Life

Experts probe obesity link to severe virus response

by Kelly MACNAMARA PARIS, France (AFP) — Inflammatory and immune responses linked to obesity could help explain the likelihood of a more severe outcome among patients with Covid-19, European experts said Wednesday. As the new coronavirus has spread, killing more than 800,000 people globally, it has become increasingly clear that co-morbidities put patients at greater risk. In a presentation at European and International Congress on Obesity, researchers said that inflamation caused by a buildup of […]

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Toxic liquid leaks into Paris river from cement plant

PARIS, France (AFP) — Hundreds of litres of toxic wastewater have leaked into Paris’ Seine River from a plant belonging to Franco-Swiss cement giant Lafarge-Holcim, local reports said, sparking outrage from French officials. Lafarge acknowledged the spillage but insisted it had been the result of sabotage, rather than an intentional act by the company. The contaminated liquid is composed of a mixture of cement, wastewater treatment liquid and plastic microfibres and comes from a Lafarge […]

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Zimbabwe to return land to farmers protected by investment deals

HARARE, Zimbabwe (AFP) — Zimbabwe said Tuesday that only foreign farmers protected by international investment treaties qualified to retrieve land seized by the government two decades ago. Former president Robert Mugabe launched land reforms in 2000, grabbing parcels from 4,000 white farmers on the grounds that he was reversing historical land ownership imbalances that favoured the minority whites. On Monday, the government said white farmers could apply to regain the titles to their land. Information ministry […]

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Brazilian Amazon fires near level of 2019 crisis

SAO PAULO, Brazil (AFP) — The number of fires in the Brazilian Amazon last month was the second-highest in a decade for August, nearing the crisis levels that unleashed a flood of international condemnation last year, official figures showed Tuesday. Fires meanwhile tripled year-on-year in the Pantanal, the world’s largest tropical wetlands, according to data based on satellite images from Brazil’s national space agency, causing alarm on a new front. Despite guarantees from President Jair […]

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Chinese bus offers new evidence of airborne coronavirus spread: study

WASHINGTON D.C., United States (AFP) — A person on a poorly ventilated Chinese bus infected nearly two dozen other passengers with coronavirus even though many weren’t sitting close by, according to research published on Tuesday that offers fresh evidence the disease can spread in the air. Health authorities had initially discounted the possibility that simply breathing could send infectious micro-droplets into the air, but did a U-turn as experts piled on pressure and evidence mounted. […]

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Study shows how masks with valves and face shields allow spread of virus

WASHINGTON D.C., United States (AFP) — People wearing plastic face shields or masks fitted with a valve can spray invisible droplets over a very wide area when they sneeze or cough, making the devices ineffective at preventing the spread of coronavirus when used on their own, a simulation model shows. In a report published Tuesday in the US journal Physics of Fluids, researchers at Florida Atlantic University used vertical and horizontal laser sheets to track […]

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Climate change fuels sharp increase in glacier lakes

by Marlowe HOOD Agence France-Presse PARIS, France (AFP) — The volume of lakes formed as glaciers worldwide melt due to climate change has jumped by 50 percent in 30 years, according to a new study based on satellite data. “We have known that not all meltwater is making it into the oceans immediately,” lead author Dan Shugar, a geomorphologist and associate professor at the University of Calgary, said in a statement. “But until now there […]

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WHO urges ‘dialogue’ with virus protesters

  by Nina LARSON Agence France Presse GENEVA, Switzerland (AFP) — The World Health Organization urged governments Monday to engage with people demonstrating against Covid-19 restrictions and listen to their concerns, but stressed protesters needed to understand the virus was dangerous. Asked about recent demonstrations in a number of countries against coronavirus restrictions, WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said it was important to “listen to what people are asking, what people are saying”. “We should […]

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Earth’s ice sheets tracking worst-case climate scenarios

by Marlowe HOOD PARIS, France (AFP) — The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets, which hold enough frozen water to lift oceans 65 metres, are tracking the UN’s worst-case scenarios for sea level rise, researchers said Monday, highlighting flaws in current climate change models. Mass loss from 2007 to 2017 due to melt-water and crumbling ice aligned almost perfectly with the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change’s (IPCC) most extreme forecasts, which see the two ice sheets […]

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Junk food linked to age-marker in chromosomes: study

  by Marlowe HOOD Agence France Presse PARIS, France (AFP) — People who eat a lot of industrially processed junk food are more likely to exhibit a change in their chromosomes linked to ageing, according to research presented Tuesday at an online medical conference. Three or more servings of so-called “ultra-processed food” per day doubled the odds that strands of DNA and proteins called telomeres, found on the end of chromosomes, would be shorter compared […]

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Musk shows off progress merging brains and machines

  by Glenn CHAPMAN Agence France Presse Futurist entrepreneur Elon Musk late Friday demonstrated progress made by his Neuralink startup in meshing brains with computers, saying the work is essential to the future of humanity. Musk has long contended that a neural lace merging minds with machines is vital if people are going to avoid being so outpaced by artificial intelligence that, under the best of circumstances, humans would be akin to “house cats.” “It’s […]

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Landmark protest in Mauritius over giant oil spill

PORT LOUIS, Mauritius (AFP) — Tens of thousands of Mauritians protested Saturday in the capital Saint-Louis over the government’s handling of a giant oil spill off its pristine Indian Ocean coast. The Japanese bulk carrier MV Wakashio crashed into a reef off southeastern Mauritius last month spewing more than 1,000 tonnes of oil into waters that are home to mangrove forests and endangered species. After the boat split in two, the larger piece was towed […]

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