Bangladesh ship breakers win right to sue UK owners


New Age Online | Published:  Mar 12,2021


An AFP file photo shows the skeletal of a ship at a shipbreaking yard in Shitakundo.

British shipping companies that sell old vessels to be scrapped cheaply in dangerous, low-paid conditions in Bangladesh, India or Pakistan may now be sued in London for workers’ deaths or injuries, reports the Guardian.

In the first ruling of its kind by any higher court anywhere in the world, the court of appeal of England and Wales had held that a shipping company in London selling a vessel in South Asia could owe a legal ‘duty of care’ to shipbreaking workers in Bangladesh even where there were multiple third parties involved in the transaction.

The landmark ruling meant that Hamida Begum whose husband, Khalid Mollah, fell to his death in 2018 while working high up on a 300,000-ton oil tanker on the beach at Chattogram will now be able to sue the shipping company Maran in London.

But by putting the legal spotlight on the notoriously lax environmental and health and safety practices in Bangladesh, the ruling might open the gates for other cases and force Asian shipbreaking yards to improve working conditions.

The ruling followed decisions on two other long-running cases where impoverished communities in low-income countries were also given permission to sue multinational companies or their subsidiaries in London for alleged environmental pollution or damages.

Last month the Supreme Court ruled that a group of Nigerian farmers and fishers could sue Royal Dutch Shell in the English courts over pollution in a region where the Anglo-Dutch energy giant had a subsidiary. Shell had argued that it was not responsible.

In a second landmark ruling, the Supreme Court ruled in 2019 that Zambian villagers could sue UK-based mining conglomerate Vedanta in the English courts for alleged water pollution because, as the parent body of the mining company working in Zambia, it owed the villagers a duty of care and could be held responsible.

An estimated 216 workers had died in the past 15 years at the shipbreaking yards of Chattogram, including seven so far this year. Many more had been disabled or seriously injured.

Work in Chattogram was well-known for being precarious, dirty and dangerous, but shipping companies had been able to avoid responsibility by changing ownership of vessels at the last minute, and using tax havens and middlemen.

Hundreds of people, mostly without contracts, were injured or die every year in falls, explosions and accidents. The coastal environment was heavily polluted with oils, asbestos and dangerous chemicals and few people could work for more than a few years in the intense tropical heat without being physically injured.

London law firm Leigh Day argued that Mollah’s accident was foreseeable and that Maran, which sold the tanker for demolition to a Dubai-based company, would have known it was going to Chattogram for demolition and should have anticipated the risk of injury to workers such as Mollah demolishing it.

Leigh Day contended that the shipping industry took deliberate advantage of Bangladesh’s weak regulations. The result, it argued, was that wealthy ship owners got the highest prices for scrap vessels in the practical certainty that they will be broken up in Bangladesh where health and safety standards were lower than in more expensive but safer yards.

Maran argued that it did not control the ship’s ultimate destination and that there was nothing it could have, or should have, done to avoid the risks to the deceased. But Lord Justice Coulson said: ‘the appellant could, and should, have insisted on the sale to a so-called ‘green’ yard, where proper working practices were in place’.

According to NGO Shipbreaking Platform, more than 70 per cent of approximately 800 vessels that reach the end of their operating lives every year were broken up in Bangladesh, India or Pakistan.

Standard practice was that sales of end-of-life ships were not conducted directly between ship owners and ship breakers themselves, but through demolition cash buyers who assume the credit risk, with the result that ship owners were distanced.

Leigh Day director Martyn Day welcomed the appeal court decision.

‘The English courts have been shown to be sympathetic to these claims by communities whether in Africa or Asia bringing claims against British multinationals. Whether it is oil-spill claims against Shell, mine pollution claims against Vedanta or this claim in relation to shipbreaking, London has proved to be one of, if not the only, capitals in the world where claims can successfully be brought,’ he said.

70 killed in Myanmar crackdown on anti-coup protesters: UN

Kyodo/UNB . Geneva | Published:  Mar 12,2021

Police beat a protester as they detain him during a demonstration against the military coup in Yangon on March 6, 2021. — AFP photo

At least 70 people have been killed in the crackdown on anti-coup protesters by Myanmar security forces since the military took control of the country last month, a United Nations expert on human rights in the Southeast Asian country said on Thursday.

‘Credible reports indicate that, as of today, Myanmar security forces have murdered at least 70 people,’ Thomas Andrews said at a session of the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva.

