The charity Doctors Without Borders warns a climate of deepening mistrust and suspicion in the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo is hampering efforts to bring an Ebola epidemic under control. The outbreak, which started, last year, has killed more than 500 people in North Kivu and Ituri provinces.

Doctors Without Borders, known by its French acronym MSF, has suspended its Ebola activities in Katwa and Butembo in North Kivu Province.

This follows attacks on two of its treatment centers last week. In the last month alone, the agency says more than 30 attacks and security incidents have taken place in this volatile area.

International MSF president Joanne Liu says the Ebola epidemic, the largest ever in DRC, is taking place amid growing political, social and economic grievances. She says many communities believe Ebola is being used as an excuse for political maneuvers.

Liu says the decision to exclude two areas — Beni and Butembo — from voting in the December presidential elections has only added to the suspicion that Ebola is being used as a political tool.

“The use of coercion adds fuel to this, using police to force people into complying with health measures is not only unethical, it is totally counterproductive,” she said. “The communities are not the enemy. Ebola is a common enemy.”

Latest reports from the World Health Organization put the number of Ebola cases in eastern Congo at 907, including 569 deaths.

Liu tells VOA the government is painting the Ebola epidemic as a security emergency. She says MSF worries about the disease being framed as an issue of public order.

“We think as physicians that it is an epidemic, an infectious disease issue and that we need to treat patients and not as an enemy of the nation,” she said. “People need to feel that we are with them and we want the best for their care. And, that they want to be in our center because they believe that is going to be the best way to fight Ebola.”

Liu says coercion must not be used as a way to track and treat patients, to enforce safe burials or decontaminate homes. She says communities must be treated with respect and understanding. She says patients must be treated as such, and not as some kind of biothreat.

 
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Many new mothers worldwide express anxiety and guilt about leaving their babies to return to work, and some worry their nations’ maternity policies reflect societies that value productivity over raising children.

In a series of interviews for Reuters ahead of International Women’s Day on March 8, mothers from the United States to Uruguay to South Africa to Singapore told of their concerns about stopping work to give birth and look after their newborns.

An Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report in 2016 found that among OECD countries, mothers are on average entitled to 18 weeks of paid maternity leave around childbirth.

But the range is vast. While some countries — such as Britain and Russia — offer many months or even several years of maternity leave, the United States is the only country to offer no statutory entitlement to paid leave on a national basis.

Blanca Eschbach, a new mother in San Antonio, Texas, returned to work this week after taking 10 weeks off to have her baby. “I think as a society we value productivity above family life,” she said. “You almost feel rushed to get back to work.”

Eschbach said she’d like longer to be at home with her child — ideally 16 weeks — but her family can’t afford it.

Tatiana Barcellos, 37, a civil servant for the Federal Prosecutor’s Office in Brazil, also told Reuters she was “anxious and worried” about going back to work, and concerned that “my absence causes stress to my baby.”

In the Netherlands, Lucie Sol, a 32-year-old social worker and mother to baby Lena Amelie, said returning to work “comes with a lot of guilt.”

“I feel bad leaving her behind,” she told Reuters. “She’s only five and a half months old, so I want to keep her close.”

Sol took an extra three months off, extending her leave to 27 weeks in total. Her boyfriend, Rudie Jonkmans, got two days of official paternity leave and added three extra weeks of holiday time to be with his family. Paternity leave in the Netherlands has since been extended to a maximum of five days.

In Belarus, however, things are a little different for 28-year-old Alesia Rutsevich, who is returning to work as an ophthalmologist after having her son three years ago.

Under statutory maternity leave in Belarus, mothers are paid their average monthly income for 70 days before birth and 56 days afterward. Child care leave can be taken for up to three years after the birth by any working relative or child’s guardian. Recipients are paid a fixed sum according to the number of children in the family.

Rutsevich says she feels happy to have had significant time with her baby, and says her country’s policy is good.

“The duration of the child care leave is quite optimal,” she said. “I believe that by three years the child is growing up, and his health is improving, and his behavior.”

Ferzanah Essack, a 36-year-old mother and software developer in South Africa, says the law there allows for four months maternity leave — although employers are not obliged to pay employees during this time — and 10 days paternity leave.

Essack says she is “very nervous” about going back to work, but her baby, Salma, will be looked after by her mother and mother-in-law for free.

“We pay [for child care] in love and kisses,” she said. “With lots of love, because it’s the grannies.”
…

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Many new mothers worldwide express anxiety and guilt about leaving their babies to return to work, and some worry their nations’ maternity policies reflect societies that value productivity over raising children.

In a series of interviews for Reuters ahead of International Women’s Day on March 8, mothers from the United States to Uruguay to South Africa to Singapore told of their concerns about stopping work to give birth and look after their newborns.

An Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) report in 2016 found that among OECD countries, mothers are on average entitled to 18 weeks of paid maternity leave around childbirth.

But the range is vast. While some countries — such as Britain and Russia — offer many months or even several years of maternity leave, the United States is the only country to offer no statutory entitlement to paid leave on a national basis.

Blanca Eschbach, a new mother in San Antonio, Texas, returned to work this week after taking 10 weeks off to have her baby. “I think as a society we value productivity above family life,” she said. “You almost feel rushed to get back to work.”

Eschbach said she’d like longer to be at home with her child — ideally 16 weeks — but her family can’t afford it.

Tatiana Barcellos, 37, a civil servant for the Federal Prosecutor’s Office in Brazil, also told Reuters she was “anxious and worried” about going back to work, and concerned that “my absence causes stress to my baby.”

In the Netherlands, Lucie Sol, a 32-year-old social worker and mother to baby Lena Amelie, said returning to work “comes with a lot of guilt.”

“I feel bad leaving her behind,” she told Reuters. “She’s only five and a half months old, so I want to keep her close.”

Sol took an extra three months off, extending her leave to 27 weeks in total. Her boyfriend, Rudie Jonkmans, got two days of official paternity leave and added three extra weeks of holiday time to be with his family. Paternity leave in the Netherlands has since been extended to a maximum of five days.

In Belarus, however, things are a little different for 28-year-old Alesia Rutsevich, who is returning to work as an ophthalmologist after having her son three years ago.

Under statutory maternity leave in Belarus, mothers are paid their average monthly income for 70 days before birth and 56 days afterward. Child care leave can be taken for up to three years after the birth by any working relative or child’s guardian. Recipients are paid a fixed sum according to the number of children in the family.

Rutsevich says she feels happy to have had significant time with her baby, and says her country’s policy is good.

“The duration of the child care leave is quite optimal,” she said. “I believe that by three years the child is growing up, and his health is improving, and his behavior.”

Ferzanah Essack, a 36-year-old mother and software developer in South Africa, says the law there allows for four months maternity leave — although employers are not obliged to pay employees during this time — and 10 days paternity leave.

Essack says she is “very nervous” about going back to work, but her baby, Salma, will be looked after by her mother and mother-in-law for free.

