Category: Silicon Valley

Blantyre, Malawi — The Malawi government and the World Health Organization launched a new COVID-19 vaccination campaign on Monday in 10 of the country’s 29 districts. This is partly in response to new cases confirmed in the past three weeks in several districts across the country.

Nsanje District in southern Malawi currently leads in the number of COVID-19 cases recorded this year.

George Mbotwa, spokesperson for the district health office, said the district has registered 17 new cases in the past three weeks and some are health workers.

“Initially there were two, but we had up to eight cases that were health workers,” he said. “Some of them have now been confirmed as negative, and others are being followed up to ensure that they are fully recovered before they can resume work.”

By Monday, Malawi cumulatively recorded 89,202 confirmed COVID-19 cases, including 2,686 deaths, since the first cases were confirmed in the country in April 2020.

Malawi’s Ministry of Health says the new vaccination campaign will help boost the number of people getting the COVID-19 vaccine. Vaccination rates in some areas of Malawi are as low as 40%.

It also says the WHO-funded campaign would help avoid waste of the vaccine as was the case in 2020 when the government destroyed nearly 20,000 expired AstraZeneca doses.

Many of those doses expired due to vaccine hesitancy amid concerns of its safety and efficacy.

However, recent government public health campaigns on the importance of COVID-19 shots have helped defeat that hesitancy.

Mary Chawinga, a mother of two of Machinjiri Township in Blantyre, said she has had the vaccine and is awaiting a booster.

“And I am ready to take my children, because prevention is better than [a] cure they say,” Chawinga said. “You never know how the wave will be like this time around considering the way it was way back in 2020. We have had it in 2021, and now this is 2024.”

Another mother of two, Habeeba Nyasulu, said she received the COVID-19 doses during the first campaign and encourages others to get the shot.

“I know that we are not safe until everyone is safe,” she said. “So, let others also receive the vaccine. I know that the vaccine does not prevent us from getting infected, but it helps us when we contract it not to be critically ill.”

Maziko Matemba is a community health care ambassador in Malawi, said the COVID-19 threat is still present in the country.

“Malawi didn’t vaccinate a required number of people against COVID-19, because the targeted population was about 11 million Malawians,” Matemba said. “But we were less than half about 2 or 3 million Malawians who were able to get vaccinated.”

Matemba said the country now needs to have the vaccine in the right places and encourage more people to get vaccinated.

The Ministry of Health says the new campaign targets 10 of the country’s 29 health districts that have recently recorded new cases. These include Machinga, Blantyre, Dowa, Mzimba and Nsanje districts.
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GENEVA — The World Health Organization says great progress has been made in the global elimination of industrially produced trans fat, with nearly half the world’s population protected against the harmful effects of this toxic product.

“Five years ago, WHO called on countries and the food sector to eliminate industrially produced trans fats from the food supply. The response has been incredible,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said Monday.

“So far, 53 countries have implemented best practice policies, including bans and limits on trans fats, with three more countries on the way. This removes a major health risk for at least 3.7 billion people, or 46% of the world’s population.

“These policies are expected to save 183,000 lives every year. Just five years ago, only 6% of the world’s population was protected from this toxic additive with similar policies,” Tedros said.

Trans fat is created by adding hydrogen to vegetable oil, which causes the oil to become solid at room temperature.

“It is also solid in your body, in your coronary artery,” said Tom Frieden, president and CEO of Resolve to Save Lives. “And this is why it was at one point estimated to kill half a million people per year.” 

With almost half the world covered, Frieden said millions of deaths will be prevented in the coming decades. He said the next two years will be critical, noting that the original deadline for the global elimination of trans fats has been extended from 2023 to 2025 due to the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

“Global elimination, according to published estimates, would prevent about 17.5 million deaths over 25 years. The progress of reducing trans fat globally show that the noncommunicable diseases can be beaten,” Frieden said.

He said this was important because “sometimes when it comes to the noncommunicable diseases, we have the sense that we can describe them, we can predict them, but we cannot stop them. In fact, we can, and the progress stopping trans fat shows that that is possible. And there are other areas, as well, where specific results are available.”

