Zika was first noticed in Africa, in Uganda's Ziika forest (yes it's spelled with two i's) in 1947. It spread slowly at first, and seemed to be a pretty harmless virus, causing hardly any symptoms at all in most people. But it picked up speed in around 2007 when it started spreading in the South Pacific and it showed up inBrazil in 2013, according to the latest research. Because hardly anyone in the Americas has immunity to Zika, it's spread explosively since then.
Ebola. Pandemic flu. And now the Zika virus. These emergencies all test the mettle of the world’s public health officials.
Those who would face such a challenge must have some sense of what to do.
“We need to be prepared, and quite frankly, the country is underprepared,” said U.S. Rep Susan Brooks, who Wednesday convened a group of about 40 public health workers and other would-be first responders to run through a training exercise at the Fishers Public Library.
Dr. W. Craig Vanderwagen, former assistant secretary for preparedness and response at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, led the thought experiment into how to handle a blossoming smallpox outbreak that starts in Europe and rapidly spreads overseas.
With 33 countries in the Americas now identified as carrying the Zika virus, the need for a solution to the epidemic is great. But with limited funds in the regions where it’s spreading the fastest, the need for a cost-effective one is even greater.
05 APRIL 2016 -WHO and partners need US$ 2.2 billion to provide lifesaving health services to more than 79 million people in more than 30 countries facing protracted emergencies this year, according to WHO’s Humanitarian Response Plans 2016 launched today.
WASHINGTON (AP) — The Obama administration is to announce Wednesday it will transfer leftover money from the largely successful fight against Ebola to combat the growing threat of the Zika virus, congressional officials say.
Roughly 75 percent of the $600 million or so would be devoted to the Centers for Disease Control, which is focused on research and development of anti-Zika vaccines, treating those infected with the virus and combating the mosquitoes that spread it. The rest would go to foreign aid accounts to fight the virus overseas.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to publicly discuss the matter before the White House announcement.
It was an autumn day in the Shetland Islands of Scotland. Perhaps fishing boats were hauling in catch; maybe children were playing on the beach. Then it came in: a wall of water reaching a height of 25m above normal sea level at some points, high enough to top a seven-storey building.
Image: The Great Barrier Reef is the world's largest living structure and can be seen from space.
bbc.com - March 29th 2016
Evidence that Australia's Great Barrier Reef is experiencing its worst coral bleaching on record has renewed calls for the UN to list it as "in-danger".
The National Coral Bleaching Taskforce says 95% of reefs from Cairns to Papua New Guinea are now severely bleached.
It says only four reefs out of 520 have no evidence of bleaching.
Image: A general view on the chimneys of the Hsieh-ho Power Plant in Keelung, northern Taiwan, 17 November 2015. EPA/DAVID CHANG
washingtonpost.com - March 16, 2016 - Chris Mooney
Roughly a year ago, the International Energy Agency announced a wonky yet nonetheless significant development. Looking at data for the year 2014, the agency found that although the global economy grew — by 3.4 percent that year — greenhouse gas emissions from the use of energy (their largest source) had not. They had stalled at about 32.3 billion metric tons of carbon dioxide, just as in 2013.
The agency called this a “decoupling” of growth from carbon dioxide emissions, and noted that it was the “the first time in 40 years in which there was a halt or reduction in emissions of the greenhouse gas that was not tied to an economic downturn.” For decades prior to 2014, economic growth had pretty much always meant more pollution of the atmosphere, and a worsening climate problem.
Image: A new report released by the World Meteorological Organization shows that climate change is accelerating at an "unprecedented" rate, warning that actions must be taken "before we pass the point of no return." (Photo : Getty Images )
hngn.com - March 21, 2016 - Samantha Mathewson
A new report from the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) suggests global climate change is advancing at an alarming and "unprecedented" rate.
Last year's extreme weather broke a series of records, including global temperatures, exceptional rainfall, devastating droughts, unusual cyclone activity and intense heat waves. And while 2015 proved to be the warmest year worldwide, 2016 is expected to far exceed those records.
Key factors that can combine to produce a Zika virus outbreak are expected to be present in 50 US cities during peak summer months, a study has warned.
The Aedes aegypti mosquito, which is spreading the virus in much of Latin America and the Caribbean, will likely be increasingly abundant across much of the southern and eastern US as the weather warms, according to the study led by experts at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in US.
Summertime weather conditions are favourable for populations of the mosquito along the East Coast as far north as New York City and across the southern tier of the country as far west as Phoenix and Los Angeles, according to computer simulations conceived and run by researchers at NCAR and the NASA Marshall Space Flight Centre.
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