THE GAME IS AFOOT WATSON

California family found dead on trail had 'no obvious cause of death.' Could toxic algae be responsible?


By Yasemin Saplakoglu

The bodies were found on Tuesday on a remote hiking trail.

(Image credit: Shutterstock)

A family was recently found dead on a hiking trail along the Merced River in a remote area of the Sierra National Forest in California. There were no signs of damage to their bodies.
Investigators are looking into the possibility that toxic algal blooms may be to blame. But is that the likeliest explanation? One researcher told Live Science, that while possible, that scenario would be unusual.

After a friend reported the family missing, searchers discovered the bodies of John Gerrish, Ellen Chung, their 1-year-old daughter Miju and their dog, Oski on Tuesday (Aug. 17) in Mariposa County, along the Hite Cove Trail near Devil Gulch.

"This is a very unusual, unique situation," Kristie Mitchell, a spokesperson for the Mariposa County Sheriff's Office, told the San Francisco Chronicle. "There were no signs of trauma, no obvious cause of death. There was no suicide note. They were out in the middle of a national forest on a day hike." What's more, the couple were known to be avid hikers, according to the Chronicle.

Related: The 5 most poisonous substances: Polonium to mercury

Investigators briefly considered the possibility that the family may have been exposed to toxic fumes from nearby abandoned mines.

As many as half a million abandoned mines may dot the U.S., according to the Bureau of Land Management (BLM). Back when these mines were in operation, their operators could just simply abandon them without removing hazards.

Abandoned mines can accumulate many different lethal gases, including methane, carbon monoxide, hydrogen sulfide and toxic levels of carbon dioxide. If people breathe in these gases, their muscles stop responding normally, thinking becomes clouded and a person can become unconscious and die. What's more, these chemicals are often odorless and there are no other warning signs that you're breathing them in, according to the BLM.

When the bodies were found, the area was briefly designated a hazmat site — or an area that may have "hazardous materials" to a person's health; the designation was lifted the next day, according to NPR.

The Mariposa County Sheriff Jeremy Briese told The Fresno Bee that he didn't believe the deaths were connected to a nearby mine. The nearest known mine was over 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) away from the bodies; still, because that area had a community of mines, there could be some that we don't know about, Briese said. In the mid-19th century, an area around Hites Cove held a hard-rock gold mine, where certain techniques are used to extract "hard" minerals holding metals like gold, according to The Associated Press.

Toxic algae

Briese also said investigators were considering toxic algae blooms as a possible cause, and that the U.S. Forest Service had recently posted warnings about toxic algae at the start of the trail near Hites Cove, where the bodies were found, according to the Fresno Bee.


Such blooms are caused by algae or cyanobacteria that grow in the water and can release toxins that can sometimes poison animals, such as cattle or dogs, according to The California Department of Public Health. These toxins can get into the body through ingestion, through the skin or even through inhalation.


People who swim, wade or participate in other aquatic activities in water laced with cyanobacterial toxins can develop health effects such as skin rashes, diarrhea and vomiting (if they ingest the toxins), or develop problems with the liver, kidneys or nervous system. But there are no known human deaths connected to drinking or wading in such contaminated water, according to the California Department of Public Health.


Indeed, Alan Wilson, a professor at the School of Fisheries, Aquaculture and Aquatic Sciences at Auburn University in Alabama, said that it's unusual for people to die from algal blooms. "There are reports, but they're usually kind of anecdotal reports," Wilson told Live Science. "I get more people calling me this time of year normally for pet or livestock deaths."


Dogs tend to be more susceptible to the algal toxins, in part because they get into the water and then get out and lick their fur, potentially ingesting a high dose of toxins, he said. "Human exposure when swimming is fairly low, we don't ingest tons of water."


In this case, if this family were to be exposed to such toxins, it would likely be from toxic algal mats and not blooms, he said. While algal blooms are not attached to anything, algal mats cling onto the bottom of water, such as on rocks.


The Merced River doesn't look particularly deep and the water moves, which would make it hard for algae to build up and form algal blooms like it does in lakes, he added. But algal mats, because they're clinging onto the rocks, wouldn't flow down the stream.

