UBC Study Links Living Near Highways to Risk of Neurological Disorders
January 26th, 2020Via: Vancouver Sun:
Researchers at the University of B.C. have found a link between living near highways and an increased risk of several major neurological disorders, including dementia and Parkinson’s disease.
The study, published this week in Environmental Health, found proximity to major roads may also increase the risk for multiple sclerosis and Alzheimer’s diseases, likely because of exposure to more air pollution such as nitrogen dioxide and particulate matter.
Lead author Weiran Yuchi, and a team of researchers at the UBC school of population and public health, analyzed data for 678,000 adults between the ages of 45 and 84 in Metro Vancouver. The subjects were interviewed from 1994 to 1998, and again during a follow-up period from 1999 to 2003.
The researchers concluded that living less than 50 metres from a major road or less than 150 metres from a highway is associated with a higher risk of the neurological disorders, while living near green spaces such as parks and forests reduced risk.
“In our research, we found that the green spaces have protective effects against developing the neurological disorders,” said Yuchi, adding that they measured green space using an index of satellite images.
Yuchi said this is the first time UBC researchers have confirmed a link between air pollution and traffic proximity with a higher risk of dementia, Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and MS at the population level. There are other epidemiological studies that have reported associations between road proximity and traffic-related air pollution with impaired cognitive function in adults and neurological disorders.
Tulsi Sues Hillary
January 26th, 2020Via: Tulsi Gabbard:
Warden in Charge When Jeffrey Epstein Died Behind Bars Given Top Job at ‘Club Fed’ Prison
January 25th, 2020Via: Daily Mail:
The warden in charge when Jeffrey Epstein died in his jail cell is getting a cushy new supervisor’s job at ‘Club Fed’ despite Attorney General Bill Barr’s demand that he be reassigned to a desk job.
Lamine N’Diaye is being reassigned to a leadership role at FCI Fort Dix, a low-security prison in Burlington County, New Jersey, two people familiar with the matter said.
The move comes months after Barr ordered N’Diaye be reassigned to a desk post at the Bureau of Prisons’ regional office in Pennsylvania after Epstein´s death as the FBI and the Justice Department´s inspector general investigated.
Schools Took Away Students’ Phones, Now They’re Treating Separation Anxiety
January 25th, 2020We’re far enough into the zombie apocalypse that we’re seeing the zombies spawning their own zombie children. Or, to use a different analogy, addicts are giving birth to more addicts.
The enabling of the behavior by the schools and the sycophantic coddling is absolutely unbelievable.
Even the French ban doesn’t go far enough, since it allows the students to physically keep the phones on them.
Sanity prevailing would look something like this:
Turn the phones in at the start of school
or
Leave them at home
The end.
Via: Wall Street Journal:
Before class each day, a high-school teacher in Indianapolis grabs a clear plastic bag and fastens it to her waist with a ribbon. The homemade pouch is a repository for phones that are either confiscated or handed over voluntarily by students who don’t want to be tempted to tap or swipe during class.
She calls it the “phoney pack,” and the magic of the makeshift vault isn’t that it keeps devices out of reach. It’s that it lowers students’ anxiety by keeping their phones in view.
Smartphones have long been a scourge for teachers and administrators, who have employed a range of strict measures to keep them out of the classroom. But it turns out that getting rid of phones introduced another distraction: withdrawal pangs.
Now, teachers across the country are testing their own methods for managing their students’ phone-related angst. Some use lockable pouches that let students hold their phones rather than having to leave them alone in their lockers. Others have set up charging stations in classrooms, betting that the visibility and value of a charge will keep students at ease. Then there are the teachers who have decided dangling extra credit and other prizes is the best defense against phone withdrawal.
Students don’t always appreciate the efforts to appease them.
July 2019: Chinese Researcher Escorted from Canadian Infectious Disease Lab Amid RCMP Investigation
January 25th, 2020Via: CBC:
A researcher with ties to China was recently escorted out of the National Microbiology Lab (NML) in Winnipeg amid an RCMP investigation into what’s being described as a possible “policy breach.”
Dr. Xiangguo Qiu, her husband Keding Cheng and an unknown number of her students from China were removed from Canada’s only level-4 lab on July 5, CBC News has learned.