‘The junta is detaining dozens, sometimes hundreds, every day,’ he said, adding, ‘The total number of arbitrary arrests and detentions since February 1 had risen beyond 2,000, and the violence against protesters, including violence against people sitting peacefully in their homes, is steadily increasing.’

The United Nations special rapporteur said that international coordination will be key in effectively imposing sanctions on Myanmar, and asked other countries not to endorse the military regime as a legitimate government.

While the United States had imposed unilateral sanctions on Myanmar, China and Russia had not followed suit on the grounds that the coup was part of Myanmar’s internal affairs.

‘The people of Myanmar need not only words of support but supportive action. They need the help of the international community now,’ said Andrews, a former US congressman.

The Myanmar military staged a coup on February 1, ousting the country’s democratically elected government led by Aung San Suu Kyi and detaining many government officials including Suu Kyi.

The UN Security Council on Wednesday adopted a president’s statement condemning the military’s use of violence in cracking down on people protesting the coup and urged the military to ‘exercise utmost restraint.’

Voicing its ‘continued support for the democratic transition in Myanmar,’ the council stressed the need to ‘fully respect human rights and fundamental freedoms and uphold the rule of law.’

It also expressed ‘deep concern at restrictions on medical personnel, civil society, labour union members, journalists and media workers.’

THE FINAL WORD ON HARRY & MEGAN 

AKA THE SUSSEX'S

DEEPWATER HORIZON LEGACY

Red Snapper in the Gulf show signs of stress

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA (USF INNOVATION)

Research News

 

IMAGE: ONE OF THE RED SNAPPER SAMPLED AS PART OF THIS GULF-WIDE STUDY IN THE WAKE OF THE DEEPWATER HORIZON OIL SPILL. view more 

CREDIT: UNIVERSITY OF SOUTH FLORIDA

Nearly 100 percent of the red snapper sampled in the Gulf of Mexico over a six-year period by University of South Florida (USF) marine scientists showed evidence of liver damage, according to a study reported in Aquatic Toxicology.

The study is the first to correlate the concentration of crude oil found in the workhorses of the digestive system -- the liver, gall bladder, and bile - with microscopic indicators of disease, such as inflammation, degenerative lesions, and the presence of parasites. The team sampled nearly 570 fish from 72 Gulf locations between 2011 to 2017 in the wake of the historic 2010 Deepwater Horizon oil spill.

"The results add to the list of other species we've analyzed indicating early warning signs of a compromised ecosystem," said Erin Pulster, PhD, first author of the study and researcher at the USF College of Marine Science.

Pulster and the team of researchers studying oil pollution in Gulf of Mexico fishes have previously reported high levels of oil exposure in yellowfin tuna, golden tilefish, and red drum as well.

The Gulf of Mexico not only experiences hundreds of annual oil spills with long-lasting effects such as the historic Deepwater Horizon spill in 2010 but is routinely subject to intense shipping traffic and collects pollutants from faraway places that flow in from coastlines and rivers like the Mighty Mississippi and the Rio Grande.

In this study Pulster and the team looked specifically at the most toxic component of crude oil called polycyclic aromatic compounds, or PAHs. PAH sources include old oil and gas rigs, fuel from boats and airplanes, and natural oil seeps, which are fractures on the seafloor that can add millions of barrels of oil to the Gulf every year.

CAPTION

Mean concentrations of polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs, which are labeled here as total fluorescent aromatic compounds)in the bile (biliary, top map) and the liver (hepatic, bottom map)in the red snapper study that took place 2011-2017.

CREDIT

University of South Florid

The presence of PAHs in the bile, which is produced by the liver to aid in digestion, indicates relatively recent oil exposure (days to weeks). The team found that the PAH concentration in the bile declined and remained relatively stable after 2011 but they noted a sharp increase in 2017.

Overall, the bile PAH "hot spots" were on the West Florida Shelf (WFS) and in the vicinity of the Deepwater Horizon spill, off the mouth of the Mississippi River. This is the site of the 2004 Taylor oil platform collapse off Louisiana, the longest oil spill in history, which continues to leak oil today. The hotspot west of Tampa on the WFS could be due to shipping traffic or submarine groundwater discharge, Pulster said.

PAH found in the liver indicates the fish has been chronically exposed to oil (months to years). The team found the liver PAH "hot spots" in the northwest Gulf of Mexico, where a considerable number inactive oil and gas platforms exist.