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On July 13, the Sierra National Forest posted a warning on their Facebook page about toxic algal mats in the Merced River near Hites Cove. "The Sierra National Forest (SNF) would like to inform those visitors who like to enjoy this area of the Merced River and SNF, not to swim, wade or allow their pets to enjoy the water," due to these mats, the agency warned.

The trail the family was hiking, the Savage Lundy Trail, snakes along the Merced River. On Thursday (Aug. 19), the State Water Resources Control Board said they were testing waterways in the area for such toxic algae, according to The Fresno Bee.

"The fact that it was two adults, a kid and a dog," makes this a really unusual situation, he said. "You think that even if people were exposed they're not all going to be exposed at the same rate." Investigators are hoping that autopsies and toxicology tests will ultimately reveal more about what happened in this tragic story.

Originally published on Live Science.

Thousands of sand dollars mysteriously wash ashore in Oregon in 'mass die-off'


By Rachael Rettner 

Experts don't know why so many sand dollars showed up on a beach in Northern Oregon.

Thousands of sand dollars washed ashore at Seaside Beach, Oregon, on Aug. 15, 2021. (Image credit: Tiffany Boothe/Seaside Aquarium)

Thousands of sand dollars mysteriously washed ashore in Oregon in a "mass die-off" event, according to news reports.

Last week, the circular sea creatures showed up in droves on Seaside Beach in northern Oregon, according to a Facebook post from Seaside Aquarium.

"At this time, we do not know what has caused this, and these types of incidents usually have several contributing factors," aquarium representatives wrote. "It is hard to convey how many sand dollars [are] washing in."

Related: 10 strange animals that washed ashore in 2020

The sand dollars were alive when they washed in during high tides and became stranded, but they "are unable to make it back to the water once the tide recedes," aquarium representatives said. "This is resulting in them drying up and dying."

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Sand dollars are species of sea urchins that live on the sandy seafloor, typically close to shore, according to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Beachgoers are likely familiar with the white exoskeleton of the dead sand dollar. But living sand dollars are covered with tiny gray or purple spines that make the animals look fuzzy, Seaside Aquarium said. Once sand dollars wash ashore, they can survive only a few minutes, according to The Oregonian.

Sand dollars often live packed together on the seafloor, with more than 600 inhabiting 1 square yard (0.8 square meters), according to the Monterey Bay Aquarium.

The reason for the mass die-off in Oregon is still unknown, but the phenomena may be related to currents unearthing the sand dollars and bringing them ashore, according to local news outlet Oregon Coast Beach Connection

Originally published on Live Science.

Strange wasp nests glow neon green under UV light


By Nicoletta Lanese 

about 6 hours ago

A wasp nest (left) and wasps under white light; the same nest (right) under UV light, with parts of the nest are glowing bright green. (Image credit: Bernd Schöllhorn and Serge Berthier)

While trekking through the tropical forests of northern Vietnam, scientists unexpectedly discovered wasp nests that glow fluorescent green under ultraviolet light.


The nests, which look like a cluster of hexagonal cells, were built by several species of paper wasp, all belonging to the genus Polistes. The wasps seal off the underside of the hexagonal cells with so-called cocoon caps made of silken fibers, which protect the growing larvae within the nest. And for reasons yet unknown, these cocoon caps emit a strong greenish-yellow glow when exposed to UV light between 360 and 400 nanometers in wavelength.

"We were very surprised to find such strongly fluorescent biomatter," senior author Bernd Schöllhorn, a professor of chemistry at the University of Paris, told Live Science in an email.


Related: Bioluminescent: A glow-in-the-dark gallery

Wasp nest (left) shown under white light; the same wasp nest (right) shown under UV light and glowing bright green. (Image credit: Bernd Schöllhorn and Serge Berthier)

The team initially set out to discover unknown fluorescent insects in tropical rainforests, so they'd come equipped with UV LED torches. "We were not searching for wasp nests in particular," Schöllhorn said. "To our knowledge, this phenomenon has not been observed in the past, neither by scientific researchers nor by any photographers."


