Poliovirus has been detected in sewage samples at six locations in the Gaza Strip, the World Health Organization said on Friday, following announcements from both the Israel and Gaza health ministries.
Vaccine-derived poliovirus type 2 was found in samples taken on June 23 from sites in Khan Younis and Deir al-Balah.
While applauding the proposal, climate advocates said they would “keep fighting to ensure there’s no new oil extraction on a single acre” of the region.
Teshekpuk Caribou in the National Petroleum Reserve in northwest Alaska. Photo: Bureau of Land Management/flickr/CC
Indigenous groups in Alaska were joined by climate advocates on Friday in welcoming the Biden administration’s proposal to expand protections from oil and gas drilling in the Western Arctic, though some groups emphasized that the federal government should not stop with the newly announced effort.
The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) said it was opening a 60-day comment period regarding a potential expansion of areas protected from drilling in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska (NPR-A), also known as the Western Arctic.
Exxon Knew – Divest rally at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center in Dallas, TX on May 25, 2016 . Photo: 350 .org/flickr/CC
A new parody ExxonMobil advertisement released Tuesday by a group founded by Adam McKay—the Academy Award-winning writer and director of the blockbuster doomsday climate comedy Don’t Look Up—mocks humanity for letting Big Oil get away with causing one of the biggest existential threats of all time.
“There’s a world we all want to live in again. A world where the air is pure and crisp and clean and fills your lungs with joy. A world where you can drink water from any river or creek and your house will still be there tomorrow if it rains,” the narrator of Yellow Dot Studio’s latest parody video says in the two-minute clip. “Here at Exxon, we believe in that world, and we’re working hard to make sure that our customers believe that we believe in that world.”
Javier Milei, President of Argentina speaking at the World Economic Forum Annual Meeting in January 2024. Photo: World Economic Forum/flickr/CC
Argentina’s far-right president Javier Milei secured early this morning his first major win in office, with the country’s lower chamber passing the first of his landmark regressive reforms. Congress’s approval of the so-called Ley Bases, or the Bases Law, came weeks after the bill prompted a 13-hour debate in the upper chamber and a peaceful demonstration outside Parliament that was met with fierce police repression.
The legislation – which is a key part of Milei’s anarcho-liberal government plan – promotes investment in extractive industries, such as forestry, construction, mining, energy and technology. It includes a Large Investment Incentive Scheme (RIGI, by its Spanish acronym) that will grant extractive investment projects worth at least $200m lower income tax, authorise them to import fixed capital and tax only their exports in the first three years.
The administration has established that “every worker in America has the right to shade, water, and rest while working in temperatures that could kill them,” a labor leader said.
Labor advocates celebrated on Tuesday following the Biden administration’s announcement of a proposed rule to protect workers from extreme heat—the first national workplace heat safety standard.
The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA), an agency within the U.S. Department of Labor, published the rule, which the administration says would protect about 36 million indoor and outdoor employees from heat-related injuries and illnesses. It follows similar regulations that five states have approved in recent years.
The John E. Amos Power Plant is a three-unit coal-fired power plant in West Virginia owned and operated by Appalachian Power, a subsidiary of American Electric Power (AEP). Photo: Cathy/flickr/CC
Health and environmental groups decried a U.S. Supreme Court decision on Thursday that suspended an air pollution rule with far-reaching implications set by the Environmental Protection Agency.
The justices ruled 5-4 in Ohio v. EPA to nullify the rule, designed to protect people in states downwind from smog-forming pollution, until the case can be decided on its merits in federal court, siding with the industrial polluters and upwind states who’d petitioned them to do so.
Damaged trees in the Niger Delta following the 2008 Bodo oil spill. Photo: Sosialistisk Ungdom (SU)/flickr/CC
Nigerian activists believe Shell’s apparent end to its 87-year operation in the country is an effort to avoid its legal responsibilities while holding onto the potentially profitable side of the business.
In January, the oil giant revealed it had “reached an agreement to sell its Nigerian onshore subsidiary” to Renaissance, a consortium of four Nigerian oil firms and one based in Switzerland.
“There is no longer any cover for agencies to say that they are doing the right thing when working with polluters,” said one campaigner. “Everyone knows this is wrong, and everyone needs to act.”
Over 100,000 marched in Vancouver in solidarity with the youth of the world in the September 27, 2019 Climate Strike.. Photo::Chris Yakimov/flickr/CC
Despite the grim news that scientists on Wednesday reported last month as the hottest May on record globally, marking 12 straight months with record-breaking heat, climate advocates expressed optimism after United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres signaled what one called a “game-changing intervention,” urging governments to ban advertisements by fossil fuel firms.
The demand is in line with prohibitions on advertising for other “products that harm human health—like tobacco,” said Guterres.
As a record heatwave scorches large swaths of India, killing 16 people in Bihar state, climate scientists warned Thursday that extreme heat fueled by the worsening climate emergency poses a fast-growing threat to public health and human survivability.
The Indian Meteorological Department said temperatures soared to over 120°F in recent days in New Delhi. The agency said it is investigating an all-time high reading of 127.2°F in the capital on Wednesday that may be attributable to a sensor error. If the reading is accurate, it would mark the highest temperature ever recorded in India.
“Lebanon’s authorities must stop summarily deporting refugees to a place where they are at risk of violations, lift restrictions, and end their vitriolic campaign against refugees,” said one Amnesty campaigner.
Syrian refugee children in the Ketermaya refugee camp, outside Beirut, Lebanon on June 1, 2014. Photo: World Bank Photo Collection/flickr/CC
Amnesty International on Monday reiterated human rights groups’ rising concerns about a Lebanese crackdown on Syrian refugees as the European Union hosted a conference in Brussels focused on “supporting the future of Syria and the region.”
The conference comes at right-wing leaders in the E.U. campaign as anti-migrant ahead of the bloc’s June elections and after European Commission President Ursula Von Der Leyen in early May announced a three-year, €1 billion ($1.06 billion) assistance package to support “the most vulnerable people in Lebanon, including refugees, internally displaced persons, and host communities,” as well as “urgent domestic reforms” and “border and migration management.”
