Experts say race factor in US abortion laws has mental and economic implications on well-being of Blacks
About one-quarter of people in poverty in the United States are Black. Joia Crear-Perry, president of the National Birth Equity Collaborative in Washington DC, warns that banning abortion would disproportionately harm the physical, mental and economic well-being of Black people with the capacity for pregnancy. In particular, Crear-Perry is concerned...
China won’t recognise Afghanistan’s new regime, watching US cooperation with India
China will not take the lead in recognising Afghanistan’s Taliban government and will only do so in a concerted move with Pakistan, Russia and Iran, an expert familiar with China’s foreign policy considerations says. The Taliban took control of Afghanistan in August and set up an interim government in September...
Arsenal interest in Inter Milan’s Martinez possible if the Gunners cough up $70m
Arsenal lodged an offer including two first-teamers-plus-cash for Inter Milan hitman Lautaro Martinez that prompted a counter-proposal, according to a report. Amid financial strife caused by the Covid-19 pandemic, Inter have been seeking to balance the books this summer. Achraf Hakimi left for PSG to generate an initial €60 million...
Mysterious skull fossils found in Israel expand human family tree, but questions remain
Fossils found in China and Israel dating from around 140,000 years ago are adding to the ranks of hominins that mixed and mingled with early modern humans. The fossils from Israel hint that a previously unknown group of hominins, proposed to be the direct ancestors of Neanderthals, might have dominated...
G-7 DFI and multilateral partners to pump $80 billion into African economies
The G7 DFIs, the IFC, the private sector arm of the African Development Bank, EBRD and the European Investment Bank have announced they will commit $80 billion investment in the private sector over the next five years to support sustainable economic recovery and growth in Africa. The investment is intended...
Sea transport experiencing boom in ships that fly ‘fake’ flags, pollute environment
Ships transport 90 per cent of the world’s traded cargo, so are crucial to the global economy. But when tankers and other large vessels are demolished, they generate huge amounts of marine pollution, particularly if it happens in countries where environmental regulations for ship-breaking yards are lax. Research now shows...
How cartoonist shifted to bioinformatics on his way to doctorate in plant genetics
Ed Himelblau was a cartoonist before he learnt to write code. Now, the geneticist hopes his drawings will help others who embrace bioinformatics later in their careers. Here is his story: My career began in the early 1990s, when computers were just a convenience in the biological sciences. Now, they’re...
Wastewater gives clue of public health, South Africa narrowing it to unit area
The ability of wastewater testing technology to identify coronavirus hotspots is governed by the service area of the treatment plant: the wider the spread, the harder it is to pinpoint small outbreaks and at least one facility serves more than 850,000 people. The technology can provide an unbiased snapshot of...
How mysterious microbes might have triggered evolution of life on Earth
At some point in evolution, scientists say some archaea assigned the cell-division job to a different set of proteins. This is where cell biologist Buzz Baum’s latest work comes in. Evolutionary biologist David Baum’s group has been studying the archaeon Sulfolobus acidocaldarius – a protein. In this case, the scientific...
