03.31.14
Health and Environment News: Nature Still Not a Priority
Health and Nutrition
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Surgeons perform ‘world’s first’ implant of entire 3D-printed plastic skull dome (VIDEO)
Dutch surgeons have successfully placed an entire 3D-printed skull dome over the brain of a 22-year-old woman suffering from a rare bone disorder. Doctors say this surgery is unprecedented.
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Homeopathic remedies recalled for containing real medicine
The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) has recalled homeopathic remedies made by a company called Terra-Medica because they may contain actual medicine — possibly penicillin or derivatives of the antibiotic.
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7 million premature deaths annually linked to air pollution
In new estimates released today, WHO reports that in 2012 around 7 million people died – one in eight of total global deaths – as a result of air pollution exposure. This finding more than doubles previous estimates and confirms that air pollution is now the world’s largest single environmental health risk. Reducing air pollution could save millions of lives.
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Over 168,000 Gallons of Oil Spills into Ecologically Sensitive Galveston Bay
A barge moving through Galveston Bay collided with another ship Saturday afternoon, spilling over 168,000 gallons of marine fuel oil. The spill is particularly devastating, even though it isn’t the largest in recent memory, because Galveston Bay is a migratory bird habitat and shorebird season is fast approaching. On top of that, the type of fuel that spilled is particularly difficult to clean up. The ship was being towed when it collided with the other vessel, though there are no details at this point on how the collision occurred.
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U.S. fisheries dump 500 million pounds of bycatch back to the ocean annually: Report
Seafood is an integral part of American cuisine. However, the ocean pays a steep price for every plate of tuna sashimi and every serving of grilled salmon that Americans consume.
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Information poses bigger bioterrorism threat than microbes
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Thanks, Anti-Vaxxers. You Just Brought Back Measles in NYC.
Measles was considered eliminated at the turn of the millennium. Now it’s back, thanks to the loons who refuse to vaccinate their children.
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With confirmed resistance, western corn rootworm worthy of being watched
It isn’t an epidemic and it won’t shut down corn production anytime soon. However, researchers have confirmed that western corn rootworms have developed resistance to Bt corn hybrids that express the Cry3Bba trait in some areas of Nebraska.
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Open Source Seeds
Open-source software is now everywhere. For example, Android, Google’s open-source operating system, now accounts for 80% of the smartphone and tablet market. Our next guest dreams of the same kind of explosive success by applying the open-source model to one of humanity’s oldest technological achievements: agriculture. Jack Kloppenburg, a professor of community and environmental sociology at the University of Wisconsin, co-founded the Open Source Seed Initiative to help protect the public domain of seeds. He joined the Buzz on Monday, March 30th to tell us more about the project.
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Scientists’ hidden links to the GM food giants
He is group director at the Sainsbury Laboratory, and is also the founder of and adviser to biotech company Mendel Biotechnology, which counts Monsanto – a GM giant – as a major client. Mendel has been granted more than 20 biotechnology and GM patents.
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CropLife America and the European Crop Protection Association discuss joint proposal during TTIP negotiations
CropLife America (CLA) and the European Crop Protection Association (ECPA) called for a more harmonized risk assessment framework for pesticide regulations during the fourth round of negotiations of the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). The comments follow the submission of a joint proposal on U.S. – EU regulatory cooperation that CLA and ECPA sent to Assistant United States Trade Representative Daniel Mullaney and Director of DG Trade for the European Commission Ignacio Garcia Bercero on March 7, 2014.
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Watch an expert teach a smug U.S. senator about Canadian healthcare
A U.S. politician’s I-don’t-need-no-stinkin’-facts approach to health policy ran smack into some of those troublesome facts Tuesday at a Senate hearing on single-payer healthcare, as it’s practiced in Canada and several other countries.
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MEPs reject draft seed regulation
The European Commission’s proposal for plant reproductive material law, also known as the “seed regulation”, was voted down by Parliament on Tuesday, amid concerns that it would give the Commission too much power and leave EU countries without any leeway to tailor the new rules to their needs. Following the Commission’s refusal to withdraw its draft text and table an improved one, Parliament closed the first reading.
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GM foods and application of the precautionary principle in Europe
European regulations restricting the growth of genetically modified (GM) foods in the UK and across the continent are to be scrutinised in a new cross-party parliamentary inquiry launched today by MPs on the Science and Technology Committee.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) believes that GM is one of several technologies necessary to foster a “vibrant sector” in UK agriculture. But the European Union’s application of the ‘precautionary principle’ has been criticized for holding back development of the technology, despite European Commission reports finding no scientific evidence associating GM organisms with higher risks for the environment or food and feed safety.