When exposed to white light, the nest cocoon caps appear bright white. Their verdant fluorescence begins to appear under normal daylight, and at night under a UV torch, the bright green glow of the nests can be seen up to 65 feet (20 meters) away, the authors wrote in their report, published Tuesday (Aug. 24) in the Journal of the Royal Society Interface.

The authors compared the nests of these Vietnamese wasps to those of two other Polistes species: one from the Amazonian rainforest of French Guiana and one from a temperate region of southern France. They found that all the wasps' cocoon caps showed similar fluorescent properties, although their glows varied in both intensity and the range of UV light that elicited the strongest reaction.

Having discovered these mysterious glowing nests, the researchers now wonder whether the fluorescence serves any specific purpose for the wasps. On this front, they have several ideas.

It may be that the glowing nests act as homing beacons for wasps flying back to their nests at twilight, or perhaps wasps of different species use subtle variations in fluorescence to differentiate their colonies' nests from those of nearby colonies. Or it may be that the fluorescent cocoon caps protect wasp larvae from harmful UV rays that would otherwise disrupt the larvae's development.

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Past studies suggest that wasp larva development is heavily influenced by the relative length of day and night; therefore, the glowing cocoon caps may help to control how much daylight reaches the larvae as they grow into pupae, the authors wrote. "The last hypothesis is my favorite," Schöllhorn told Live Science.

The Vietnamese Polistes species usually breed during the rainy season, between June and August, when cloud cover blocks a significant amount of visible light from reaching the nests but still lets a fair amount of UV light slip through. By setting the cocoon caps aglow, this residual UV light may increase the wasp larvae's overall light exposure during development, thus influencing how they grow, the authors wrote in the study.

In future studies, the authors want to determine the chemical structures of the fluorescent compounds in the nests. They also plan to see if the compounds might have any potential uses in biological research or medicine; for instance, fluorescent compounds are often used to label molecules in the body.

Indigenous protest as Brazil high court hears land case

Issued on: 25/08/2021

Indigenous men are seen during a protest outside the Supreme Court building in Brasilia, on August 24, 2021 

CARL DE SOUZA AFP/File

Brasília (AFP)

Thousands of indigenous protesters gathered in the Brazilian capital, bearing bows and arrows and traditional headdresses, as the Supreme Court prepared to take up a case Wednesday that could eliminate reservations on their ancestral lands.

In what organizers say is the biggest indigenous protest ever in Brazil, an estimated 6,000 demonstrators prepared to march to the high court when it opens its session to consider a case that could remove protected status for some native lands, opening them to agribusiness and mining.

The protesters, who hail from more than 170 ethnic groups, are also fighting what they call systematic persecution under President Jair Bolsonaro since the far-right leader took office in 2019.

They held a candlelight vigil Tuesday night in the square bordered by the presidential palace, the Supreme Court and Congress in Brasilia, dancing and singing to the beat of drums.

"This government is attacking indigenous peoples," said Syrata Pataxo, a 32-year-old chief of the Pataxo people from the northeastern state of Bahia.

"Today all humanity is calling for the Amazon rainforest to be protected. But the government wants our rainforest, the lungs of the planet, to be replaced by soybeans and gold mining," he told AFP, decked out in elaborate body paint.

An indigenous man from the Pataxo tribe paints the body of a fellow demonstrator at a protest camp in Brasilia, Brazil on August 25, 2021

 CARL DE SOUZA AFP

The case revolves around the Brazilian constitution's protection of indigenous lands.

The agribusiness lobby argues those protections should only apply to lands whose inhabitants were present in 1988, when the constitution was adopted.

Indigenous rights activists argue the constitution mentions no such cutoff date, and that native inhabitants have often been forced from their ancestral lands.

"All Brazil is indigenous land. We've always lived here," said Tai Kariri, 28, a leader of the Kariri people from the northeastern state of Paraiba.

The case involves a reservation in the southern state of Santa Catarina but will set legal precedent for dozens of similar cases.