“We pay [for child care] in love and kisses,” she said. “With lots of love, because it’s the grannies.”
…

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An HIV-positive man in Britain has become the second known adult worldwide to be cleared of the AIDS virus. At a conference in Seattle, the U.N. agency leading the global effort to end AIDS said the agency is greatly encouraged by the possibility of an HIV-positive man being cured, but there is still a long way to go.

Scientists have been searching for a cure for HIV/AIDS for close to 40 years. The director of UNAIDS called news that a man in London has been functionally cured of HIV a “breakthrough.” Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for the U.N. secretary-general, made the announcement.

“The breakthrough gives us great hope for the future, but also shows how far we are from the point of ending AIDS with science, as well as the absolute importance to continue to focus on HIV prevention and treatment efforts,” he said.

The London man is HIV-free after receiving a stem cell transplant from a donor with a rare genetic mutation that made him resistant to HIV. His cancer has also gone into remission.

Professor Ravindra Gupta at University College London said the man is now off anti-AIDS medication.

“We waited 16 months before stopping in the post-transplant period just to make sure that the cancer was in remission, the patient was well and that the measures we had of the HIV reservoir in the body showed that there was very, very little virus there, if any at all,” he said.

Gupta hesitates to call it a cure, but this is the second patient to show no signs of the HIV virus after a similar stem cell transplant. The first man was an American treated in Berlin 12 years ago. Dr. Rowena Johnston, director of research at amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, says this second success is significant.

“We now have reason to believe that the Berlin patient was not a one-off case… meaning it is possible to nearly, or even completely, eliminate HIV from an infected person,” he said.

Just like the Berlin patient, Gupta says the British man who is being called the “London patient,” also received stem cells from a donor with a rare mutated gene called CCR5.

“If you transplant those cells into someone who already has HIV, you may protect those new cells from infection,” he said.

Some 37 million people across the globe have HIV. But stem cell treatment is not a practical cure. First, a donor has to be tissue matched. Plus, the donor has to have the mutated gene. And then there’s the procedure itself, which is painful and risky.

Dr. Sarah Fidler, a professor in HIV medicine at Imperial College London, says a bone marrow transplant would be too dangerous for patients who are healthy and taking a daily pill to treat HIV.

“Having a bone marrow transplantation is a very complicated process,” she said. “It requires an entirely new set of cells to be taken into the person who’s having treatment and that again is a process where whilst those cells are embedding, you’re very at risk of getting infections and potentially dying.”

Both patients were being treated for cancer and had no option but to try the risky procedure. Scientists will continue to search for other ways to cure HIV, but now they know it can be cured.

 
…

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An HIV-positive man in Britain has become the second known adult worldwide to be cleared of the AIDS virus. At a conference in Seattle, the U.N. agency leading the global effort to end AIDS said the agency is greatly encouraged by the possibility of an HIV-positive man being cured, but there is still a long way to go.

Scientists have been searching for a cure for HIV/AIDS for close to 40 years. The director of UNAIDS called news that a man in London has been functionally cured of HIV a “breakthrough.” Stephane Dujarric, a spokesman for the U.N. secretary-general, made the announcement.

“The breakthrough gives us great hope for the future, but also shows how far we are from the point of ending AIDS with science, as well as the absolute importance to continue to focus on HIV prevention and treatment efforts,” he said.

The London man is HIV-free after receiving a stem cell transplant from a donor with a rare genetic mutation that made him resistant to HIV. His cancer has also gone into remission.

Professor Ravindra Gupta at University College London said the man is now off anti-AIDS medication.

“We waited 16 months before stopping in the post-transplant period just to make sure that the cancer was in remission, the patient was well and that the measures we had of the HIV reservoir in the body showed that there was very, very little virus there, if any at all,” he said.

Gupta hesitates to call it a cure, but this is the second patient to show no signs of the HIV virus after a similar stem cell transplant. The first man was an American treated in Berlin 12 years ago. Dr. Rowena Johnston, director of research at amfAR, the Foundation for AIDS Research, says this second success is significant.

“We now have reason to believe that the Berlin patient was not a one-off case… meaning it is possible to nearly, or even completely, eliminate HIV from an infected person,” he said.

Just like the Berlin patient, Gupta says the British man who is being called the “London patient,” also received stem cells from a donor with a rare mutated gene called CCR5.

“If you transplant those cells into someone who already has HIV, you may protect those new cells from infection,” he said.

Some 37 million people across the globe have HIV. But stem cell treatment is not a practical cure. First, a donor has to be tissue matched. Plus, the donor has to have the mutated gene. And then there’s the procedure itself, which is painful and risky.

Dr. Sarah Fidler, a professor in HIV medicine at Imperial College London, says a bone marrow transplant would be too dangerous for patients who are healthy and taking a daily pill to treat HIV.

“Having a bone marrow transplantation is a very complicated process,” she said. “It requires an entirely new set of cells to be taken into the person who’s having treatment and that again is a process where whilst those cells are embedding, you’re very at risk of getting infections and potentially dying.”

Both patients were being treated for cancer and had no option but to try the risky procedure. Scientists will continue to search for other ways to cure HIV, but now they know it can be cured.

 
…

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An HIV-positive man in Britain has become the second known adult worldwide to be cleared of the AIDS virus. At a conference in Seattle, the U.N. agency leading the global effort to end AIDS said it was greatly encouraged by the news. VOA’s Carol Pearson reports.
…

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An HIV-positive man in Britain has become the second known adult worldwide to be cleared of the AIDS virus. At a conference in Seattle, the U.N. agency leading the global effort to end AIDS said it was greatly encouraged by the news. VOA’s Carol Pearson reports.
…

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For months, school students in various countries have been protesting against the climate policies of their respective governments. In Australia, Belgium, France, Germany, Britain and more, they attend weekly rallies to call out politicians who, in the student’s minds, are doing too little to combat climate change.

What’s controversial about it: The rallies take place while the kids should be in school.

The numbers are steadily increasing. Every week, tens of thousands of teenagers and young adults skip class, mostly on Fridays  their so-called “Fridays for Future.” The protests are expected to hit even more countries on March 15, making it the biggest international school strike yet. 

The Guardian published an open letter by the “global coordination group” of the strikes, announcing protests on every continent. While there have been some participants in the United States, on March 15, American students are expected to join in the movement in a big way.

Small steps for a big movement

What has become a global phenomenon started with one teenage girl in Sweden, now-famous activist Greta Thunberg. Originally, she skipped her Friday classes to protest in front of the Swedish parliament because of upcoming elections, but she decided to keep going until significant progress on the issue is made. 

Documenting the strikes on her Twitter page, Thunberg gained international recognition and was invited to speak at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Katowice, Poland, in December 2018. The world watched as a 15-year-old girl accused  world leaders of not being “mature enough to tell it like it is. Even that burden you leave to us children.” Thunberg has been the spearhead of the youth movement ever since, regularly attending Friday strikes in different European countries.

Reactions internationally have been mixed: While most politicians acknowledge the importance of their cause, some have taken issue with the students’ flagrant violation of mandatory school attendance. 

