European doctors warn rare kids’ syndrome may have virus tie

      No Comments on European doctors warn rare kids’ syndrome may have virus tie
APRIL 28, 2020 @ 1400 GMT | Staff at Waterloo Station in London put up a banner to thank nearby St Thomas’ Hospital, Tuesday, April 28, 2020. The highly contagious COVID-19 coronavirus has impacted on nations around the globe, many imposing self isolation and exercising social distancing when people move from their homes. (AP Photo)

LONDON (AP) — Doctors in Britain, Italy, and Spain have been warned to look out for a rare inflammatory condition in children that is possibly linked to the new coronavirus.

Earlier this week, Britain’s Paediatric Intensive Care Society issued an alert to doctors noting that, in the past three weeks, there has been an increase in the number of children with “a multi-system inflammatory state requiring intensive care” across the country. The group said there was “growing concern” that either a COVID-19 related syndrome was emerging in children or that a different, unidentified disease might be responsible.

Continue reading →

US review: Airstrike in Somalia killed, injured civilians

      No Comments on US review: Airstrike in Somalia killed, injured civilians
APRIL 27, 2020 @ 1500 GMT | FILE – In this Feb. 13, 2012, file photo, an armed member of the militant group al-Shabab attends a rally on the outskirts of Mogadishu, Somalia. An American military airstrike in Somalia more than a year ago killed two civilians and injured three others, U.S. Africa Command is acknowledging in a new report expected on Monday, April 27, 2020. (AP Photo)

WASHINGTON (AP) — An American military airstrike in Somalia more than a year ago killed two civilians and injured three others, U.S. Africa Command acknowledged in a new report on Monday.

The deaths, confirmed by an internal investigation, mark only the second time Africa Command has determined that civilians were killed in a military strike in Somalia. The decision comes even as U.S. airstrikes against the al-Qaida linked al-Shabab extremist group this year are increasingly outpacing 2019 totals. Already there have been 39 airstrikes in 2020, compared to last year’s total of 63.

Continue reading →

Indian Muslims face stigma, blame for surge in infection

      No Comments on Indian Muslims face stigma, blame for surge in infection
APRIL 25, 2020 @ 1500 GMT | FILE – In this April 21, 2020, file photo, a Muslim man, among 29 people arrested by Indian authorities, walks towards an ambulance before being taken to a prison from a quarantine center in Prayagraj, India. Muslims in India are being stigmatized after the government blamed an Islamic missionary meeting for a surge in coronavirus cases. Experts who have studied previous epidemics warn that the stigma could hamper efforts to stop the contagion and prevent many from getting themselves tested. (AP Photo)

NEW DELHI (AP) — India’s government is blaming an Islamic missionary meeting for a surge in coronavirus cases, triggering a wave of violence, business boycotts and hate speech toward Muslims that experts warn could worsen the pandemic in the world’s second-most populous country.

The stigma faced by India’s Muslims, poorer and with less access to health care than other groups, is making health workers’ battle against the virus even tougher, according to veterans of other epidemics. India has about 24,500 confirmed coronavirus cases — about one in five of which have been linked to the missionary meeting — and 775 deaths, and the outbreak may not peak until June.

Continue reading →

Turkey: Virus deaths up to 2,706, positive test rate down

      No Comments on Turkey: Virus deaths up to 2,706, positive test rate down
APRIL 25, 2020 @ 1745 GMT | In this Friday, April 24, 2020, photo provided by the Canakkale Governorate, Turkish army commander Zekai Aksakalli places carnations on the graves of fallen Turkish soldiers at Turkish cemetery during the commemoration ceremonies marking 105th anniversary of the Gallipoli Campaign, in Canakkale, Turkey. Traditional mass celebrations on the ANZAC Day by Turks, Australians, New Zealanders, British and French have been cancelled due to novel coronavirus this year. (AP Photo)

ISTANBUL (AP) — Turkey’s Health Ministry has reported 2,861 new confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus and 106 more deaths but says the rate of positive tests for the virus is decreasing.

The daily figures Health Minister Fahrettin Koca shared on Saturday brought the total number of virus-related deaths recorded by the Turkish government to 2,706.

Continue reading →

Africa’s 43% jump in virus cases in 1 week worries experts

      No Comments on Africa’s 43% jump in virus cases in 1 week worries experts
APRIL 23, 2020 @ 2400 GMT | Men walk past health workers in a mobile testing clinic to queue for screening and test for COVID-19 at Lenasia South, south Johannesburg, South Africa, Tuesday, April 21, 2020, during a campaign aimed to combat the spread of Coronavirus. (AP Photo)

CAPE TOWN, South Africa (AP) — Africa registered a 43% jump in reported COVID-19 cases in the last week, highlighting a warning from the World Health Organization that the continent of 1.3 billion could become the next epicenter of the global outbreak.

Africa also has a “very, very limited” and “very, very strained” testing capacity, John Nkengasong, director of the Africa Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, said in his weekly briefing on Thursday.