Members of different indigenous tribes hold a candlelit vigil outside the Supreme Court Building in Brasilia, on August 24, 2021

 CARL DE SOUZA AFP/File

Bolsonaro warned Tuesday that "chaos" would ensue if the court did not rule in favor of the 1988 cutoff.

The case echoes legislation before Congress that would enshrine that "time-frame argument" in law.

The bill is one of several that indigenous activists and environmentalists say Bolsonaro and his allies are trying to use to further the advance of agriculture and industry into Brazil's rapidly disappearing forests.

© 2021 AFP

Indigenous people protest land restrictions in Brazil

With feather headdresses and body paint, thousands of indigenous demonstrators camped out in Brasilia to protest President Jair Bolsonaro's policies and an initiative that could take away their ancestral lands.

Fight for Life

Women from the Krenak tribe are part of the "Fight for Life" protest camp, which opened Sunday and will hold a week of demos and other activities against what the organizers, the Association of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (APIB), call Bolsonaro's "anti-indigenous agenda," seeking to exert pressure ahead of a crucial Supreme Court ruling on native lands.

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‘New wave of volatility’: Covid stirs up grievances in Latin America

A new series on Covid’s global political impact starts by looking at how the pandemic has fuelled turbulence in Latin America and the Caribbean



People take part in a protest against the Brazilian president Jair Bolsonaro’s handling of the Covid pandemic in São Paulo. 

Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

Covid: the global political impact

by Tom Phillips in Fortaleza, Ed Augustin in Havana and Dan Collyns in Lima

Fri 6 Aug 2021

For Filipe da Silva, hitting the streets was about staying alive.

“Unfortunately, Brazil elected a murderer,” the 28-year-old declared as he and thousands of fellow protesters streamed through the seaside city of Fortaleza last month to decry the president’s bungling of a Covid epidemic that has killed more than half a million people.

For Eduardo Ramos, joining the largest protests in Cuba’s post-revolution history was about demanding political freedom and voicing anger at the hardships created by the pandemic.

“Millions of people like me have lost their youth,” complained the 18-year-old Cuban, who scrapes by hawking avocados and mangoes after Covid robbed him of his $20-a-week (£14) job collecting bus fares.

Silva and Ramos were marching against systems of different stripes: Jair Bolsonaro’s far-right administration in Brazil and the communist dictatorship of Cuba.

But both are expressions of what many suspect is a new wave of Covid-fuelled social and political turbulence that is starting to sweep the region in response to the ravages of a pandemic that has officially killed nearly 1.4 million people in Latin America and the Caribbean.

“People are pissed and they don’t have a lot of options,” said Christopher Sabatini, a senior fellow for Latin America at the Chatham House thinktank. “As people’s quality of life deteriorates, political stability also deteriorates.”

Sylvia Colombo, a Brazilian correspondent who covers the region from Argentina for the Folha de São Paulo newspaper, said she was steeling herself for “transformations and new tensions” in the coming months.

Funeral workers carry out burials of Covid victims at Inhaúma cemetery in Rio de Janeiro. Photograph: Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

During last year’s lockdown in Buenos Aires, Colombo wrote a book about the atypical upheaval that had gripped the region on the eve of the pandemic, from Venezuela and Bolivia to Chile. She called 2019 Latin America’s “year of wrath”.

Covid, which first struck Latin America in February 2020, largely smothered that indignation, as countries went into shutdown and protesters into retreat. But now it is back, with demonstrations also erupting in Paraguay, Guatemala and Colombia, where at least 44 protesters have been killed since the start of unrest in April.

“Everything suggests there’s going to be a new wave [of volatility]. We’re already seeing some ripples,” said Colombo, who believed Covid had exposed “Latin America’s pre-existing conditions” – including weak health and welfare systems, profound inequality and a huge and vulnerable informal workforce.

“If on one hand the pandemic forced people off the streets, on other hand it exacerbated all of these problems,” Colombo said of a region that has 8.4% of the global population but has suffered 32% of Covid deaths.