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You’re Absorbing BPA From Your Receipts, Study Shows
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Store Receipts on Thermal Paper Can Transfer BPA
Volunteers who handled receipts containing the hormone-altering compound bisphenol A for two hours showed elevated BPA levels in their urine. Dina Fine Maron reports
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Monsanto’s Roundup may be linked to fatal kidney disease, new study suggests
The new study was published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health.
Researchers suggest that Roundup, or glyphosate, becomes highly toxic to the kidney once mixed with “hard” water or metals like arsenic and cadmium that often exist naturally in the soil or are added via fertilizer. Hard water contains metals like calcium, magnesium, strontium, and iron, among others. On its own, glyphosate is toxic, but not detrimental enough to eradicate kidney tissue.
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Sweden to sue the Commission for delaying hormone-affecting criteria
Sweden’s government is considering suing the European Commission for stalling on criteria which are required to stop hormone-affecting substances, says the minister for the environment, Lena Ek.
In December, the Commission was supposed to publish the necessary criteria for banning different endocrine-disrupting substances found in anti-bacterial agents for shoes and clothes.
However, Commissioner for the Environment Janez Potočnik has delayed the clearance. According to Ek, Potočnik has told the Swedish government that the Commission wants to make an impact analysis first.
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China’s toxic air pollution resembles nuclear winter, say scientists
Chinese scientists have warned that the country’s toxic air pollution is now so bad that it resembles a nuclear winter, slowing photosynthesis in plants – and potentially wreaking havoc on the country’s food supply.
Beijing and broad swaths of six northern provinces have spent the past week blanketed in a dense pea-soup smog that is not expected to abate until Thursday. Beijing’s concentration of PM 2.5 particles – those small enough to penetrate deep into the lungs and enter the bloodstream – hit 505 micrograms per cubic metre on Tuesday night. The World Health Organisation recommends a safe level of 25.
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UN Report Says Small-Scale Organic Farming Only Way to Feed the World
UN Report Says Small-Scale Organic Farming Only Way to Feed the World
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Take a stand for Organic Farmers around the World!
Right now an important case is being heard halfway around the world in Western Australia about organic farmer Steve Marsh, whose organic field was contaminated by his neighbor’s genetically engineered canola. As a result, Steve lost his organic certification and as much as 70% of his Steve’s farm has been contaminated with Monsanto’s patented genes.
Warming
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UN Claims Extreme 2013 Weather Caused By Human-Induced Climate Change and Global Warming
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The climate change deniers have won
The American Association for the Advancement of Science came as close as such a respectable institution can to screaming an alarm last week. “As scientists, it is not our role to tell people what they should do,” it said as it began one of those sentences that you know will build to a “but”. “But human-caused climate risks abrupt, unpredictable and potentially irreversible changes.”
In other words, the most distinguished scientists from the country with the world’s pre-eminent educational institutions were trying to shake humanity out of its complacency. Why weren’t their warnings leading the news?
In one sense, the association’s appeal was not new. The Royal Society, the Royal Institution, Nasa, the US National Academy of Sciences, the US Geological Survey, the IPCC and the national science bodies of 30 or so other countries have said that man-made climate change is on the march. A survey of 2,000 peer-reviewed papers on global warming published in the last 20 years found that 97% said that humans were causing it.
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Exxon CEO joins anti-fracking lawsuit after drilling threatens his property value
Exxon CEO Rex Tillerson is involved in a legal battle over fracking. The weird part is, he’s on the side that’s against it.
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Singapore and Malaysia hit by extreme dry spell
Singapore suffers its longest dry spell on record, while Malaysian cabinet mulls whether to declare a national emergency
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Koch Network Raised Over $400 Million in 2012
The Koch brothers and their wealthy allies pledged to spend $400 million on the 2012 elections — and it looks like they did it.
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Maybe Nigel Lawson is right. There can’t be global warming, because isn’t it always colder at night?
It’s a method of argument perfected by disgruntled men in the corner of pubs
Nuclear Energy
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Record cesium levels in Pacific Ocean north of Fukushima plant — Spikes to 6,900 Bq/m³ from ‘not detected’ in one day — Previous high went unmatched for last 9 months
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Compelling stories of shameful treatment of Fukushima victims
When most of us think of the ongoing Fukushima nuclear disaster we think about leaks of contaminated water, criminal gangs hiring ill-trained workers to work on cleaning up radioactive materials on the site, ice-dams to stop water flowing, or government announcements that never improve anything.