A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Theresa May said that skipping school means wasting lesson time that teachers have carefully prepared – time that would be crucial for education which will help solve the climate issue in the long run.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel sparked controversy when she suggested that the strikes are possibly being initiated by outside influences. Later, she backed down, clarifying that she very much welcomes the student strikes, partially going against her own, conservative party.

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has endorsed the strikes as well, saying that he has often regretted that today’s youth seemed to be politically uninvolved.

Former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has pointed out that young women are leading the movement in most countries. The inner team behind “Youth Climate Strike US,” the biggest American participant in organizing the global school strike in March, consists exclusively of girls in their teens and younger, according to their website. 

Scientific support

Still, commentators ask if politicians would be equally supportive of the students’ political involvement if their cause were more controversial, say, open borders or gay rights. But as it stands, a large community has gathered to back the school strikes.

In mid-February, the Guardian released an open letter by more than 200 scientists who claimed to be inspired that children are making their voices heard. The German Tagesspiegel exclusively reports on another statement from more than 700 scientists pledging their full support of the school strikes, which is to be released on March 12  three days before the global strike day.

The movement is now global.

It is still run by young people, but highly professionalized and coordinated quite a change from the individual protest Greta Thunberg started in the summer of 2018. 

The question remains: How big will the impact be in the end?

In the U.S., student protests have made headlines, and occasionally, led to policy change. 

Last year’s “March For Our Lives” for stricter gun policies after the Parkland, Florida, school shooting helped inspire Thunberg to start her strikes. And with discussion about the Democrat’s “Green New Deal” bringing climate change into the center of the public’s attention, the March 15 Global school strike will come at an interesting time.
…

your ads here!

For months, school students in various countries have been protesting against the climate policies of their respective governments. In Australia, Belgium, France, Germany, Britain and more, they attend weekly rallies to call out politicians who, in the student’s minds, are doing too little to combat climate change.

What’s controversial about it: The rallies take place while the kids should be in school.

The numbers are steadily increasing. Every week, tens of thousands of teenagers and young adults skip class, mostly on Fridays  their so-called “Fridays for Future.” The protests are expected to hit even more countries on March 15, making it the biggest international school strike yet. 

The Guardian published an open letter by the “global coordination group” of the strikes, announcing protests on every continent. While there have been some participants in the United States, on March 15, American students are expected to join in the movement in a big way.

Small steps for a big movement

What has become a global phenomenon started with one teenage girl in Sweden, now-famous activist Greta Thunberg. Originally, she skipped her Friday classes to protest in front of the Swedish parliament because of upcoming elections, but she decided to keep going until significant progress on the issue is made. 

Documenting the strikes on her Twitter page, Thunberg gained international recognition and was invited to speak at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Katowice, Poland, in December 2018. The world watched as a 15-year-old girl accused  world leaders of not being “mature enough to tell it like it is. Even that burden you leave to us children.” Thunberg has been the spearhead of the youth movement ever since, regularly attending Friday strikes in different European countries.

Reactions internationally have been mixed: While most politicians acknowledge the importance of their cause, some have taken issue with the students’ flagrant violation of mandatory school attendance. 

A spokesperson for British Prime Minister Theresa May said that skipping school means wasting lesson time that teachers have carefully prepared – time that would be crucial for education which will help solve the climate issue in the long run.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel sparked controversy when she suggested that the strikes are possibly being initiated by outside influences. Later, she backed down, clarifying that she very much welcomes the student strikes, partially going against her own, conservative party.

EU Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker has endorsed the strikes as well, saying that he has often regretted that today’s youth seemed to be politically uninvolved.

Former Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton has pointed out that young women are leading the movement in most countries. The inner team behind “Youth Climate Strike US,” the biggest American participant in organizing the global school strike in March, consists exclusively of girls in their teens and younger, according to their website. 

Scientific support

Still, commentators ask if politicians would be equally supportive of the students’ political involvement if their cause were more controversial, say, open borders or gay rights. But as it stands, a large community has gathered to back the school strikes.

In mid-February, the Guardian released an open letter by more than 200 scientists who claimed to be inspired that children are making their voices heard. The German Tagesspiegel exclusively reports on another statement from more than 700 scientists pledging their full support of the school strikes, which is to be released on March 12  three days before the global strike day.

The movement is now global.

It is still run by young people, but highly professionalized and coordinated quite a change from the individual protest Greta Thunberg started in the summer of 2018. 

The question remains: How big will the impact be in the end?

In the U.S., student protests have made headlines, and occasionally, led to policy change. 

Last year’s “March For Our Lives” for stricter gun policies after the Parkland, Florida, school shooting helped inspire Thunberg to start her strikes. And with discussion about the Democrat’s “Green New Deal” bringing climate change into the center of the public’s attention, the March 15 Global school strike will come at an interesting time.
…

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Perhaps none of the communist legacies shared by Vietnam and North Korea highlighted during Kim Jong Un’s “goodwill visit” to Hanoi is stranger than the embalmed leaders on display in their capital cities, and the secretive team of Russian technicians that keeps the aging bodies looking ageless.

Kim laid a wreath outside Ho Chi Minh’s mausoleum in the Vietnamese capital on Saturday, after the conclusion of his shortened summit with U.S. President Donald Trump.

Inside the dark interior of the mausoleum, the embalmed corpse of Vietnam’s founding father lies displayed in a glass coffin for a steady stream of tourists who silently shuffle by.

In Pyongyang, Kim Jong Un’s grandfather and father are on similar display in the loftily named Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, a monument to the cult of personality that surrounds North Korea’s ruling family.

All three leaders were originally preserved by a team of specialists from the so-called “Lenin Lab” in Moscow, which first embalmed and displayed Vladimir Lenin’s body in 1924.

The Soviet Union may have collapsed, and socialism in both Vietnam and North Korea has taken on forms barely recognizable to the ideology’s first thinkers, but that same lab still performs annual maintenance on Ho, and according to at least one researcher, still helps North Korea keep the Kims looking fresh.

“The original embalming and the regular re-embalmings have always been conducted by the scientists of the Moscow lab,” said Alexei Yurchak, a professor of anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, who is writing a book about the embalmed communist leaders. “Over the years they trained local scientists in some techniques, but not all, maintaining the core of the know-how secret.”

Body work

Unlike earlier preservation processes such as mummification, the permanent embalming pioneered by Soviet scientists kept the bodies flexible, with unblemished skin and a lifelike, if rather waxy, pallor.

With North Vietnam under regular attack by American warplanes at the time of Ho’s death in 1969, the Soviet Union airlifted chemicals and equipment to a cave outside Hanoi, which the Soviet experts turned into a sterile lab, Yurchak said.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in the 1990s, the government lab faced a funding crisis, leading it to rely more heavily on offering services to foreign clients, Yurchak said.

Among those customers was North Korea, where Russian specialists embalmed both Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il at a laboratory built into the mausoleum in Pyongyang.

The original embalming takes several months, and the bodies need regular upkeep.