While the PAH concentrations in the liver remained relatively stable throughout the study, indicating that the red snapper are physically managing the oil exposure, there is a tipping point, Pulster said. Red snapper can live upwards of 40 years but fish manage oil toxins, similar to the way humans manage exposure to greasy burgers and alcohol.

Repeated exposure to oil in fish can lead to cancer and eventually to death, but it can also result in sublethal impacts. Virtually all (99 percent) of the red snapper sampled had an average of five physical signs of liver damage. The observed changes can result from natural causes but are also well documented secondary responses to stress which, could potentially signal disease progression.

"We just don't know when we will tip the scale," said Pulster. There was literally one red snapper in the bunch with PAHs but no physical signs of damage when viewed under the microscope, said Pulster.

It's a good thing that humans only eat the muscle of the fish, not the liver. Red snapper remain safe to eat but Pulster stressed the need for continued monitoring. Only then can scientists keep their finger on the pulse of fish health and know what the impacts of additional oil spills may be - especially in species like snapper that are so critical to the Gulf economy, she said.

"This is a unique study. Most investigations of oil spill effects only last a year or two, and this study gives us both a wide scale of reference across the Gulf and also long-term monitoring, which we lacked prior to Deepwater Horizon," said Steve Murawski, PhD, senior author on the study. Murawski, a professor and the St. Petersburg Downtown Partnership Peter R. Betzer Endowed Chair at the USF College of Marine Science, led the 10-year research effort in response to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill (C-IMAGE (usf.edu).

"There is a story we can tease out of the data," Murawski said. "The observed decline in oil exposure in red snapper in the few years following the Deepwater Horizon accident suggests the high levels measured in earlier years were a direct impact from the spill. Its legacy continues, and we'd be wise to continue the critical research ironically made possible by long-term monitoring post-disaster."

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The study was supported by The Gulf of Mexico Research Initiative, and The Center for the Integrated Modeling and Analysis of the Gulf Ecosystem (C-IMAGE I, II, and II).

CAPTION

This table outlines the prevalence (%) of physical microscopic signs of liver damage, such as inflammation, observedin the red snappercollected from different regions of the Gulf of Mexico (North Centralor NC, Northwest or NW, Southwest or SW, and Gulf-wide).

CREDIT

University of South Florid

High rates of mental health disorder among all health and social care groups

Peer reviewed; observational study; people

UNIVERSITY COLLEGE LONDON

Research News

 

Almost 60% of frontline health and social care workers (HSCWs) experienced a mental health disorder during the first COVID-19 lockdown, with many suffering "very high rates of distress", suggests a new study led by researchers at UCL and the University of Haifa, Israel.

Given the significantly high levels of mental health disorders across all HSCWs, the researchers (part of the UCL-led COVID Trauma Response Working Group*), are now calling for long-term planning to meet the needs of staff from across health and social care, including specialist trauma services to be set up for healthcare workers, similar to the specialist commissioned NHS psychological trauma services for military veterans.

The 'Frontline-COVID study', published in the European Journal of Psychotraumatology, surveyed 1,194 HSCWs, who worked in UK hospitals, nursing or care homes and other community settings, to identify and compare the rates of mental health disorder across different job roles and places of work.

The study, carried out just after the first wave of COVID in the UK between 27 May and 23 July, 2020, found that 58% of HSCWs met the threshold for any mental health disorder; 22% met criteria for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD); 47% had clinically significant anxiety and 47% had depression. Symptom levels were high across all job roles and settings.

Importantly, the study found that it was not just doctors and nurses who were experiencing clinically significant distress, but all staff from across health and care.

Furthermore, the research also identified some specific mental health risk factors, principally: concern about infecting others with COVID; being unable to talk with their managers about how they were coping; feeling stigmatised (about their role); and not having had reliable access to personal protective equipment (PPE). Key predictors for PTSD included staff being redeployed to other teams and having had COVID themselves.

The research was conducted by the COVID Trauma Response Working Group, formed by UCL psychiatrists and psychologists, who are calling for immediate additional mental health support for HSCWs. This is the first UK study to assess mental health disorders across all health and social care settings during COVID-19.

Lead author, Dr Talya Greene (UCL Psychiatry and University of Haifa), said: "Our study shows that more than half of health and social care staff surveyed met criteria for a mental disorder following the first wave of COVID-19 in the UK. Importantly, we found that rates of distress were high, not only among doctors and nurses, but across a wide range of health and social care roles, such as allied health professionals, ambulance workers, hospital porters, pharmacists, and care home staff.