So far the most unexpected convulsion has come in Cuba, where thousands took to the streets on 11 July for what were the most widespread protests since Fidel Castro’s 1959 revolution. The dissenters, who mobilised in every city and every province, had a mishmash of grievances, including the lack of political freedoms under one-party rule. But many were in part driven by the human impact of Cuba’s worst economic slump since the early 1990s, when the disintegration of the Soviet Union plunged it into a “special period” of hunger and deprivation.

When Cuba confirmed its first coronavirus cases in March last year, the Caribbean island was already reeling from Donald Trump’s decision to reverse Barack Obama’s easing of the trade embargo and ratchet up sanctions. Coupled with Covid, which has decimated the local tourism industry, those supercharged sanctions caused the economy to contract 11% last year and have cost the state billions of dollars of annual revenue. The fall in imports created by this cash crunch has led to realities unimaginable a few years ago: last weekend Ramos spent five hours queueing for two packs of hotdogs. Queueing for hours or even days is now part of life for millions of Cubans. “Things were better before because food wasn’t scarce, and the queues weren’t like this,” Ramos said.

In Brazil, there is also widespread anger over the Covid-battered economy, the estimated 8m jobs lost during the pandemic and the resurgence of hunger. “This is a humanitarian crisis,” said Júlio Lancellotti, a Catholic priest who has been battling to feed malnourished citizens on the streets of the country’s richest city, São Paulo.

Public indignation has been amplified by the scale of the death toll, second only to that of the US, allegations of vaccine-related corruption, and the denialist response of a president who has refused to be vaccinated and called coronavirus a “little flu”.

“He’s indecent. He’s immoral. He is incompatible with civilisation. He is an outrage,” seethed Alfredo Marques, a 62-year-old lawyer who joined the recent anti-Bolsonaro rally in Fortaleza, ripping off his face mask to lambast his country’s far-right leader.

It remains unclear what, if any, the long-term political consequences of this fledgling outbreak of dissent will be.

Hundreds of Cuban objectors have reportedly been detained, as the government battles to prevent repeat protests and retain control. In Brazil, Bolsonaro’s ratings have plummeted and hundreds of thousands have repeatedly taken to the streets since late May. But the country is not due to choose its next leader until October 2022, by which time the political and economic landscape may have shifted dramatically.

The pandemic’s most tangible political impact has come in Peru, which has been deeply traumatised by coronavirus and has suffered by far the world’s highest recorded death rate per capita.

The epidemic compounded an already profound political crisis in Peru and fuelled a dramatic increase of poverty as a strict lockdown made millions jobless, forcing thousands in the coastal capital to migrate, some by foot, to their home towns and villages in the Andes and Amazon. As Covid ravaged the country, claiming nearly 200,000 lives, some citizens were forced to buy overpriced oxygen tanks for suffocating relatives as the chronically underfunded health system, worsened by corruption, was swamped.

As elections approached this year, grief-stricken and angry Peruvians disappointed by their incumbent centrist leaders opted, sometimes out of desperation, for candidates with more extreme, anti-systemic messages, in a fragmented political field. In June, Pedro Castillo, a leftist teacher who had never held public office, was elected president – a political earthquake many suspect would not have occurred without Covid.

Protesters in Lima, Peru, demonstrate against the election of Pedro Castillo. Photograph: Kevin Limbher Vega Tinta/Medialys Images/Rex/Shutterstock

“All the [past] presidents made promises and in the end they just got rich themselves and they took Peru’s wealth to sell it to other countries,” said Elizabeth Altamirano Campos, one of the rural voters who helped catapult Castillo into office.

Javier Torres, the editor of Noticias Ser news website, said the pandemic had aggravated Peru’s underlying political crisis and deep inequality, paving the way for the shock election

“Castillo is a product of that,” Torres said, adding that the far right could also easily have prevailed as voters rebelled. “The pitch we’ve been playing on is not fit for purpose any more,” Torres said. “People are looking for something different – on the extremes.”

Filipe da Silva, an artist and LGBTQ+ activist from Brazil’s Unified Black Movement, said he was unsure what his country’s future held. He worried the “complicity” of many congresspeople meant the main demand of protesters – Bolsonaro’s impeachment – was far from guaranteed.