A Level 4 virology facility is a lab equipped to work with the most serious and deadly human and animal diseases. That makes the Arlington Street lab one of only a handful in North America capable of handling pathogens requiring the highest level of containment, such as Ebola.
Security access for the couple and the Chinese students was revoked, according to sources who work at the lab and do not want to be identified because they fear consequences for speaking out.
Sources say this comes several months after IT specialists for the NML entered Qiu’s office after-hours and replaced her computer. Her regular trips to China also started being denied.
At meetings on July 8, NML staff were told the researchers are on leave for an unknown period of time. They were told not to communicate with them.
Qiu is a prominent virologist who helped develop ZMapp, a treatment for the deadly Ebola virus which killed more than 11,000 people in West Africa between 2014-2016.
Former Head of World Health Organisation’s Health Emergencies Programme Has Died Suddenly
January 25th, 2020Via: 9News:
A prominent Australian doctor who led the World Health Organisation’s Health Emergencies Programme has died suddenly.
Doctor Peter Salama was a medical epidemiologist who led research and published extensively on vaccine-preventable diseases, HIV and war related mortality and violence.
…
Prior to his work with WHO, Dr Salama led UNICEF’s global response to the Ebola crisis, worked with the US Centres for Disease Control, and worked with Doctors Without Borders in several regions including Asia and Africa.
Coronavirus – Inside Info and Discussion
January 24th, 2020Via: serpentza:
U.S. Says 34 Troops Diagnosed with Traumatic Brain Injury After Iran Strike
January 24th, 2020Via: Reuters:
The Pentagon said on Friday that 34 service members had been diagnosed with traumatic brain injury following missile strikes by Iran on a base in Iraq earlier this month, a number higher than the military had previously announced.
President Donald Trump and other top officials initially said Iran’s attack had not killed or injured any U.S. service members.
Last week the U.S. military said 11 U.S. troops had been treated for concussion symptoms after the attack on the Ain al-Asad air base in western Iraq and this week said additional troops had been moved out of Iraq for potential injuries.
Pentagon spokesman Jonathan Hoffman told reporters that 17 service members diagnosed had already returned to duty in Iraq.
Eight service members who had been previously transported to Germany had been moved to the United States and would receive treatment at either Walter Reed military hospital or their home bases.
U.S. and Russian Dueling Roadblocks Create Friction Near Syria’s Oil and Gas Regions
January 24th, 2020Via: Newsweek:
U.S. and Russian forces have blocked or attempted to block one another’s movements along the strategic M4 highway that connects major towns and cities running parallel to the border with Turkey, the Syrian Observatory of Human Rights, a United Kingdom-based monitor with ties to Syria’s exiled opposition, has reported.
For more than one week, the organization has reported near-daily incidents mainly in rural Al-Hasakah, a resource-rich province where both a U.S.-led coalition and Russia and its allies hold positions.
The overlapping lines of control have still reportedly produced frictions, however. The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights said Wednesday that “tensions have continued to increase significantly in recent days between U.S. and Russian forces in the north-eastern regions of Syria.”
In most cases, the U.S. has reportedly forced the Russian side to turn back on the M4. However, in at least one scenario earlier this month it was Russian and allied Syrian forces that blocked access for U.S. armored vehicles. The Syrian Democratic Forces have reportedly intervened in some instances to defuse the situation.
U.S. Navy Could Get Potent Airburst Rounds to Take Out Drones
January 24th, 2020Via: Military.com:
Crews on Navy littoral combat ships could soon be armed with powerful rounds that can blast hard-to-hit drones out of the sky.
Northrop Grumman, which produces modules for the LCS based on its mission, is eyeing a powerful precision airburst munition to combat drones targeting ships at sea. The round would be compatible with the 30mm gun module that’s already installed on some ships.
“We’re looking at another round called the proximity round, which detects the drone as it approaches and then blows up,” Kevin Knowles, who works on Northrop Grumman’s LCS and unmanned surface vessel programs, said Tuesday at the Surface Navy Association conference. “It’s not a radar system, but it’s something similar. That’s what we’re looking at for drones.”