"Let's be clear: we may be on the verge of a mental health crisis across the health and social care sector. So we need to make sure that specialist help is offered and accessible across all the different roles and settings.

"It is important that this support (for those that need it) is planned for the long-term. Our findings highlight the urgency for immediate long-term funding for specialist mental health services for health and social care workers."

Co-author, Dr Jo Billings (UCL Psychiatry), said: "A really important finding from our study is that it showed that, in addition to doctors and nurses, all staff across the health and social care sector need to be offered help. This study also highlights the need for reliable access to PPE for all staff working in health and social care roles, and further investigation of barriers to communication between managers and staff. Our findings also highlight that staff redeployed into new frontline roles are at particular risk of being traumatised and are likely to require additional support during redeployment."

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Co-author, Dr Michael Bloomfield (UCL Psychiatry), added: "Our colleagues in acute hospitals are doing fantastic work under very difficult circumstances. At the same time we know that many mental health clinicians are doing great work in supporting frontline colleagues in need. Whilst our study is based on self-report, and so needs to be interpreted with caution, our findings nonetheless add to a growing body of research on the toll of the pandemic on health and social care workers. Importantly, our study has identified risk factors that might help in better supporting staff. It's important that staff across the health and social care sector are offered this support."

*COVID Trauma Response Working Group

How global sustainable development will affect forests

UNIVERSITY OF LEEDS

 

Global targets to improve the welfare of people across the planet will have mixed impacts on the world's forests, according to new research.

The United Nations' 17 key areas for global development - known as the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) - range from tackling poverty, hunger and sanitation to promoting clean energy, economic growth and reducing inequality.

Many of these goals, such as improved peace and justice, good health and wellbeing, and quality education, will have a positive impact on the Earth's natural forests.

But others, including creating new roads, industry and infrastructure, are likely to have detrimental consequences.

The research, led by the University of Leeds, reviewed a wide range of existing academic papers into the UN's global goals.

The findings, funded by the Natural Environment Research Council and the United Bank of Carbon, are published in the journal Forest Policy and Economics.

Lead author Jamie Carr, of Leeds' School of Earth and Environment, said: "Almost none of the 17 goals are universally good or bad for forests.

"The only exception to this is the goal concerning education, for which all impacts were identified as beneficial. Well-being and social progress are also most commonly associated with beneficial outcomes.

"Overall, targets relating to energy and infrastructure have the potential to be the most damaging to the world's forest ecosystems.

"For example, negative impacts were associated with hard infrastructure including roads, railways, dams, housing and industrial areas.

"In particular, there is good evidence to suggest that roads designed to boost access to markets are especially damaging for forests.

"Other damaging impacts included efforts to combat cocaine-associated crime in Colombia. Despite having some forest benefits, coca crop eradication has been shown to result in cultivators simply moving their activities elsewhere or switching to even more damaging agricultural practices.

"Overall, beneficial impacts are more numerous than damaging ones, but are typically less well understood. This suggests an urgent need for increased research on these so that society and policymakers can take full advantage."

Forest ecosystems also help to mitigate against climate change while offering watershed protection and preventing soil erosion. In addition, about 1.6 billion people live near forests, and hundreds of millions depend on forest products in the form of fuel, food and timber.

The UN goals to create a fairer society for everyone are broken down into 169 more specific targets. These were agreed by the organisation's General Assembly in 2015 and are intended to be achieved by 2030.

The research team led by the University of Leeds included scientists from the University of Oxford, the International Union for Conservation of Nature, the United Nations Environment Programme World Conservation Monitoring Centre, and the International Institute for Environment and Development.

They reviewed 466 academic papers on the UN targets, collecting 963 examples of impacts.

They found that 63 of the 169 targets were likely to have effects on forests that were either damaging or beneficial, or in some cases, both.

Of the identified impacts, 29 were potentially beneficial, 15 damaging and 19 had mixed impacts.

Identifying and understanding these effects will help Governments to avoid negative impacts, while capitalising on the positive ones.

Lead supervisors of the research were Professor Dominick Spracklen and Dr Susannah Sallu, of Leeds' School of Earth and Environment.

Dr Sallu said: "Institutions working to help achieve the UN goals need to be aware that their actions can have negative implications for forests and the environmental services these forests provide.