Health officials say no amount of trans fat is safe and regard it as the worst type of fat anyone can eat because it has no known nutritional benefits. Trans fat is cheap to make and is found in margarine, palm oil, fried foods, baked products, pastries and some processed foods. 

WHO reports that a high intake of trans fat increases the risk of death from any cause by 34% and from coronary heart disease by 28%. 

WHO on Monday held an awards ceremony honoring the achievements of the first five countries to have eliminated trans fat from their food supply.  

“Today, we recognize Denmark, Lithuania, Poland, Saudi Arabia and Thailand as the first countries to go beyond just adopting policies, to monitoring and enforcing them,” Tedros said.  

“Congratulations to all these countries. You are leading the world and showing what is possible. You are the first countries to be validated, but you will not be the last,” he said.

In accepting the award, Ib Petersen, Danish ambassador to the United Nations in Geneva, said studies show that trans fat elimination policies put in place in his country in 2003 have “led to a reduction of deaths from coronary disease of 11%, which is significant.”

“It also shows that it is the most financially disadvantaged groups that have benefited most from this policy,” he said.

Frieden said he hopes more nations will follow the lead of these five countries in putting in place the policies, regulations and enforcement mechanisms needed to rid the world of trans fat.

“Of the remaining burden, just five countries — China, Pakistan, Russia, Indonesia, and Iran — account for about 60% of the remaining estimated burden. If these five countries were to implement [the best practice policies], the world would get to about 85% of the estimated burden, banned or trans fat-free,” he said.

WHO reports progress remains uneven, and a lot of work is still to be done. While many low- and middle-income countries are advancing, it says there is a long way to go, especially in Africa and the western Pacific.

“Africa has the lowest policy coverage, but there have been leaders with Nigeria and South Africa implementing,” said Frieden. “South Africa is beginning the enforcement process, and Ethiopia, Ghana and Cameroon are considering regulations in the near future.  

“They understand that trans fat is not only a toxic product, but one that might be dumped on them if they do not take action when the rest of the world is banning it,” Frieden said, adding that governments and the food industry have a responsibility to ensure that does not happen. 
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JERUSALEM — Iran said Sunday it successfully launched three satellites into space, the latest for a program that the West says improves Tehran’s ballistic missiles.

The state-run IRNA news agency said the launch also saw the successful use of Iran’s Simorgh rocket, which has had multiple failures in the past.

The launch comes as heightened tensions grip the wider Middle East over Israel’s continued war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip.

While Iran has not intervened militarily in the conflict, it has faced increased pressure within its theocracy for action after a deadly Islamic State suicide bombing earlier this month and as proxy groups like Yemen’s Houthi rebels conduct attacks linked to the war.

Footage released by Iranian state television showed a nighttime launch for the Simorgh rocket. An Associated Press analysis of the footage’s details showed that it took place at the Imam Khomeini Spaceport in Iran’s rural Semnan province.

State TV named the launched satellites Mahda, Kayhan-2 and Hatef-1. It described the Mahda as a research satellite, while the Kayhan and the Hatef were nanosatellites focused on global positioning and communication respectively.

There have been five failed launches in a row for the Simorgh program, another satellite-carrying rocket. The Simorgh, or “Phoenix,” rocket failures have been part of a series of setbacks in recent years for Iran’s civilian space program, including fatal fires and a launchpad rocket explosion that drew the attention of former U.S. President Donald Trump.

The United States has previously said Iran’s satellite launches defy a U.N. Security Council resolution and called on Tehran to undertake no activity involving ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons. U.N. sanctions related to Iran’s ballistic missile program expired last October.

The U.S. intelligence community’s 2023 worldwide threat assessment said the development of satellite launch vehicles “shortens the timeline” for Iran to develop an intercontinental ballistic missile because it uses similar technology.

The U.S. military and the State Department did not immediately respond to requests for comment. However, the U.S. military has quietly acknowledged a successful Iranian satellite launch from January 20 conducted by the country’s paramilitary Revolutionary Guard.
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AZUA, Dominican Republic —  It was a busy Saturday morning at Marcia González’s church. A bishop was visiting, and normally she would have been there helping with logistics, but on this day she was teaching sex education at a local school.