What we often don’t think about are the victims. More than 150,000 people were made victims by this disaster, most are still victims. But these days there is little coverage of their daily lives and the problems they continue to face. -
New TEPCO Report Shows Damage to Unit 3 Fuel Pool MUCH Worse Than That at Unit 4
The bottom line here is that TEPCO has just acknowledged that at least 50-tons of rubble has fallen on top of and into the spent fuel pool in Unit 3. What does this 50-ton pile of debris mean to the Unit 3 spent fuel pool and its cleanup?
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Gundersen: Terrifying cancer data for Fukushima — “Statistics are astounding especially for young girls” — “Growing concern around cancer risk” (VIDEO)
Introduction: “In response to growing concern around cancer risk to children, in particular young girls, in and around the Fukushima Prefecture, we’re reissuing a film we made last year. [...] 1 in every 100 young girls will devlop cancer for every year they are exposed to Fukushima’s radiation”
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Fukushima Evacuee: 50% of class with nosebleeds at same time; This is a recurring thing — Immune system problems reported by many families (VIDEO)
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Cancer Risk To Young Children Near Fukushima Daiichi Underestimated
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Anti-nuclear protests in Taiwan draw tens of thousands
Tens of thousands have marched in anti-nuclear protests across Taiwan, calling on the government to phase out nuclear energy. The protest comes ahead of the third anniversary of the Fukishima disaster.
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Documents Say Navy Knew Fukushima Dangerously Contaminated the USS Reagan
A stunning new report indicates the U.S. Navy knew that sailors from the nuclear-powered USS Ronald Reagan took major radiation hits from the Fukushima atomic power plant after its meltdowns and explosions nearly three years ago.
Pollution
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Oil spills into Lake Michigan from BP refinery
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Pollution Caused by Chip Fabrication
It is a sobering fact that the chip fabrication industry which is so vital to our modern society is also the cause of a lot of pollution. This unglamorous topic doesn’t get much media attention. No one wants to be reminded that the hi-tech world of computers isn’t possible without the use of a lot of caustic chemicals.
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Great Barrier Reef authority argued against dredge dumping, FOI reveals
The dredging and dumping of 3m tonnes of spoil in Great Barrier Reef marine park waters posed an “unacceptable social and environmental risk”, the authority in charge of the world heritage area wrote in draft assessments just months before it approved the permit to carry out the disposal.
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Is The Solution To Climate Change In Vancouver?
Across America, the impacts of climate change are already being felt as temperatures rise, droughts are prolonged, and weather becomes increasingly severe and unpredictable. But solutions seem few and far between — and solutions that both sides can agree on even fewer. Outraged Republicans and recalcitrant conservative Democrats cut down the cap-and-trade bill in 2009; and President Obama’s promised regulations are probably destined for years of give-and-take between the Environmental Protection Agency, the courts, and the power industry. The result: America remains one of the few advanced nations with no national policy of any sort to curb its carbon dioxide emissions.
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EU to force large companies to report on environmental and social impacts
The negotiations were long and painful, but in the end a deal was done. EU member states finally agreed to back reforms that will mean large listed companies are required to report on their environmental and social impacts.
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Excuse me, but we shouldn’t be moving on from West Virginia’s chemical spill
America has grown a vast and complex regulatory and financial support system for cheap, dirty energy. This isn’t over
Misc.
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Cameron’s Prime Aberdeen Angus Bullshit
David Cameron is peddling bullshit of the premium Aberdeen Angus kind today. At today’s oil prices, recoverable North Sea oil is worth a minimum of 1.2 trillion and a maximum of 2.4 trillion dollars. Cameron is claiming that potential will not be released without government subsidy of 24 billion dollars, and that only the UK government’s “broad shoulders” can raise this.
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A Small Little Bolt: The Tar Sands Poisoning of An Alberta Family
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Nigeria ravaged by $20bn oil robbery
It was 2am when a fireball pierced the inky night sky above a small community in the Niger delta. The explosion near Port Harcourt last June killed several people and released 6,000 barrels of crude oil. The cause: contractors hired by Royal Dutch Shell to stop pirates siphoning oil from a huge pipeline were themselves stealing fuel, and something went terribly wrong. The blast led to the shutdown… Shell, the largest foreign operator in the country, was responsible for more than 20,00 barrels of last year’s spills.
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