building. He said there are no reports of injuries of people in the tower.”
Source: JOHANNES EISELE / Getty A Disturbing Timeline Of 4-Year-Old Maleah Davis Going Missing After Being Left With Her Stepfather Entertainment, News and Lifestyle for Black America. News told by us for us. Black America’s #1 News Source: Our News. Our Voice.
Thanks for signing up! Get ready for Exclusive content, Interviews,and Breaking news delivered direct to your inbox. Get ready for Exclusive content, Interviews,and Breaking news delivered direct to your inbox. 787 7th ave, #midtown NYC. We’re 1 block south. 20 mins ago there was a loud sound like a too-low #helicopter & I looked up and saw sheet of flame on roof and then smoke. News reports saying helicopter/small plane crash onto roof which would be consistent with what I heard/saw. pic.twitter.com/swY3ksLskH— Lance Koonce (@LHKoonce) June 10, 2019CNN reported on live TV that at least one person has died, but there was no immediate indication that it could be terror-related.BNO News tweeted video footage of what it said showed the helicopter flying “erratically” shortly before it crashed. The New York Times reported that Cuomo also made a reference to the past terrorism that has happened in New York City.“If you’re a New Yorker, you have a level of P.T.S.D., right, from 9/11,’’ Cuomo said. “I remember that morning all too well.”Witnesses said they were startled by the crash.“We heard an explosion — it sounded like a manhole cover had exploded,’’ Andrew Heath, who was working inside the building where the helicopter crashed, told the Times. “I heard and felt it. It was like a thud. I was wondering if a really heavy truck was driving by, but it was a little too much.’’About 100 fire and emergency response units were on the building, also called the AXA Equitable Center, between 51st and 52nd Streets. The skyscraper that was built in 1985 has 51 stories and stands 752 feet tall.“The helicopter made a hard landing onto the roof of the building, said a fire official,” ABC News reported about the cause of the crash.
Source: JOHANNES EISELE / GettyIt was unclear if the weather was a factor, but it’s been steadily raining in the city since late morning.It was also unclear whether the helicopter was owned by the city or if it was related to tourism.SEE ALSO:Wendy Williams Bursts Into Tears Over Divorce: ‘I Would Ask You To Respect Our Privacy But I Don’t’‘Disgusting’ Cop Forces Mom To Rape Her Own Baby Under Threat Of Arrest For Parking Ticket helicopter crash , Midtown Manhattan , NYC