Wuhan’s virus: Did the French have a hand in the origin and spread of coronavirus?
One chilly morning in February 2017, a tall Chinese scientist in his 50s named Yuan Zhiming showed Bernard Cazeneuve, then the French prime minister, around Wuhan’s new high-security pathogen laboratory. Built with French engineering, it was China’s first P4 laboratory, one of several dozen in the world with that highest...
Cancer incidence in South Africa expected to double; it’s still viewed as disease for the elderly and whites
The Cancer Alliance, made up of civil society and NGO partners and advocates, has released its Cost of Cancer report looking at the challenges for this decade, reports The Maverick Citizen, an online investigative publication. The newspaper reports that it is the first time that such comprehensive data sets have...
Low Covid morbidity in children: They seem to have an innate response that’s ‘revved up and ready to go’
Early last year, children’s hospitals across New York City had to pivot to deal with a catastrophic Covid-19 outbreak. “We all had to quickly learn – or semi-learn – how to take care of adults,” says Betsy Herold, a paediatric infectious-disease physician who heads a virology laboratory at the Albert...
Nairobi’s $45 billion new Athi River Smart Green City to house two million people upon completion
Nairobi’s dispersion to the outlying areas took another turn towards the decongestion and modernisation last month following the approval of development of a smart city project in Athi River, some 30 kilometres southeast of the Kenyan capital’s central business district. The project will cost a total of Ksh5 trillion ($45...
Flying cars deal between Kenya Airways, Brazil’s aircraft maker Embraer to ease movement in Nairobi
Kenyan capital Nairobi expects to experience ease in commuter movement in the coming three years following the signing of an agreement between national carrier Kenya Airways and Brazilian aircraft manufacturer Embraer to supply flying taxis. As business hub if the region, Nairobi which also hosts headquarters a number of international,...
Ex-Boko Haram fighters surrender: Nigeria torn between pardoning killers or bringing them to justice
A surge of surrenders by Boko Haram jihadists in north-eastern Nigeria has turned the spotlight onto how the government deals with fighters who claim to have repented and are now – controversially – looking to be reintegrated into a society scarred by 12 years of war. The New Humanitarian visited...
Does teaching people aged over 65 years a foreign language promote heathy brain function?
For a long time, it was thought that the only way to really learn a language was to do it early. It was thought that after adolescence, you couldn’t learn a language perfectly. You were always going to be accented. But we now know that that’s not true, because there...
Colombia ‘crop substitution’ programmes: Reality on the ground is the illicit drug business is thriving
As part of the Colombia peace agreement, the government pledged to invest heavily in rural infrastructure and in crop substitution programmes for coca growers like Pípe under what was called the Plan for Development and Territorial Focus, known by its Spanish initials, PDET. Since the plan was launched in 2017,...
Five years on Colombia’s coca regions remain at war, narcotics trade rebuilding and distrust is growing
Colombia’s 2016 peace deal was lauded for bringing to an end the longest-running war in the Americas. But five years on, aggressive counter-narcotics tactics and unkept government pledges are blamed for fuelling distrust in rural areas and driving a new cycle of violence. President Iván Duque’s administration has launched a...
Afghanistan: Humanitarian work at risk after Taliban took control of ‘keys to the server room’ with biometric data
From ethical dilemmas on data security to worst-case scenarios unfolding in real time – the Taliban’s rise to power in Afghanistan is spurring urgent concern about the safety of data that aid groups have collected over the past 20 years. Data protection experts warn that aid groups must quickly review...