“Every one-and-a-half to two years, these bodies are re-embalmed by the Moscow scientists,” Yurchak said, citing interviews he conducted with lab scientists and his own field research.

The website for the committee that manages Ho’s mausoleum says Russia started charging for the chemicals after the Soviet Union collapsed, prompting Hanoi to ask that the supplies be produced in Vietnam. Vietnam has also sent technicians to study in Russia and can now handle the operations of the mausoleum by itself, the website says.

A source with committee, however confirmed the monument is closed every year for two months and that Russian technicians help with annual maintenance of the body.

When contacted by Reuters, the mausoleum lab in Moscow, which since 1992 has been known as the Center for Scientific Research and Teaching Methods in Biochemical Technologies, declined to comment on any aspect of its work.

The North Korean delegation at the United Nations did not respond to a request for comment.

Researcher Tom Fowdy, who founded a group promoting tourism and cultural engagements in North Korea, said he has seen the Kumsusan Palace closed for unexplained “renovations,” but maintenance of the bodies is a mystery.

“While it is obvious the methodology was derived from Russia, it will be a closely kept secret,” he said.

Some experts say China, which relied on its own scientists to embalmed Mao Zedong because of tension between Beijing and Moscow at the time, may have taught or helped North Korea.

Changing symbols

Visitors to Pyongyang’s Kumsusan Palace pass displays that include Kim Jong Il’s personal yacht and an Apple computer the dictator had once owned, before being required to bow three times to the bodies.

“The personality politics of the Kims exceeds all others,” Fowdy said, noting that maintaining the memorial will continue to “receive overwhelming priority” in North Korea’s government budgeting.

It’s not clear how much impoverished North Korea spends on maintaining the Kims’ bodies. When Moscow released preservation costs for the first time in 2016, it reported spending nearly $200,000 that year to maintain Lenin.

Originally the embalming was seen as a way of joining the various countries to international communism, as embodied in Lenin.

But as Vietnam and North Korea developed in their different political ways, so has the meaning attached to preserving the leaders’ bodies.

“Today this original meaning of these bodies has changed — in Vietnam the body of Ho today stands for anti-colonial struggles for independence and even for new nationalism, much more than for communism,” Yurchak said. “In North Korea the two Kims’ bodies stand for a self-sufficient country organized around one leader and existing in the face of the ‘imperialist surroundings.'”
…

your ads here!

Perhaps none of the communist legacies shared by Vietnam and North Korea highlighted during Kim Jong Un’s “goodwill visit” to Hanoi is stranger than the embalmed leaders on display in their capital cities, and the secretive team of Russian technicians that keeps the aging bodies looking ageless.

Kim laid a wreath outside Ho Chi Minh’s mausoleum in the Vietnamese capital on Saturday, after the conclusion of his shortened summit with U.S. President Donald Trump.

Inside the dark interior of the mausoleum, the embalmed corpse of Vietnam’s founding father lies displayed in a glass coffin for a steady stream of tourists who silently shuffle by.

In Pyongyang, Kim Jong Un’s grandfather and father are on similar display in the loftily named Kumsusan Palace of the Sun, a monument to the cult of personality that surrounds North Korea’s ruling family.

All three leaders were originally preserved by a team of specialists from the so-called “Lenin Lab” in Moscow, which first embalmed and displayed Vladimir Lenin’s body in 1924.

The Soviet Union may have collapsed, and socialism in both Vietnam and North Korea has taken on forms barely recognizable to the ideology’s first thinkers, but that same lab still performs annual maintenance on Ho, and according to at least one researcher, still helps North Korea keep the Kims looking fresh.

“The original embalming and the regular re-embalmings have always been conducted by the scientists of the Moscow lab,” said Alexei Yurchak, a professor of anthropology at the University of California, Berkeley, who is writing a book about the embalmed communist leaders. “Over the years they trained local scientists in some techniques, but not all, maintaining the core of the know-how secret.”

Body work

Unlike earlier preservation processes such as mummification, the permanent embalming pioneered by Soviet scientists kept the bodies flexible, with unblemished skin and a lifelike, if rather waxy, pallor.

With North Vietnam under regular attack by American warplanes at the time of Ho’s death in 1969, the Soviet Union airlifted chemicals and equipment to a cave outside Hanoi, which the Soviet experts turned into a sterile lab, Yurchak said.

When the Soviet Union collapsed in the 1990s, the government lab faced a funding crisis, leading it to rely more heavily on offering services to foreign clients, Yurchak said.

Among those customers was North Korea, where Russian specialists embalmed both Kim Il Sung and Kim Jong Il at a laboratory built into the mausoleum in Pyongyang.

The original embalming takes several months, and the bodies need regular upkeep.

“Every one-and-a-half to two years, these bodies are re-embalmed by the Moscow scientists,” Yurchak said, citing interviews he conducted with lab scientists and his own field research.

The website for the committee that manages Ho’s mausoleum says Russia started charging for the chemicals after the Soviet Union collapsed, prompting Hanoi to ask that the supplies be produced in Vietnam. Vietnam has also sent technicians to study in Russia and can now handle the operations of the mausoleum by itself, the website says.

A source with committee, however confirmed the monument is closed every year for two months and that Russian technicians help with annual maintenance of the body.

When contacted by Reuters, the mausoleum lab in Moscow, which since 1992 has been known as the Center for Scientific Research and Teaching Methods in Biochemical Technologies, declined to comment on any aspect of its work.

The North Korean delegation at the United Nations did not respond to a request for comment.

Researcher Tom Fowdy, who founded a group promoting tourism and cultural engagements in North Korea, said he has seen the Kumsusan Palace closed for unexplained “renovations,” but maintenance of the bodies is a mystery.

“While it is obvious the methodology was derived from Russia, it will be a closely kept secret,” he said.

Some experts say China, which relied on its own scientists to embalmed Mao Zedong because of tension between Beijing and Moscow at the time, may have taught or helped North Korea.

Changing symbols

Visitors to Pyongyang’s Kumsusan Palace pass displays that include Kim Jong Il’s personal yacht and an Apple computer the dictator had once owned, before being required to bow three times to the bodies.

“The personality politics of the Kims exceeds all others,” Fowdy said, noting that maintaining the memorial will continue to “receive overwhelming priority” in North Korea’s government budgeting.

It’s not clear how much impoverished North Korea spends on maintaining the Kims’ bodies. When Moscow released preservation costs for the first time in 2016, it reported spending nearly $200,000 that year to maintain Lenin.

Originally the embalming was seen as a way of joining the various countries to international communism, as embodied in Lenin.

But as Vietnam and North Korea developed in their different political ways, so has the meaning attached to preserving the leaders’ bodies.