“I coordinate activities at the church and my husband is a deacon,” González said. “The bishop comes once a year and children are being confirmed, but I am here because this is important for my community.”

For 40 years, González and her husband have pushed for broader sex education in the Dominican Republic, one of four Latin American nations that criminalizes abortion without exceptions. Women face up to two years in prison for having an abortion; penalties for doctors or midwives range from five to 20 years.

With a Bible on its flag, the Caribbean country has a powerful lobby of Catholics and evangelicals who are united against decriminalizing abortion.

President Luis Abinader committed to the decriminalization of abortion as a candidate in 2020, but his government hasn’t acted on that pledge. For now, it depends on whether he is reelected in May.

To help girls prevent unplanned pregnancies in this context, González and other activists have developed “teenage clubs,” where adolescents learn about sexual and reproductive rights, self-esteem, gender violence, finances and other topics. The goal is to empower future generations of Dominican women.

Outside the clubs, sex education is often insufficient, according to activists. Close to 30% of adolescents don’t have access to contraception. High poverty levels increase the risks of facing an unwanted pregnancy.

For the teenagers she mentors, González’s concerns also go beyond the impossibility of terminating a pregnancy.

According to activists, poverty forces some Dominican mothers to marry their 14 or 15-year-old daughters to men up to 50 years older. Nearly 7 out of 10 women suffer from gender violence such as incest, and families often remain silent regarding sexual abuse.

For every 1,000 adolescents between 15 and 19, 42 became mothers in 2023, according to the United Nations Population Fund. And until 2019, when UNICEF published its latest report on child marriage, more than a third of Dominican women married or entered a free union before turning 18.

Dominican laws have prohibited child marriage since 2021, but community leaders say that such unions are still common because the practice has been normalized and few people are aware of the statute.

“In my 14-year-old granddaughter’s class, two of her younger friends are already married,” González said. “Many mothers give the responsibility of their younger children to their older daughters so, instead of taking care of little boys, they run away with a husband.”

Activists hope education can help prevent girls from facing this situation.

“There are myths that people tell you when you have your period,” said Gabriela Díaz, 16, during a recent encounter organized by the Women’s Equality Center. “They say that we are dirty or we have dirty blood, but that is false. We are helping our body to clean itself and improve its functions.”

Díaz calls González “godmother,” a term applied by Plan International to community leaders who implement the programs of this UK-based organization, which promotes children’s rights.

According to its own data, San Cristóbal and Azua, where González lives, are the Dominican cities with the highest rates of teenage pregnancy and child marriage.

To address this, its clubs accept girls between 13 and 17. Each group meets two hours per week, welcomes up to 25 participants and is led by volunteers like González.

In San Cristobal, also in southern Dominican Republic, the National Confederation of Rural Women (CONAMUCA) sponsors teenage clubs of its own.

“CONAMUCA was born to fight for land ownership, but the landscape has changed, and we have integrated new issues, such as food sovereignty, agrarian reform, and sexual and reproductive rights,” said Lidia Ferrer, one of its leaders.

Its clubs gather 1,600 girls in 60 communities, Ferrer said. The topics they study vary from region to region, but among the recurring ones are adolescent pregnancy, early unions and feminicide.

“The starting point is our own reality,” said Kathy Cabrera, who joined CONAMUCA clubs at age 9 and two decades later takes new generations under her wing. “It’s how we live and suffer.”

Migration is increasingly noticeable in rural areas, Cabrera said. Women are forced to walk for miles to attend school or find water, and health services fail in guaranteeing their sexual and reproductive rights.

“We have a government that tells you ‘Don’t have an abortion’ but does not provide the necessary contraception to avoid it.”

She has witnessed how 13-year-old girls bear the children of 65-year-old men while neither families nor authorities seem to be concerned. On other occasions, she said, parents “give away” their daughters because they cannot support them or because they discover that they are no longer virgins.

“It’s not regarded as sexual abuse because, if my grandmother got pregnant and married at an early age, and my great-grandmother too and my mother too, then it means I should too,” Cabrera said.

In southern Dominican communities, most girls can relate to this, or know someone who does.

