Study: Mombasa, Dar es Salaam among Africa’s booming coastal cities to be underwater as sea levels rise
Rising ocean levels threaten dozens of Africa’s rapidly expanding coastal metropolises, resulting in shrinking land area, coastal flooding, more powerful storm surges and the need for better mitigation. African coastlines have experienced a steady rise in sea levels for four decades. At the current pace, sea levels are projected to...
UNEP landmark decision to create legally binding treaty will cut plastic pollution once ratified
Plastic is one of the fastest growing materials and production is on course to double to more than one billion tonnes a year by 2050. With that, will come more pollution. This week, delegates from more than 150 countries are expected to meet in Uruguay to begin negotiations for a...
New study on Kenyan zebras reveals the gorgeous animal uses stripes to repel parasites
About 30 miles north of the equator, in central Kenya, Kaia Tombak and her colleagues stood beside a plexiglass box. Tombak, who studies the evolution of animals’ social behaviour, was dressed for the power of the Savannah sun in a light, long-sleeved shirt and pants. A gang of flies buzzed...
With highest number of remandees awaiting trial, Nigeria’s criminal justice system is in itself ‘criminal’
Nigeria’s prison population is more than 76,000, housed in 240 correctional centres. About 70 per cent of these inmates are still awaiting trial. They have been arrested and charged, but not yet convicted or cleared. This is the highest percentage of awaiting-trial prisoners in Africa. World Prison Brief’s latest report...
Arsenal and After-My Story: Ex-Gunners’ midfielder’s memoir details how racism stalks Blacks in English sports
Paul Davis, an Arsenal midfielder who played almost 450 times for the club and swept the board with domestic honours, was one of English football’s black trailblasers. Having emerged from the club’s apprenticeship scheme at the start of the 1980s, Davis came of age during the height of English football’s...
Anti-Taliban revolt: Afghanistan’s shadowy new conflict sets off new displacement, new civilian abuses
Six months ago, Sadullah’s life changed forever. His family, including his eight children, had made do with life under the Taliban. That was until the National Resistance Front of Afghanistan (NRF), an armed opposition movement, tried to wrest control from Taliban fighters in Panjshir, and their once-peaceful province became the...
Processed food stigma: Surveys suggest Chinese and Indians are more likely to eat lab-grown meat than Americans
To have a chance of meeting our global climate targets, ending deforestation and protecting the world’s wildlife, we need to eat much less meat. Both plant foods and meat substitutes have a much lower carbon footprint, use much less land and cause less water pollution than meat. The environmental toll...
Use of antibiotics to prevent new sexually transmitted infections in US hits brickwall as gonorrhoea spikes
A health department in the United States has become one of the first to recommend that people who are at high risk of getting a sexually transmitted infection (STI) take a preventive dose of antibiotics after unprotected sex. Clinical trials have shown the strategy can reduce infections such as chlamydia,...
Rumba in the bedroom: Franco may be the Congo music colossus, but his 18 children are no match for Tabu Ley’s 89-plus
Some of the most prolific Congolese musicians who excelled at recording songs that became big hits all over Africa and beyond over the years are, are also reported to have excelled at siring children. Rumba in the bedroom! While many of their offspring did not walk in their footsteps to...
New medical evidence shows having a purpose in life helps people live longer regardless of race or gender
A growing body of evidence suggests that living with purpose helps human beings live longer. Recently, researchers wondered whether this effect would apply equally across genders, ethnicities and races. This was the focus of a new study led by Dr Koichiro Shiba, assistant professor at Boston University’s School of Public...