“Today this original meaning of these bodies has changed — in Vietnam the body of Ho today stands for anti-colonial struggles for independence and even for new nationalism, much more than for communism,” Yurchak said. “In North Korea the two Kims’ bodies stand for a self-sufficient country organized around one leader and existing in the face of the ‘imperialist surroundings.'”
…

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An environmental movement is growing in Europe and looking to come to the U.S.: Kids and teenagers skipping class to protest and raise awareness of climate change issues. While their cause is mostly praised, their method is controversial. Should students go on school strikes for political issues? VOA’s Markus Meyer-Gehlen explains.
…

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An environmental movement is growing in Europe and looking to come to the U.S.: Kids and teenagers skipping class to protest and raise awareness of climate change issues. While their cause is mostly praised, their method is controversial. Should students go on school strikes for political issues? VOA’s Markus Meyer-Gehlen explains.
…

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A hospital in Jordan has given a victim of Yemen’s war new hope for the future, thanks to the cutting edge technology of 3D printed prosthetics.

Abdullah Ayed, 21, lost one arm and badly damaged the other when his home in Aden was hit by an explosive in 2017.

He spent weeks in a coma in a local hospital. When he woke, he learned one of his arms had to be amputated while the other was almost beyond repair.

“I wished for death, that would have been better than being like this,” said Ayed.  “It was embarrassing to go out with my hand amputated, especially still being young, I wanted to get married, I wanted a job. But I did not lose my faith in God.”

In August 2018, the international medical charity, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), sent Ayed to Amman for treatment and rehabilitation.

The MSF reconstructive surgery program was set up in 2006, and aims to help patients regain independence. Ayed was chosen to receive a 3D-printed prosthetic.

Project supervisor, Samar Ismail, said 3D-printed prosthetics are faster to produce and much cheaper. The price for a 3D limb is around 30$, while the more conventional limbs start at 200$ and can go up to thousands of dollars.

The lightweight is also a huge advantage, Ismail added, which enables patients to use them for longer.

So far, more than 20 limbs have been fitted to patients, from Gaza, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.

Ayed said his prosthetic is life-changing. Though difficult to use at first, therapy helped him regain skills such as tying his shoes or putting on a shirt.

“I had lost hope in life, but now after training my mental state is much better,” he said.

He is practicing motor-skills that would enable him to work at a laundromat. But his biggest dream is to be able to go back to Yemen, get married and start a family.

“That’s all I want, to go back home and for things to get better there.”
…

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A hospital in Jordan has given a victim of Yemen’s war new hope for the future, thanks to the cutting edge technology of 3D printed prosthetics.

Abdullah Ayed, 21, lost one arm and badly damaged the other when his home in Aden was hit by an explosive in 2017.

He spent weeks in a coma in a local hospital. When he woke, he learned one of his arms had to be amputated while the other was almost beyond repair.

“I wished for death, that would have been better than being like this,” said Ayed.  “It was embarrassing to go out with my hand amputated, especially still being young, I wanted to get married, I wanted a job. But I did not lose my faith in God.”

In August 2018, the international medical charity, Medecins Sans Frontieres (MSF), sent Ayed to Amman for treatment and rehabilitation.

The MSF reconstructive surgery program was set up in 2006, and aims to help patients regain independence. Ayed was chosen to receive a 3D-printed prosthetic.

Project supervisor, Samar Ismail, said 3D-printed prosthetics are faster to produce and much cheaper. The price for a 3D limb is around 30$, while the more conventional limbs start at 200$ and can go up to thousands of dollars.

The lightweight is also a huge advantage, Ismail added, which enables patients to use them for longer.

So far, more than 20 limbs have been fitted to patients, from Gaza, Iraq, Syria and Yemen.

Ayed said his prosthetic is life-changing. Though difficult to use at first, therapy helped him regain skills such as tying his shoes or putting on a shirt.

“I had lost hope in life, but now after training my mental state is much better,” he said.

He is practicing motor-skills that would enable him to work at a laundromat. But his biggest dream is to be able to go back to Yemen, get married and start a family.

“That’s all I want, to go back home and for things to get better there.”
…

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The Trump administration’s plans to roll back climate change regulations could boost U.S. carbon emissions by over 200 million tons a year by 2025, according to a report on Tuesday prepared for state attorneys general.

The increase from the world’s second-biggest greenhouse gas emitter behind China would hobble global efforts to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, which scientists say is caused by burning fossil fuels and will lead to devastating sea-level rise, droughts and more frequent powerful storms.

“The Trump administration’s actions amount to a virtual surrender to climate change,” said the report by the State Energy & Environmental Impact Center, released at a gathering of the National Association for Attorneys General in Washington.

The report from the research group, based out of New York University’s law school, analyzed the impact of rolling back six major regulations related to climate change that President Donald Trump is seeking to rework to unfetter business.

They include national vehicle tailpipe standards and the Obama-era Clean Power Plan to limit emissions from power plants, among others focused on major polluter industries.

More than a dozen state attorneys general, including those from Maryland, New York and Massachusetts, are challenging the administration on their rollbacks in court.

California, for example, is leading a coalition of 21 states in challenging the administration’s rollback of tailpipe standards. Weakening those standards will lead to an additional 16 million to 34 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually by 2025, according to the report.

It also estimated that American drivers would pay between $193 billion and $236 billion dollars in added fuel costs by 2035 without the national clean car standard.

The Trump administration has said it wants to reduce the emissions standard targets for vehicles because sticking to them would make automobiles too expensive.

The Trump administration’s Affordable Clean Energy rule (ACE), which replaced the Clean Power Plan, would also result in a big jump in emissions along with a higher number of premature deaths from poor air quality, the report said.

The administration has countered that its revised rule would reduce emissions in much the same way as the Clean Power Plan, but in a way that strictly adheres to the federal Clean Air Act.

The six regulations the center examined provided the “most important near-term opportunity to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fight against climate change,” the report said.
…

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The Trump administration’s plans to roll back climate change regulations could boost U.S. carbon emissions by over 200 million tons a year by 2025, according to a report on Tuesday prepared for state attorneys general.

The increase from the world’s second-biggest greenhouse gas emitter behind China would hobble global efforts to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, which scientists say is caused by burning fossil fuels and will lead to devastating sea-level rise, droughts and more frequent powerful storms.

“The Trump administration’s actions amount to a virtual surrender to climate change,” said the report by the State Energy & Environmental Impact Center, released at a gathering of the National Association for Attorneys General in Washington.

The report from the research group, based out of New York University’s law school, analyzed the impact of rolling back six major regulations related to climate change that President Donald Trump is seeking to rework to unfetter business.

They include national vehicle tailpipe standards and the Obama-era Clean Power Plan to limit emissions from power plants, among others focused on major polluter industries.

More than a dozen state attorneys general, including those from Maryland, New York and Massachusetts, are challenging the administration on their rollbacks in court.

California, for example, is leading a coalition of 21 states in challenging the administration’s rollback of tailpipe standards. Weakening those standards will lead to an additional 16 million to 34 million tons of carbon dioxide emissions annually by 2025, according to the report.

It also estimated that American drivers would pay between $193 billion and $236 billion dollars in added fuel costs by 2035 without the national clean car standard.

The Trump administration has said it wants to reduce the emissions standard targets for vehicles because sticking to them would make automobiles too expensive.