“My sister got pregnant at 16, and that was very disturbing,” said 14-year-old Laura Pérez. “She got together with a person much older than her, and they have a baby. I don’t think that was right.”

The clubs’ dynamics change as needed to create safe and loving environments for girls to share what they feel. Some sessions kick off with relaxation exercises and others with games.

Some girls speak proudly of what they have learned. One of them mentioned she confronted her father when he said she shouldn’t cut any lemons from a tree while menstruating. Another said that her friends always go to the bathroom in groups, to avoid safety risks. They all regard their godmothers as mentors who have their backs.

“They call me to confide everything,” González said. “I am happy because, in my group, no girl has become pregnant.”

Many girls from teenage clubs have dreams they want to follow. Francesca Montero, 16, would like to become a pediatrician. Perla Infante, 15, a psychologist. Lomelí Arias, 18, a nurse.

“I want to be a soldier!” shouted Laura Pérez, the 14-year-old who wants to be careful not to following her sister’s footsteps.

“I was undecided, but when I entered CONAMUCA I knew I wanted to become a soldier. In here we see all these women who give you strength, who are like you, but as a guide,” Pérez said. “It’s like a child seeing an older person and thinking: ‘When I grow up, I want to be like that.'”
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los angeles — Data gathered by NASA’s Perseverance rover have confirmed the existence of ancient lake sediments deposited by water that once filled a giant basin on Mars called Jezero Crater, according to a study published Friday.

The findings from ground-penetrating radar observations conducted by the robotic rover substantiate previous orbital imagery and other data leading scientists to theorize that portions of Mars were once covered in water and may have harbored microbial life.

The research, led by teams from the University of California at Los Angeles  and the University of Oslo, was published in the journal Science Advances.

It was based on subsurface scans taken by the car-sized, six-wheeled rover as it made its way across the Martian surface from the crater floor onto an adjacent expanse of braided, sedimentary-like features resembling, from orbit, the river deltas found on Earth.

Soundings from the rover’s RIMFAX radar instrument allow scientists to peer underground to get a cross-sectional view of rock layers 65 feet (20 meters) deep, “almost like looking at a road cut,” said UCLA planetary scientist David Paige, the first author of the paper.

Those layers provide unmistakable evidence that soil sediments carried by water were deposited at Jezero Crater and its delta from a river that fed it, just as they are in lakes on Earth. The findings reinforced what previous studies have long suggested — that cold, arid, lifeless Mars was once warm, wet and perhaps habitable.

Scientists look forward to an up-close examination of Jezero’s sediments — thought to have formed some 3 billion years ago — in samples collected by Perseverance for future transport to Earth.

In the meantime, the latest study is welcome validation that scientists undertook their geobiological Mars endeavor at the right place on the planet after all.

Remote analysis of early core samples drilled by Perseverance at four sites close to where it landed in February 2021 surprised researchers by revealing rock that was volcanic in nature, rather than sedimentary as had been expected.

The two studies are not contradictory. Even the volcanic rocks bore signs of alteration through exposure to water, and scientists who published those findings in August 2022 reasoned then that sedimentary deposits may have eroded away.

Indeed, the RIMFAX radar readings reported on Friday found signs of erosion before and after the formation of sedimentary layers identified at the crater’s western edge, evidence of a complex geological history there, Paige said.

“There were volcanic rocks that we landed on,” Paige said. “The real news here is that now we’ve driven onto the delta and now we’re seeing evidence of these lake sediments, which is one of the main reasons we came to this location. So that’s a happy story in that respect.”
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Groundbreaking artificial intelligence-assisted technology can help people with voice disorders speak in their natural voice, giving millions a chance to have clearer conversations. VOA’s Julie Taboh reports. Camera: Tina Trinh
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LOS ANGELES — The estate of George Carlin has filed a lawsuit against the media company behind a fake hour-long comedy special that purportedly uses artificial intelligence to recreate the late standup comic’s style and material. 

The lawsuit filed in federal court in Los Angeles on Thursday asks that a judge order the podcast outlet, Dudesy, to immediately take down the audio special, “George Carlin: I’m Glad I’m Dead,” in which a synthesis of Carlin, who died in 2008, delivers commentary on current events.

