Prominent international experts are warning that a virulent flu pandemic capable of spreading across the world in 36 hours, killing up to 80 million people, is entirely plausible and efforts by governments to prepare for it are “grossly insufficient.” The Guardian reports: The first annual report by the Global Preparedness Monitoring Board, an independent group of 15 experts convened by the…
Tag: West Africa
281 Alleged Email Scammers Arrested In Massive Global Sweep
The Department of Justice today announced the arrest of 281 suspects in connection with email scams and wire transfer fraud. The action is the biggest of its kind yet against this type of digital scammer, and is a strong symbol of law enforcement’s sense of urgency in trying to contain a rapidly growing threat. Wired reports: You’re familiar with crimes like…
Ebola Is Now Curable
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Wired: Amid unrelenting chaos and violence, scientists and doctors in the Democratic Republic of Congo have been running a clinical trial of new drugs to try to combat a year-long Ebola outbreak. On Monday, the trial’s cosponsors at the World Health Organization and the National Institutes of Health announced that two of the experimental…
A Massive Seaweed Bloom Is Smothering Life from the Caribbean to West Africa
Researchers call it the Great Atlantic Sargassum Belt. Source: https://www.livescience.com/65873-record-breaking-sargassum-bloom.html
9000 km belt of seaweed spanning the Atlantic threatens marine life
A massive 9000-kilometre-stretch of algae spanning between west Africa and the Gulf of Mexico is threatening marine life and ecosystems Source: https://www.newscientist.com/article/9000-9000-km-belt-of-seaweed-spanning-the-atlantic-threatens-marine-life/?utm_campaign=RSS%7CNSNS&utm_source=NSNS&utm_medium=RSS&utm_content=home…
What Bill Gates Wishes More People Knew About Paul Allen
Microsoft’s original co-founder Paul Allen was honored posthumously with a lifetime achievement award for philanthropy this week at the Forbes Philanthropy summit. Bill Gates remembers Allen as “one of the most intellectually curious people I’ve ever known,” adding “I wish more people understood just how wide-ranging his giving was,” and shared his remembrances at the ceremony: Later in life, Paul gave…
Facebook Shuts Down An Israeli Firm’s Effort To Influence Politics In West Africa
Facebook today said it detected dozens of Facebook accounts that were engaging in election interference and other forms of public manipulation via news and social media, directed primarily at West African countries. What’s especially noteworthy about this announcement is the source. Israeli commercial entity Archimedes Group was behind the behavior. The Verge reports: The goal ostensibly was to have some type…