The Trump administration’s Affordable Clean Energy rule (ACE), which replaced the Clean Power Plan, would also result in a big jump in emissions along with a higher number of premature deaths from poor air quality, the report said.

The administration has countered that its revised rule would reduce emissions in much the same way as the Clean Power Plan, but in a way that strictly adheres to the federal Clean Air Act.

The six regulations the center examined provided the “most important near-term opportunity to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and fight against climate change,” the report said.
…

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A mind-altering medication related to the club drug Special K won U.S. approval Tuesday for patients with hard-to-treat depression, the first in a series of long-overlooked substances being reconsidered for severe forms of mental illness.

The nasal spray from Johnson & Johnson is a chemical cousin of ketamine, which has been used for decades as a powerful anesthetic to prepare patients for surgery. In the 1990s, the medication was adopted as a party drug by the underground rave culture due to its ability to produce psychedelic, out-of-body experiences. More recently, some doctors have given ketamine to people with depression without formal FDA approval.

The Food and Drug Administration approved Spravato as a fast-acting treatment for patients who have failed to find relief with at least two antidepressants. Up to 7.4 million American adults suffer from so-called treatment-resistant depression, which heightens the risk of suicide, hospitalization and other serious harm, according to the FDA.

The drug will cost between $590 and $885 depending on the dosage and before various insurance discounts and rebates.

There have been no major pharmaceutical innovations for depression since the launch of Prozac and related antidepressants in the late 1980s. Those drugs target the feel-good brain chemical serotonin, and can take weeks or months to kick in.

Ketamine and J&J’s version work differently than those drugs, targeting a chemical called glutamate that is thought to restore brain connections that help relieve depression. 

When the drug works, its effect is almost immediate. That speed “is a huge thing because depressed patients are very disabled and suffer enormously,” said Dr. John Mann, a psychiatrist and researcher at Columbia University. If the drug doesn’t work, physicians can quickly switch to other options, he noted.

The FDA approved Spravato, known chemically as esketamine, based on study results that showed patients taking the drug experienced a bigger improvement in their depression levels than patients taking a sham treatment, when measured with a psychiatric questionnaire.

The drug is designed to be lower-dose and easier to use than ketamine, which is normally given as an intravenous infusion. 

Robin Prothro, 60, began taking antidepressants more than 20 years ago. But she says none of the five medications she tried relieved the depression that has stymied her personal and professional life.

Since enrolling in a Spravato trial two years ago, Prothro says her depression has lifted and she’s returned to hobbies she abandoned years ago, like gardening.

She takes the drug every two weeks at her psychiatrist’s office while reclining in a comfortable chair.

“You can feel it coming on, it’s a strong drug,” she said, describing colors and shapes that drift before her eyes. “I just let the drug work. I close my eyes and my mind is amazingly quiet.” 

Psychedelics reconsidered 

The ketamine-like drug is the first of several psychoactive substances making their way through the U.S. regulatory process as physicians search further afield for new therapies. Researchers are conducting late-stage trials of psilocybin, the active ingredient in magic mushrooms, and MDMA, a euphoria-inducing club drug, as potential treatments for depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.

“Substantially different agents are only rarely appearing from pharmaceutical companies or other laboratories,” said Dr. Paul Summergrad, a psychiatrist at Tufts University. “That’s prompting people to investigate other compounds.”

Unlike ketamine, psilocybin and MDMA have no legal medical use. Classified in the same category as heroin and LSD, they are tightly restricted by the federal government. But the FDA’s approval of esketamine could smooth their path.

Burden of depression

Depression is among the leading causes of disability in the U.S. and is being closely monitored by health authorities amid rising suicides nationwide. In 2017, the U.S. suicide rate rose to 14 deaths per 100,000 people, the highest rate in at least 50 years, according to federal records. 

Government officials haven’t suggested an explanation for the trend, though academic researchers point to the nation’s widening income gap, financial struggles and divisive politics.

J&J’s drug will be subject to a number of restrictions due to its abuse potential, side effects and lingering safety questions.

The drug will only be given by accredited specialists who must monitor patients for at least two hours after administration, due to its trippy, disorienting effects. Additionally, all patients will be tracked in a registry to monitor long-term safety and effectiveness.

The immediate impact of ketamine is thought to last just four to seven days and there’s no consensus yet on how long patients can benefit from ongoing treatment.

Still, there are few other options for patients who fail to respond to antidepressants. The most effective treatment in such cases, electroshock therapy, requires patients to be fully sedated and can cause persistent memory loss.

Wall Street has high expectations for J&J’s medication, with analysts predicting more than $600 million in annual sales by 2022. But J&J will face competition in the marketplace.

A decades-old drug, ketamine is already used off-label to treat depression by some doctors. At least 150 clinics around the U.S. provide treatment with various forms of the drug, which is available as a low-cost generic. Patients often pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for intravenous infusions of the drug over several weeks or months. Such therapies are generally not covered by insurance because they haven’t been approved as safe and effective by FDA regulators.

Some doctors plan to offer both ketamine and the new J&J drug.

Dr. Steve Levine says having FDA-approved standards for dosing and administering the new drug should raise standards in the field and drive out some of the bad actors who are not qualified to treat depression.

“This is going to bring in some standards, regulation and it’s going to make it safer and more accessible to patients,” said Levine, who serves as vice president of the American Society of Ketamine Physicians, a group representing doctors, nurses and others using ketamine for treating depression or other non-approved uses.
…

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A mind-altering medication related to the club drug Special K won U.S. approval Tuesday for patients with hard-to-treat depression, the first in a series of long-overlooked substances being reconsidered for severe forms of mental illness.

The nasal spray from Johnson & Johnson is a chemical cousin of ketamine, which has been used for decades as a powerful anesthetic to prepare patients for surgery. In the 1990s, the medication was adopted as a party drug by the underground rave culture due to its ability to produce psychedelic, out-of-body experiences. More recently, some doctors have given ketamine to people with depression without formal FDA approval.

The Food and Drug Administration approved Spravato as a fast-acting treatment for patients who have failed to find relief with at least two antidepressants. Up to 7.4 million American adults suffer from so-called treatment-resistant depression, which heightens the risk of suicide, hospitalization and other serious harm, according to the FDA.

The drug will cost between $590 and $885 depending on the dosage and before various insurance discounts and rebates.

There have been no major pharmaceutical innovations for depression since the launch of Prozac and related antidepressants in the late 1980s. Those drugs target the feel-good brain chemical serotonin, and can take weeks or months to kick in.

Ketamine and J&J’s version work differently than those drugs, targeting a chemical called glutamate that is thought to restore brain connections that help relieve depression. 

When the drug works, its effect is almost immediate. That speed “is a huge thing because depressed patients are very disabled and suffer enormously,” said Dr. John Mann, a psychiatrist and researcher at Columbia University. If the drug doesn’t work, physicians can quickly switch to other options, he noted.