Carlin’s daughter, Kelly Carlin, said in a statement that the work is “a poorly-executed facsimile cobbled together by unscrupulous individuals to capitalize on the extraordinary goodwill my father established with his adoring fanbase.” 

The Carlin estate and its executor, Jerold Hamza, are named as plaintiffs in the suit, which alleges violations of Carlin’s right of publicity and copyright. The named defendants are Dudesy and podcast hosts Will Sasso and Chad Kultgen. 

“None of the Defendants had permission to use Carlin’s likeness for the AI-generated ‘George Carlin Special,’ nor did they have a license to use any of the late comedian’s copyrighted materials,” the lawsuit says. 

The defendants have not filed a response to the lawsuit and it was not clear whether they have retained an attorney. They could not immediately be reached for comment. 

At the beginning of the special posted on YouTube on January 9, a voiceover identifying itself as the AI engine used by Dudesy says it listened to the comic’s 50 years of material and “did my best to imitate his voice, cadence and attitude as well as the subject matter I think would have interested him today.” 

The plaintiffs say if that was in fact how it was created — and some listeners have doubted its stated origins — it means Carlin’s copyright was violated. 

The company, as it often does on similar projects, also released a podcast episode with Sasso and Kultgen introducing and commenting on the mock Carlin. 

“What we just listened to, was that passable,” Kultgen says in a section of the episode cited in the lawsuit. 

“Yeah, that sounded exactly like George Carlin,” Sasso responds. 

The lawsuit is among the first in what is likely to be an increasing number of major legal moves made to fight the regenerated use of celebrity images and likenesses. 

The AI issue was a major sticking point in the resolution of last year’s Hollywood writers and actors strikes. 

Josh Schiller, an attorney for the plaintiffs, said in a statement that the “case is not just about AI, it’s about the humans that use AI to violate the law, infringe on intellectual property rights, and flout common decency.” 
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Chinese-made drones dominate the global market and are used widely by government agencies inside the United States. As Matt Dibble reports, US cybersecurity watchdogs warn that using those drones come with risks.
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WASHINGTON — U.S. officials hoping to break China’s near monopoly on the production of rare earth elements needed for many cutting-edge technologies should engage the governments of Central Asia to develop high concentrations of REEs found in the region, says a new report. 

The study by the U.S.-based International Tax and Investment Center warns that a failure to act could leave China with a “decisive advantage” in the sector, which is crucial to green energy, many new weapons systems and other advanced technologies. 

“As the uses for these minerals has expanded, so too has global competition for them in a time of sharply increasing geostrategic and geo-economic tension,” the report says. 

“Advanced economies with secure, reliable access to REEs enjoy economic advantages in manufacturing, and corresponding economic disadvantages accrue for those without this access.” 

China, which accounts for most of the world’s rare earth mining within its own borders, has not yet had to seek additional supplies from Central Asia, which enjoys plentiful reserves of minerals ranging from iron and nonferrous metals to uranium. 

But, the report says, “the massive size of the Chinese economy and the Chinese Communist Party’s conscious efforts to dominate the REE sector globally mean such increases are a matter of time.”  

Oil-rich Kazakhstan, the region’s economic giant, holds the world’s largest chromium reserves and the second-largest stocks of uranium, while also possessing other critical elements.  

Report co-author Ariel Cohen says it is up to the governments of Central Asia to create the investment climate for development of these resources.   

“They may be the next big thing in Central Asia as the engine of economic growth,” Cohen said this week during a panel discussion at the Atlantic Council, a Washington think tank.  

Across Central Asia, experts note, REEs are found in substantial volumes in the Kazakh steppe and uplands as well as in the Tien Shan mountains across Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, and in the Pamir Mountains in Tajikistan.  

Monazite, zircon, apatite, xenotime, pyrochlore, allanite and columbite are among Central Asia’s most abundant rare metals and minerals.  

In 2016, the U.S. Geological Survey listed 384 REE occurrences in the region: 160 in Kazakhstan, 87 in Uzbekistan, 75 in Kyrgyzstan, 60 in Tajikistan, and two in Turkmenistan.