Continue reading →

Mass virus test in nursing home seeks to combat loneliness

      No Comments on Mass virus test in nursing home seeks to combat loneliness
APRIL 19, 2020 @ 1800 GMT | Marie Lithard, right, and her neighboor Yves Chretien sit looking out of their rooms in a nursing home in Ammerschwir, France Thursday April 16, 2020. The elderly make up a disproportional share of coronavirus victims globally, and that is especially true in nursing homes, which have seen a horrific number of deaths around the world. In France, nursing home deaths account for more than a third of the country’s total coronavirus victims — figures the government now documents meticulously after weeks of pressure. (AP Photo)

AMMERSCHWIR, France (AP) — Some were born in this warren of small rooms in what used to be a hospital, dating to the 17th century. Many are likely to die here. And all are currently confined to their rooms, denied the simple comfort of human companionship.

The residents at the Weiss nursing home in eastern France want to chat face to face, to play board games, to share meals. And so each gave a vial of blood to be tested for the coronavirus, as did each staff member — about 580 tests in all. The goal: to identify who must be isolated and who will be allowed the freedom to leave their rooms.

Continue reading →

Study: Warming makes US West megadrought worst in modern age

      No Comments on Study: Warming makes US West megadrought worst in modern age
APRIL 16, 2020 @ 1500 GMT | This March 31, 2018 photo provided by researcher A. Park Williams shows the Catalina Mountains in southern Arizona. A two-decade-long dry spell that has parched much of the western United States is turning into one of the deepest megadroughts in the region in more than 1,200 years, and about half of this historic drought can be blamed on man-made global warming, according to a study released Thursday, April 16, 2020 in the journal Science. (Earth Observatory via AP)

KENSINGTON, Maryland (AP) — A two-decade-long dry spell that has parched much of the western United States is turning into one of the deepest megadroughts in the region in more than 1,200 years, a new study found.

And about half of this historic drought can be blamed on man-made global warming, according to a study in Thursday’s journal Science.

Scientists looked at a nine-state area from Oregon and Wyoming down through California and New Mexico, plus a sliver of southwestern Montana and parts of northern Mexico. They used thousands of tree rings to compare a drought that started in 2000 and is still going — despite a wet 2019 — to four past megadroughts since the year 800.

Continue reading →

Russia slaps US for ignoring Gagarin on Spaceflight Day

      No Comments on Russia slaps US for ignoring Gagarin on Spaceflight Day
APRIL 13, 2020 @ 1700 GMT | FILE – In this file photo taken on Monday, April 11, 2011, An undated portrait of the first man in space, Yuri Gagarin, and his award of the Hero of the Soviet Union, at right, part of an exhibition dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the first man in space, in Moscow, Russia. Russia’s Foreign Ministry has accused the U.S. State Department of spreading disinformation by not mentioning Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in a Facebook post about the International Day of Human Space Flight. (AP File Photo)

MOSCOW, Russia (AP) — Russia’s Foreign Ministry has accused the U.S. State Department of spreading disinformation by not mentioning Soviet cosmonaut Yuri Gagarin in a Facebook post about the International Day of Human Space Flight.

The United Nations General Assembly in 2011 proclaimed the annual observance held on the anniversary of the solo one-orbit mission that made Gagarin the first man in space on April 12, 1961.

Continue reading →

Indonesia’s Anak Krakatau volcano shoots ash, lava

      No Comments on Indonesia’s Anak Krakatau volcano shoots ash, lava
APRIL 10, 2020 @ 1700 GMT | FILE – This April 10, 2004 file photo shows the volcano, Anak Krakatau, seen from the coast of West Java, Indonesia. Indonesia’s Anak Krakatau in Lampung erupted on Friday night, April 10, 2020, Indonesia’s volcanology agency said the eruption is spewing the column of ash up to 500 meter high.(AP File Photo)

JAKARTA, Indonesia (AP) — Indonesia’s Anak Krakatau volcano spewed a column of ash 500 meters (1,640 feet) into the sky in the longest eruption since the explosive collapse of the island caused a deadly tsunami in 2018, scientists said Saturday.

Closed-circuit TV from Indonesia’s Center for Volcanology and Geological Disaster Mitigation showed lava flares Friday night.

Continue reading →

Apollo 13′s most famous quotes originated in Hollywood

      No Comments on Apollo 13′s most famous quotes originated in Hollywood
APRIL 9, 2020 @ 1700 GMT | FILE – In this April 21, 1970 file photo, Apollo 13 commander James A. Lovell Jr., left, opens the astronauts televised news conference at the Manned Spacecraft Center, Houston, by saying “I’m not a superstitious man” alluding to the number 13 and the trouble that befell the flight. With Lovell are his fellow crew members, command module pilot John Swigert, center, and lunar module pilot Fred Haise. With their moon-bound spacecraft wrecked by an oxygen tank explosion on April 13, 1970, the astronauts urgently radioed, “Houston, we’ve had a problem here.” Screenwriters for the 1995 film “Apollo 13″ wanted to punch that up. Thus was born “Houston, we have a problem.” (AP Photo)

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — Apollo 13′s best known quotes originated not in space or Mission Control, but in Hollywood.

Their moon-bound spacecraft wrecked by an oxygen tank explosion on April 13, 1970, the astronauts urgently radioed, “Houston, we’ve had a problem here.”

Screenwriters for the 1995 film “Apollo 13″ wanted to punch that up. Thus was born “Houston, we have a problem.”

Even more artistic license was taken with NASA flight director Gene Kranz’ mobilizing speech to his team in Houston.

Continue reading →