The FDA approved Spravato, known chemically as esketamine, based on study results that showed patients taking the drug experienced a bigger improvement in their depression levels than patients taking a sham treatment, when measured with a psychiatric questionnaire.

The drug is designed to be lower-dose and easier to use than ketamine, which is normally given as an intravenous infusion. 

Robin Prothro, 60, began taking antidepressants more than 20 years ago. But she says none of the five medications she tried relieved the depression that has stymied her personal and professional life.

Since enrolling in a Spravato trial two years ago, Prothro says her depression has lifted and she’s returned to hobbies she abandoned years ago, like gardening.

She takes the drug every two weeks at her psychiatrist’s office while reclining in a comfortable chair.

“You can feel it coming on, it’s a strong drug,” she said, describing colors and shapes that drift before her eyes. “I just let the drug work. I close my eyes and my mind is amazingly quiet.” 

Psychedelics reconsidered 

The ketamine-like drug is the first of several psychoactive substances making their way through the U.S. regulatory process as physicians search further afield for new therapies. Researchers are conducting late-stage trials of psilocybin, the active ingredient in magic mushrooms, and MDMA, a euphoria-inducing club drug, as potential treatments for depression and post-traumatic stress disorder.

“Substantially different agents are only rarely appearing from pharmaceutical companies or other laboratories,” said Dr. Paul Summergrad, a psychiatrist at Tufts University. “That’s prompting people to investigate other compounds.”

Unlike ketamine, psilocybin and MDMA have no legal medical use. Classified in the same category as heroin and LSD, they are tightly restricted by the federal government. But the FDA’s approval of esketamine could smooth their path.

Burden of depression

Depression is among the leading causes of disability in the U.S. and is being closely monitored by health authorities amid rising suicides nationwide. In 2017, the U.S. suicide rate rose to 14 deaths per 100,000 people, the highest rate in at least 50 years, according to federal records. 

Government officials haven’t suggested an explanation for the trend, though academic researchers point to the nation’s widening income gap, financial struggles and divisive politics.

J&J’s drug will be subject to a number of restrictions due to its abuse potential, side effects and lingering safety questions.

The drug will only be given by accredited specialists who must monitor patients for at least two hours after administration, due to its trippy, disorienting effects. Additionally, all patients will be tracked in a registry to monitor long-term safety and effectiveness.

The immediate impact of ketamine is thought to last just four to seven days and there’s no consensus yet on how long patients can benefit from ongoing treatment.

Still, there are few other options for patients who fail to respond to antidepressants. The most effective treatment in such cases, electroshock therapy, requires patients to be fully sedated and can cause persistent memory loss.

Wall Street has high expectations for J&J’s medication, with analysts predicting more than $600 million in annual sales by 2022. But J&J will face competition in the marketplace.

A decades-old drug, ketamine is already used off-label to treat depression by some doctors. At least 150 clinics around the U.S. provide treatment with various forms of the drug, which is available as a low-cost generic. Patients often pay hundreds or thousands of dollars for intravenous infusions of the drug over several weeks or months. Such therapies are generally not covered by insurance because they haven’t been approved as safe and effective by FDA regulators.

Some doctors plan to offer both ketamine and the new J&J drug.

Dr. Steve Levine says having FDA-approved standards for dosing and administering the new drug should raise standards in the field and drive out some of the bad actors who are not qualified to treat depression.

“This is going to bring in some standards, regulation and it’s going to make it safer and more accessible to patients,” said Levine, who serves as vice president of the American Society of Ketamine Physicians, a group representing doctors, nurses and others using ketamine for treating depression or other non-approved uses.
…

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Some of the world’s largest airlines have yet to set long-term targets to reduce their climate-changing emissions, climate and economic researchers warned Tuesday.

Top publicly listed airlines have cut their “emissions intensity” — how much pollution they produce for the same amount of activity — significantly in recent years, said researchers from the London School of Economics’ Grantham Research Institute.

But they are not making clear plans for the much larger emissions reductions needed to meet internationally agreed climate goals, the researchers said.

Beyond 2020 and particularly in the long-term “the targets these airlines have set to reduce their emissions are not clearly consistent with the Paris Agreement goals,” said Simon Dietz, co-author of a study released Tuesday.

The Paris goals, agreed by world governments in 2015, call for keeping global temperature rise to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius and ideally to 1.5C above pre-industrial times.

The study, which looked at 20 of the world’s largest publicly listed airlines, noted that air travel currently accounts for about 2 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, and 12 percent of transport-related emissions.

Cutting those emissions — and emissions from shipping — is particularly challenging because their mobile nature makes it harder for companies to use clean energy sources such as solar or wind power.

Alternative fuels, such as hydrogen, may offer long-term solutions but are still being developed.

The study, backed by investor groups, analyzed the public disclosures of airlines as a way of assessing their performance on combatting climate change, Dietz said.

The airlines were evaluated based on their carbon management practices and emissions performance. Airlines with lower emissions often had younger fleets, more passengers per flight and a focus on longer versus shorter flights, Dietz said.

Helen Vines Fiestas, the deputy global head of sustainability at BNP Paribas Asset Management, said the report raises key questions about what the aviation industry is prepared to do to contribute to climate change action in the long run.

Airlines, she said, should join forces and look at airline-related emissions as a joint problem, “asking how are we going to go about it” in making emissions reductions, she said.

But “this is just not what we are seeing, and this is what really worries us,” she said.

Carbon offsets

Many airlines have adopted industry targets to reduce net emissions, usually through “carbon offsetting,” which can include things like paying to plant carbon-absorbing forests or build clean energy systems elsewhere to compensate for airline emissions, Dietz said.

Delta Airlines, for instance — rated in the study as one of the most active airlines on addressing climate issues — has committed to capping carbon emissions at 2012 levels, in part by purchasing offsets, according to Catherine Simmons, a spokeswoman for Delta.

Its website lets customers estimate their emissions and contribute to a range of carbon offset programs to compensate for them.

The airline between 2016 and 2020 also is replacing 30 percent of its main fleet with aircraft 15 to 25 percent more fuel-efficient, Simmons said, and its fleet has seen a 9 percent increase in fuel efficiency since 2009.

The airline industry more broadly has set goals that include capping aviation’s net emissions at 2020 levels, and halving net emissions by 2050 from 2005 levels, Dietz said.

But that approach is not necessarily the most effective, he said, because reducing “net emissions” can be done through offsets rather than actual aviation emissions reductions.

“If you look at modeling by organizations like the International Energy Agency, it clearly shows that in the long run, the airline sector needs to reduce its own emissions,” he said. “We’re calling on airlines to make commitments that clearly show what they are going to achieve.”
…

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Some of the world’s largest airlines have yet to set long-term targets to reduce their climate-changing emissions, climate and economic researchers warned Tuesday.

Top publicly listed airlines have cut their “emissions intensity” — how much pollution they produce for the same amount of activity — significantly in recent years, said researchers from the London School of Economics’ Grantham Research Institute.

But they are not making clear plans for the much larger emissions reductions needed to meet internationally agreed climate goals, the researchers said.