Wesley Hill, another expert on Central Asia’s mineral reserves, says production of rare earths at present “is almost wholly monopolized by China.”  

“Depending on how you count, between 80 to 90% of REE refining is controlled by China and done directly inside of China,” Hill said.   

But, he argued, despite China’s heavy involvement in Central Asia, it has yet to fully take over the region’s rare earth sector. “So, this means that Central Asia is very much at a crossroads,” he said. “Central Asia has the opportunity to expand its REE production without being wholly dependent on China.” 

Central Asia is currently in a position where it can develop its REE refining capacities both for its national development strategies and to break the Chinese monopoly, Hill said.  

“But this is only going to happen with good policy, both from the American side and the Central Asian side.”  

Ambassador John Herbst, Washington’s former top diplomat in Uzbekistan and Ukraine, says the region’s REE assets are “simply another reason for enhanced engagement by the West.” 

He said he is not sure that Central Asian governments appreciate how important rare earths can be to their development. “But I do know that the countries of Central Asia want a closer relationship with the United States, and that is one important part of their maintaining their hard-won independence.” 

Herbst added that the United States and Central Asia have a common interest in working together to develop the region’s rare earths “for the economy of the future.” 

“We have an ability to innovate that far exceeds [China’s]. Their innovation is based largely on taking our technology.”

Suriya Evans-Pritchard Jayanti, who serves as energy transition counsel at the U.S. Department of Commerce, says the region is eager for investment. 

“It is a development opportunity. Particularly with the geostrategic energy realignment after the Russian invasion of Ukraine, but also, because of the energy transition. Lithium and other REE are necessary for different parts of that transition. So that’s primarily an economic incentive,” she said. 

She pointed to the Mineral Strategic Partnership Initiative run by the U.S. State Department’s Bureau on Energy Resources, which is able to promote foreign direct investment in the region while providing technical assistance in the mining sector. 

Cohen said the Central Asian countries cannot wait long to develop their rare earths. “There is a competition, and the African countries, Latin American countries and others will compete increasingly.”  

Wilder Alejandro Sanchez, who heads a consultancy called Second Floor Strategies, says Central Asia needs a rare earth research center that can provide timely information to prospective customers and investors.  

Transportation is key, Sanchez said. “It’s not just about finding and mining them. You have to get them to the international market.”  

Access from the landlocked region at present is limited to China’s Belt and Road infrastructure or routes through Russia. Sanchez and others recommend using the Middle Corridor, also called the Trans-Caspian International Transport Route, which can carry goods to Europe across the Caspian and Black seas.  

These experts also say progress will depend on regional governments overcoming their traditional secretiveness regarding natural resources. They emphasize the importance of transparency, the rule of law, adherence to best practices and compliance with international norms if they hope to attract Western investment.
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NAIROBI, Kenya — Researchers say a rhinoceros was impregnated through embryo transfer in the first successful use of a method that they say might later make it possible to save the nearly extinct northern white rhino subspecies. 

The experiment was conducted with the less endangered southern white rhino subspecies. Researchers created an embryo in a lab from an egg and sperm collected from rhinos and transferred it into a southern white rhino surrogate mother at the Ol-Pejeta Conservancy in Kenya. 

“The successful embryo transfer and pregnancy are a proof of concept and allow [researchers] to now safely move to the transfer of northern white rhino embryos — a cornerstone in the mission to save the northern white rhino from extinction,” the group said in a statement Wednesday. 

However, the team learned of the pregnancy only after the surrogate mother died of a bacterial infection in November 2023. The rhino was infected when spores from the clostridium strain were released from the soil by floodwater, and the embryo was discovered during a post-mortem examination. 

Still, the scientists were optimistic about their finding, though some conservationists are skeptical that the breakthrough has come in time to save the northern white rhino. 

“Now we have the clear evidence that an embryo that is frozen, thawed, produced in a test tube can produce new life, and that is what we want for the northern white rhino,” said Thomas Hildebrandt, the lead researcher and head of the Department of Reproduction at BioRescue. 

Roughly 20,000 southern white rhinos remain in Africa. That subspecies and an additional species, the black rhino, are bouncing back from significant reduction in their populations because of poaching for their horns. 