"Inter-sectoral coordination between agriculture, energy, health, transport and forest sectors can help ensure future development does not cause unintended consequences.

"Inclusive planning involving a diverse range of society further minimises the potential for negative impacts."

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The city of Minneapolis saw an 81-degree swing between Valentine's Day and Tuesday, meteorologists say. 

File Photo by John Angelillo/UPI | License Photo

March 10 -- You'll have to excuse the residents of Minnesota if they don't know exactly what clothes to wear these days.

Within the span of just a few weeks, Minneapolis has experienced low temperatures that challenged a daily record low set almost 150 years ago -- and now has broken a daily temperature record that stood for 142 years.

On Feb. 14, temperatures dipped all the way down to -19 degrees Fahrenheit at Minneapolis-St. Paul International Airport, just missing a record low temperature for the date set in 1875.

Now, just three weeks later, residents are dressing for a very different record. On Tuesday, the city reached a high of 62 degrees, shattering the previous record high (61 F) set in 1879.


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"We've got a system going up to our west, putting us in the warm part of the system [on Tuesday] with strong southerly winds really pumping in the warmth," Chris O'Brien, a National Weather Service meteorologist in Minneapolis, told AccuWeather.

The system has baked the central United States since last weekend, sending temperatures across the northern Plains and Midwest 15 to 30 degrees above normal for this time of the year.

By Tuesday afternoon, daily records were already broken in Chicago, Duluth, Minn., Green Bay, Wis., Wausau, Wis., and Sioux Falls, S.D. On Monday, records were broken farther west, including a high of 65 in Mobridge, S.D., breaking a 110-year-old record for the date. North Platte, Neb., broke a record from 1936 by 4 degrees on Tuesday.


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"The driving force behind the warm blast has been a pronounced northward bulge in the jet stream," AccuWeather Meteorologist Mary Gilbert wrote. "As this bulge builds farther northward and eastward each day through the middle of the week, it will allow unseasonably warm air to spread across much of the Central and Eastern states."

After heating up the central region, the surging heat is expected to be welcomed by residents in the mid-Atlantic and Northeast.

Following the record warmth, conditions have begun to take an unsettled turn as a storm system sweeps through the region and cold air presses southward from the Canadian Prairies and into the northern Plains.

RELATED Study: Global warming could make survival in tropics impossible

This is the first of a pair of storms that will hit the central United States over the next week -- with a bigger, more significant storm set to unfold over the weekend.

In decision-making, biases are an unconscious tendency that are difficult to eradicate

This is according to a study conducted in primates, published in Current Biology, led by Ruben Moreno Bote and Gabriela Mochol, researchers at the Center for Brain and Cognition, in collaboration with Roozbeh Kiani, a researcher at New York University

UNIVERSITAT POMPEU FABRA - BARCELONA

Research News

 

IMAGE: OUTLINE OF THE WORK BY MORENO ET AL., PUBLISHED IN CURRENT BIOLOGY view more 

CREDIT: UPF

often, humans display biases, i.e., unconscious tendencies towards a type of decision. Despite decades of study, we are yet to discover why biases are so persistent in all types of decisions. "Biases can help us make better decisions when we use them correctly in an action that has previously given us great reward. However, in other cases, biases can play against us, such as when we repeat actions in situations when it would be better not to", says Rubén Moreno Bote, coordinator of the UPF Theoretical and Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory.

In these cases, decisions are guided by tendencies, or inclinations, that do not benefit our wellbeing. For example, playing the lottery more regularly after winning a small consolation prize is a common bias that unfortunately does not tend to improve our financial situation.

The aim of the research was to establish how biases arise in decision-making using mathematical models and neural recordings

A study led by professor Rubén Moreno Bote's laboratory, with Grabriela Mochol, researchers at the Center for Brain and Cognition (CBC) at the UPF Department of Information and Communication Technologies (DTIC), in collaboration with the experimental laboratory of professor Roozbeh Kiani of New York University (USA), has studied how biases arise in decision-making using mathematical models and neural recordings in primates. The study was published by the authors on 26 February in the journal Current Biology.

A task dealing with the perception of visual stimuli

The experimental block of the study consisted of a visual perception task in which a monkey observed a certain stimulus, specifically moving dots. The primate had to decide whether there were more dots moving to the right or to the left. Trial after trial, the animal performed this monotonous decision-making process.