Beyond 2020 and particularly in the long-term “the targets these airlines have set to reduce their emissions are not clearly consistent with the Paris Agreement goals,” said Simon Dietz, co-author of a study released Tuesday.

The Paris goals, agreed by world governments in 2015, call for keeping global temperature rise to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius and ideally to 1.5C above pre-industrial times.

The study, which looked at 20 of the world’s largest publicly listed airlines, noted that air travel currently accounts for about 2 percent of global carbon dioxide emissions, and 12 percent of transport-related emissions.

Cutting those emissions — and emissions from shipping — is particularly challenging because their mobile nature makes it harder for companies to use clean energy sources such as solar or wind power.

Alternative fuels, such as hydrogen, may offer long-term solutions but are still being developed.

The study, backed by investor groups, analyzed the public disclosures of airlines as a way of assessing their performance on combatting climate change, Dietz said.

The airlines were evaluated based on their carbon management practices and emissions performance. Airlines with lower emissions often had younger fleets, more passengers per flight and a focus on longer versus shorter flights, Dietz said.

Helen Vines Fiestas, the deputy global head of sustainability at BNP Paribas Asset Management, said the report raises key questions about what the aviation industry is prepared to do to contribute to climate change action in the long run.

Airlines, she said, should join forces and look at airline-related emissions as a joint problem, “asking how are we going to go about it” in making emissions reductions, she said.

But “this is just not what we are seeing, and this is what really worries us,” she said.

Carbon offsets

Many airlines have adopted industry targets to reduce net emissions, usually through “carbon offsetting,” which can include things like paying to plant carbon-absorbing forests or build clean energy systems elsewhere to compensate for airline emissions, Dietz said.

Delta Airlines, for instance — rated in the study as one of the most active airlines on addressing climate issues — has committed to capping carbon emissions at 2012 levels, in part by purchasing offsets, according to Catherine Simmons, a spokeswoman for Delta.

Its website lets customers estimate their emissions and contribute to a range of carbon offset programs to compensate for them.

The airline between 2016 and 2020 also is replacing 30 percent of its main fleet with aircraft 15 to 25 percent more fuel-efficient, Simmons said, and its fleet has seen a 9 percent increase in fuel efficiency since 2009.

The airline industry more broadly has set goals that include capping aviation’s net emissions at 2020 levels, and halving net emissions by 2050 from 2005 levels, Dietz said.

But that approach is not necessarily the most effective, he said, because reducing “net emissions” can be done through offsets rather than actual aviation emissions reductions.

“If you look at modeling by organizations like the International Energy Agency, it clearly shows that in the long run, the airline sector needs to reduce its own emissions,” he said. “We’re calling on airlines to make commitments that clearly show what they are going to achieve.”
…

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Last month’s visit by roaming polar bears that put a Russian village on lockdown may be just the beginning.

For as Moscow steps up its activity in the warming Arctic, conflict with the rare species is likely to increase.

More than 50 bears approached Belyushya Guba, a village on the far northern Novaya Zemlya archipelago, in February. As many as 10 of them explored the streets and entered buildings.

Local authorities declared a state of emergency for a week and appealed for help from Moscow.

Photos of the incident went viral, with some observers blaming officials for ignoring a sprawling garbage dump nearby where the animals feasted on food waste.

But polar bear experts say the main reason the Arctic predators came so close to humans was the late freezing of the sea. It was this that kept them from hunting seals and sent them looking for alternate food sources.

And as Russia increases its footprint in the Arctic, pursuing energy projects, Northern Passage navigation and strategic military interests, experts expect more clashes between humans and bears.

“Development in the Arctic will definitely increase conflict with humans, especially now that the polar bear is losing its life platform in several regions and coming ashore,” said biologist Anatoly Kochnev, who has studied polar bears in the eastern Arctic since the 1980s.

World’s fastest-melting ice

Novaya Zemlya, an archipelago of two islands between the Kara and Barents seas, is a good example of Moscow’s new frontier that falls inside the polar bear habitat.

Bears in the Barents Sea are seeing the fastest ice reduction of the species’ range, having lost 20 weeks of ice a year over the last few decades, according to Polar Bears International.

“Ice monitoring shows that previously, ice near Belushya Guba formed in December,” said Ilya Mordvintsev from the Severtsov Institute in Moscow, who was in a group of scientists flown out to aid the village.

“For thousands of years, they migrated this time of year to hunt seals. This year they came to the shore and there was no ice.”

Since the incident, ice has formed and the bears have left land to hunt, he said. “But it’s impossible to rule out a repeat of the situation in the coming years.”

And as more humans come to Novaya Zemlya, the likelihood of human-bear conflict increases.

A Soviet-era nuclear weapons testing site, Novaya Zemlya remains a restricted territory. But following a post-Soviet hiatus, the military has put up new buildings and an aerodrome.

A new port is under construction, in tandem with imminent plans to mine the giant Pavlovskoye lead and zinc deposit.

New contingents of military police were deployed to Belushya Guba in 2018. The community, which has schools and a large sports complex for military families, numbers over 2,000 people.

Soldiers vs bears 

Kochnev remembers the damage caused by Soviet missile defense personnel previously stationed on the east Arctic’s Wrangel Island.

In 1991, soldiers drove an axe into the head of a polar bear after it had got used to feeding on discarded scraps and become aggressive. Biologists from the island’s nature reserve never found the injured animal, he said.

“When they left a year later, we were relieved. Only reserve staff remained, who knew how to behave around bears,” he said. “But now it’s all starting again.”

Moscow announced in 2014 that the Arctic was a strategic priority for its military.

Kochnev in 2015 wrote an emotional blog post after a bear near a military construction site on Wrangel island swallowed an explosive flare. He criticized the new base, and was fired from his job in a national park as a result.

Current instructions regarding polar bears focus on how to ward them off, he said. But the priority should be fortifying facilities to prevent any contact.

“Put yourself inside a cage and let the bears roam around,” he said in advice to Arctic developers.

Mordvintsev, however, said this would not work on Novaya Zemlya, where winds would turn any fence into a giant snowdrift for bears to walk over. 

Belushya Guba is planning to install cameras and address its waste problem, he said. Already all arrivals to the local airport listen to a mandatory lecture on polar bear behavior.

Moscow’s plans to develop the Northern Passage also pose a problem for polar bears in the region, he said.

“Constant use of icebreakers through ice where seals give birth affects populations of seals” which bears feed on.

Putin last year ordered an increase in the capacity of the Northern Passage, touted as an alternate trade route to Asia, from the current 18 million tonnes to 80 million tonnes by 2024.

Kochnev said bears have been able to adapt so far to unfavorable trends, learning to feed in groups rather than hunt in solitude. But if warming continues, “polar bears will simply leave Russia.”

“If the ice-free period increases by another two-three weeks, they will likely migrate to northern Canada, where changes have been less noticeable,” he said. 

The ones that stay behind on Russian soil, meanwhile, will eventually get killed off in conflicts with humans. 
…

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