However, the northern white rhinoceros subspecies has only two known members left in the world. 

Najin, a 34-year-old, and her 23-year-old offspring, Fatu, are both incapable of natural reproduction, according to the Ol-Pejeta Conservancy where they live. 

The last male white rhino, Sudan, was 45 when he was euthanized in 2018 because of age-related complications. He was Najin’s sire. 

Scientists stored his semen and that of four other dead rhinos, hoping to use them in in vitro fertilization with eggs harvested from female northern white rhinos to produce embryos that eventually will be carried by southern white rhino surrogate mothers. 

Some conservation groups have argued that it is probably too late to save the northern white rhino with in vitro fertilization, as the species’ natural habitat in Chad, Sudan, Uganda, Congo and Central African Republic has been ravaged by human conflict. 

Skeptics say the efforts should focus on other critically endangered species with a better chance at survival. 

“News of the first successful embryo transfer in a rhino is an exciting step, however it sadly comes too late to re-create a viable population of northern white rhinos,” said Dr. Jo Shaw, chief executive officer of Save the Rhino International. 

Shaw said her group’s focus remains on addressing the two main threats to the five species of rhino around the world — poaching of rhinos for their horns and their loss of habitat to development. 

“Our best hope remains to work with the range of partners involved to give rhinos the space and security they need to thrive naturally,” she said. 

Her group said it continues to encourage natural breeding to boost numbers. It cited the example of the Sumatran rhino, of which there are fewer than 80 left. Last year, two calves were born through natural reproduction, the group said. 
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Turkey makes space history. Plus, the 20th anniversary of twin rovers on Mars, and a flood of news for future missions to the Red Planet. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi brings us The Week in Space.
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Windhoek, Namibia — Namibian President Hage Geingob is set to undergo medical treatment in the United States after an exam found the possible return of cancerous cells in his body, according to a news release from his office Wednesday.

Having been diagnosed, treated and cleared of prostate cancer, Geingob was again found to have cancerous cells after undergoing colonoscopy, gastroscopy and biopsy procedures earlier this month.

The CEO of the Cancer Association of Namibia, Rolf Hansen, told VOA the president has been open about his cancer diagnosis in the past. He said early detection and treatment played a big role in Geingob’s past treatment and recovery.

“The scope that was done indicates that there might be cancerous cells in the soft tissue, perhaps the gut, the stomach, something like this,” Hansen said. “But until there is a formal prognosis by a doctor that has been publicly released, it’s all speculation.”

Political analyst James Makuwa said Namibians would like to know more about what the latest diagnosis means.

“What are the reasons and motives of the president’s office sharing a diagnosis which has no prognosis?” Makuwa asked. “They are basically putting the country in a state of panic … because you are telling us the person’s diagnosis, but we have no clue what condition he’s in, how he is doing, what is going to happen to him. We have no clue.”

According to the statement issued by the president’s office, Geingob accepted an offer from scientists and doctors in Los Angeles to undergo a novel therapy for the cancerous cells.

Dr. Elizabeth Kamati lauded Geingob’s openness in a country where men are known not to take their health seriously until too late.

“We applaud the president for being very open to us,” she said. “He can encourage other men who are also going through the same disease of cancer, which is somehow taboo in our society, to come out and tell them a diagnosis with cancer is not a death sentence.”

The president has come under harsh criticism in the past for seeking medical treatment abroad. However, Namibian doctors acknowledge that cancer treatments are relatively specialized and that the country does not have the equipment and medical expertise to treat the disease effectively.
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TOKYO — Japan’s “Moon Sniper” craft landed around 55 meters from its target, the country’s space agency said Thursday as it released the first images from the mission.

The unmanned Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM), dubbed the “Moon Sniper” for its pin-point technology, had the goal of touching down within 100 meters of a specific landing spot.

That is much more precise than the usual landing zone of several kilometers.

“SLIM succeeded in a pin-point soft landing … the landing point is confirmed to be 55 meters away from the target point,” space agency JAXA said.

Saturday’s soft lunar landing made Japan the fifth nation to achieve the feat, after the United States, Soviet Union, China and India.