The authors found that primate developed two types of bias: a "slow" tendency to indicate right (or left) that lasted several minutes, despite not having any net tendency in the set of stimuli used, and a "fast" tendency that lasted scarcely a few seconds, resulting from the actions had just been made in the previous decision.

The neural representation of biases is similar to the neural representation of relevant information for solving a certain task

"For this research, we study how the prefrontal cortex, which is crucial in decision-making, encodes the two identified biases (slow and fast). The main result of the study shows that the neural representation of biases is similar to the neural representation of relevant information for solving a certain task. This would seem to indicate that the format in which biases and information are coded in the brain are very similar, so similar that it is difficult to distinguish them", points out Moreno Bote, study principal investigator.

And he adds: "We still have much to understand, but the results of this research could explain why biases are so prevalent in decision-making, and why, much to our regret, they are so difficult to eradicate".

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Related work:

Gabriela Mochol, Roozbeh Kiani, Rubén Moreno Bote (2021) "Prefrontal cortex represents heuristics that shape choice bias and its integration into future behavior", Current Biology, 26 february. DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cub.2021.01.068

 

Face masks are a ticking plastic bomb

UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN DENMARK

Research News

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IMAGE: DISPOSED FACEMASKS COLLECTED IN ODENSE CITY, DENMARK. view more 

CREDIT: ELVIS GENBO XU/SDU

Recent studies estimate that we use an astounding 129 billion face masks globally every month - that is 3 million a minute. Most of them are disposable face masks made from plastic microfibers.

- With increasing reports on inappropriate disposal of masks, it is urgent to recognize this potential environmental threat and prevent it from becoming the next plastic problem, researchers warn in a comment in the scientific journal Frontiers of Environmental Science & Engineering.

The researchers are Environmental Toxicologist Elvis Genbo Xu from University of Southern Denmark and Professor of Civil and Environmental Engineering Zhiyong Jason Ren from Princeton University.

No guidelines for mask recycling:

Disposable masks are plastic products, that cannot be readily biodegraded but may fragment into smaller plastic particles, namely micro- and nanoplastics that widespread in ecosystems.

The enormous production of disposable masks is on a similar scale as plastic bottles, which is estimated to be 43 billion per month.

However, different from plastic bottles, (of which app. 25 pct. is recycled), there is no official guidance on mask recycle, making it more likely to be disposed of as solid waste, the researchers write.

CAPTION

Collection of photos of disposed facemasks in the environment in the city of Odense, Denmark.

CREDIT

Elvis Genbo Xu/SDU

Greater concern than plastic bags:

If not disposed of for recycling, like other plastic wastes, disposable masks can end up in the environment, freshwater systems, and oceans, where weathering can generate a large number of micro-sized particles (smaller than 5 mm) during a relatively short period (weeks) and further fragment into nanoplastics (smaller than 1 micrometer).

- A newer and bigger concern is that the masks are directly made from microsized plastic fibers (thickness of ~1 to 10 micrometers). When breaking down in the environment, the mask may release more micro-sized plastics, easier and faster than bulk plastics like plastic bags, the researchers write, continuing:

- Such impacts can be worsened by a new-generation mask, nanomasks, which directly use nano-sized plastic fibers (with a diameter smaller than 1 micrometer) and add a new source of nanoplastic pollution.

- The researchers stress that they do not know how masks contribute to the large number of plastic particles detected in the environment - simply because no data on mask degradation in nature exists.

- But we know that, like other plastic debris, disposable masks may also accumulate and release harmful chemical and biological substances, such as bisphenol A, heavy metals, as well as pathogenic micro-organisms. These may pose indirect adverse impacts on plants, animals and humans, says Elvis Genbo Xu.

CAPTION

collected face masks in city of Odense, Denmarnk

CREDIT

Elvis Genbo Xu/SDU

What can we do?

Elvis Genbo Xu and Zhiyong Jason Ren have the following suggestions for dealing with the problem:

1. Set up mask-only trash cans for collection and disposal
2. consider standardization, guidelines, and strict implementation of waste management for mask wastes
3. replace disposable masks with reusable face masks like cotton masks
4. consider development of biodegradable disposal masks.