But celebrations were muted because of a problem with the lightweight spacecraft’s solar batteries, which were not generating power.

JAXA decided to switch the craft off with 12% of its power remaining, to allow for a possible recovery when the sun’s angle changes.

“If sunlight hits the moon from the west in the future, we believe there’s a possibility of power generation, and we’re currently preparing for restoration,” JAXA said earlier this week.

Before switching SLIM off, mission control was able to download technical and image data from the craft’s descent and the lunar surface.

On Thursday, JAXA published the first color images from the mission, showing the SLIM craft sitting intact at a slight angle on the rocky, gray surface, lunar slopes rising in the distance.

The mission was aiming for a crater where the moon’s mantle, the usually deep inner layer beneath its crust, is believed to be exposed on the surface.

By analyzing the rocks there, JAXA hopes to shed light on the mystery of the moon’s possible water resources, key to building bases there one day as possible stopovers on the way to Mars.

Two probes detached successfully from SLIM on Saturday: one with a transmitter and another designed to trundle around the lunar surface beaming images to Earth.

This shape-shifting mini-rover, slightly bigger than a tennis ball, was co-developed by the firm behind the Transformer toys and took the picture released by JAXA on Thursday.

SLIM is one of several recent lunar missions by governments and private firms, 50 years after the first human moon landing.

But technical problems are rife, and the United States faced two setbacks this month in its ambitious moon programs.

Two previous Japanese lunar missions, one public and one private, have also failed.

In 2022, the country unsuccessfully sent a lunar probe named Omotenashi as part of the United States’ Artemis 1 mission.

In April, Japanese startup ispace tried in vain to become the first private company to land on the Moon, losing communication with its craft after what it described as a “hard landing.”
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Montreal — A 10-year global study of positive doping tests by children and young teenagers showed most were tied to Russia, India and China, and in sports like weightlifting, athletics and cycling, the World Anti-Doping Agency said Wednesday.

Diuretics, stimulants and anabolic steroids were the most commonly found substances in more than 1,500 positive tests involving more than 1,400 minors since 2012.

The youngest athlete tested was 8 years old, and the youngest sanctioned in a doping case was a 12-year-old, WADA said in the Operation Refuge study.

“Operation Refuge reports in heartbreaking detail the deep trauma and isolation child athletes experience following a positive test and a doping sanction,” the chair of WADA’s athlete council, Ryan Pini, said in a statement.

It cited the testimony of a female minor “who recalled the extreme pressure she and other female athletes felt from the male coaches to keep their weight down,” the report said. “This pressure included an impossible expectation to slow down the effects of puberty, because puberty would supposedly negatively impact their ability to compete.”

WADA said its intelligence and investigations unit analyzed testing data of samples collected from minors since 2012. The investigators also received 58 alerts since 2018 on a confidential hotline that implicated minors in doping.

“Analysis of those disclosures revealed that the majority had originated from Russia and India, and that the most reported sports, globally, were aquatics and athletics,” the agency said.

In cases that reached a sanction, the most commonly found doping substance was the diuretic furosemide in Russia, the anabolic steroid stanozolol in India and clenbuterol in China, the report said.

In weightlifting cases, the most common substance was stanozolol. In track and field, it was the endurance boosting hormone EPO. And in cycling, it was meldonium, WADA said. Meldonium is the heart medication most widely known for the doping case of Russian tennis star Maria Sharapova.

WADA said about 80% of positive tests led to sanctions and others were for substances allowed for therapeutic use. Those included a stimulant for treating ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder).

Some evidence suggested systematic doping, including multiple minors testing positive for the same substance in samples taken on the same day.

WADA highlighted a 2012 case of four boxers in Romania testing positive for furosemide; three track and field athletes in China testing positive for stanozolol in 2021; two Belarusian skaters testing positive for furosemide in 2022; and two Kazakh weightlifters testing positive for ostarine last year.

“Operation Refuge places a difficult but important issue into the spotlight,” said WADA director of intelligence and investigations Günter Younger. “We are working towards ensuring that the experiences of those interviewed during this operation do not continue to repeat themselves.”
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