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I ain't afraid of no ghosts: people with mind-blindness not so easily spooked

The link between mental imagery and emotions may be closer than we thought

UNIVERSITY OF NEW SOUTH WALES

Research News

 

IMAGE: PEOPLE WITH APHANTASIA - THAT IS, THE INABILITY TO VISUALISE MENTAL IMAGES - ARE HARDER TO SPOOK WITH SCARY STORIES, A NEW UNSW SYDNEY STUDY SHOWS. view more 

CREDIT: UNSPLASH

People with aphantasia - that is, the inability to visualise mental images - are harder to spook with scary stories, a new UNSW Sydney study shows.

The study, published today in Proceedings of the Royal Society B, tested how aphantasic people reacted to reading distressing scenarios, like being chased by a shark, falling off a cliff, or being in a plane that's about to crash.

The researchers were able to physically measure each participant's fear response by monitoring changing skin conductivity levels - in other words, how much the story made a person sweat. This type of test is commonly used in psychology research to measure the body's physical expression of emotion.

According to the findings, scary stories lost their fear factor when the readers couldn't visually imagine the scene - suggesting imagery may have a closer link to emotions than scientists previously thought.

"We found the strongest evidence yet that mental imagery plays a key role in linking thoughts and emotions," says Professor Joel Pearson, senior author on the paper and Director of UNSW Science's Future Minds Lab.

"In all of our research to date, this is by far the biggest difference we've found between people with aphantasia and the general population."

To test the role of visual imagery in fear, the researchers guided 46 study participants (22 with aphantasia, and 24 with imagery) to a blackened room before attaching several electrodes to their skin. Skin is known to become a better conductor of electricity when a person feels strong emotions, like fear.

The scientists then left the room and turned the light off, leaving the participants alone as a story started to appear in the screen in front of them.

At first, the stories started innocuously - for example, 'You are at the beach, in the water' or 'You're on a plane, by the window'. But as the stories continued, the suspense slowly built, whether it was a dark flash in the distant waves and people on the beach pointing, or the cabin lights dimming as the plane starts to shake.

"Skin conductivity levels quickly started to grow for people who were able to visualise the stories," says Prof Pearson. "The more the stories went on, the more their skin reacted.

"But for people with aphantasia, the skin conductivity levels pretty much flatlined."

To check that differences in fear thresholds didn't cause the response, the experiment was repeated using a series of scary images instead of text, like a photo of a cadaver or a snake bearing its fangs.

But this time, the pictures made the skin crawl equally in both groups of people.

"These two sets of results suggest that aphantasia isn't linked to reduced emotion in general, but is specific to participants reading scary stories," says Prof. Pearson. "The emotional fear response was present when participants actually saw the scary material play out in front of them.

"The findings suggest that imagery is an emotional thought amplifier. We can think all kind of things, but without imagery, the thoughts aren't going to have that emotional 'boom'."

Living with aphantasia

Aphantasia affects 2-5 per cent of the population, but there is still very little known about the condition.

A UNSW study published last year found that aphantasia is linked to a widespread pattern of changes to other cognitive processes, like remembering, dreaming and imagining.

But while most previous aphantasia research focused on behavioural studies, this study used an objective measure of skin conductance.

"This evidence further supports aphantasia as a unique, verifiable phenomenon," says study co-author Dr Rebecca Keogh, a postdoctoral fellow formerly of UNSW and now based at Macquarie University.

"This work may provide a potential new objective tool which could be used to help to confirm and diagnose aphantasia in the future."

The idea for this experiment came after the research team noticed a recurring sentiment on aphantasia discussion boards that many people with the condition didn't enjoy reading fiction.

While the findings suggest that reading may not be as emotionally impactful for people with aphantasia, Prof. Pearson says it's important to note that the findings are based on averages, and not everyone with aphantasia will have the same reading experience.

The study was also focused on fear, and other emotional responses to fiction could be different.

"Aphantasia comes in different shapes and sizes," he says. "Some people have no visual imagery, while other people have no imagery in one or all of their other senses. Some people dream while others don't.

"So don't be concerned if you have aphantasia and don't fit this mould. There are all kinds of variations to aphantasia that we're only just discovering."

Next, Prof. Pearson and his team at the Future Minds Lab plan to investigate how disorders like anxiety and Post Traumatic Stress Disorder might be experienced differently by people with aphantasia.

"Aphantasia is neural diversity," says Prof. Pearson. "It's an amazing example of how different our brain and minds can be."

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To be involved in this type of research and learn more about aphantasia and the Future Minds Lab, visit https://www.futuremindslab.com/aphantasia.