But as protesters across Latin America geared up for their next mobilisation, the civil rights activist vowed to stay on the streets battling a health emergency that has disproportionately affected black Brazilians.

“We’ve lost so many people. It’s heartbreaking,” Silva said. “This project of death must be stopped.”

US HOUSE PASSES JOHN LEWIS VOTING RIGHTS ADVANCEMENT ACT

by Black EnterpriseAugust 24, 2021

(image: Verizon Media Player)

MoveOn praises House passage of John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act and calls on the Senate to pass it as well

Tonight, MoveOn is celebrating a crucial victory for democracy with the passage of the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act by the U.S. House of Representatives. Once signed into law, the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act will restore the essential portion of the Voting Rights Act, struck down by a Republican-packed Supreme Court, that blocks discriminatory voting policies before they go into effect, putting a transparent process in place for protecting everyone’s freedom to vote.

“Passing the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act is of utmost importance. We’re in a five alarm fire, with Republican attacks continuing to escalate, and the promise of democracy is on the line,” said MoveOn Political Action Executive Director Rahna Epting. “Voters pick our leaders, and not the other way around. To deny this bill would be to deny the very foundation of democracy. The Senate must act now and pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Advancement Act to restore the Voting Rights Act, as well as the For the People Act and protect the freedom to vote for all Americans.”

As we commend the House for passing a voting rights bill which places value on the freedom to vote, we must be sure to note that the job is not finished. Democrats in the Senate must not let Republicans abuse the Jim Crow filibuster to block this urgently needed legislation.

“Ensuring that democracy works for and includes all Americans regardless of color, party, or zip code should not be a partisan issue,” MoveOn Political Action Executive Director Rahna Epting explained, “As the freedom to vote is being attacked by Republicans at the state level across the country, we need strong legislation to create national standards and accountability for those who try to rig the rules in their own favor.”

The Voting Rights Act has a long history of bipartisan support. In fact, every time the law has been reauthorized, it has been signed into law by a Republican president after first being signed into law by Democratic President Lyndon Johnson in 1965 at the peak of the Civil Rights movement. When it was reauthorized most recently in 2006, it passed the Senate with unanimous support, 98 to 0.

MoveOn is one of the largest independent progressive advocacy groups in the United States that mobilizes millions for a better society—one in which everyone can thrive. Whether through supporting candidates, passing legislation, or changing our national culture, MoveOn members are committed to mobilizing together for an inclusive and progressive future marked by equality, sustainability, and justice.

Pedaling for peace: cyclists hit the road in war-torn Yemen


Issued on: 25/08/2021 -

A Yemeni man performs a stunt before setting off to cycle from the Huthi rebel-held capital Sanaa to the northern Saada province 

Mohammed HUWAIS AFP

Sanaa (AFP)

Dozens of Yemeni cyclists hit the road Wednesday with a shared goal -- to spread peace in a country embroiled in conflict for more than seven years.

In the capital Sanaa, the cyclists prepared for their 320-kilometre (200-mile) journey to the northern province of Saada, one of the areas devastated by the ongoing war between the government and the Huthi rebels.

Mohammed al-Jidadi checked his pedals before he set off with approximately 40 others on the busy streets of Sanaa.

Another cyclist nearby pumped air into his tyres, while a third young man in full cycling gear playfully carried his bike pretending to play the guitar.

They plan to ride north through Amran province to reach Saada.

"We are going to Saada to spread the message of peace," Jidadi told AFP.

Yemen, the poorest country in the Arabian Peninsula, is devastated by conflict, coronavirus and a humanitarian crisis that the United Nations has called the world's worst.

Cyclists ride out from the Yemeni capital Sanaa hoping to spread a message of peace in the war-torn nation 

Mohammed HUWAIS AFP

Millions of people have been displaced by the grinding war, and more than 80 percent of Yemen's 30 million people depend on aid.

But despite everything, the cyclists said they hoped their ride would have a positive impact.

"We don't want cycling limited to one province, and we want to relay the message to all provinces that cycling is meant to reach all nations," cyclist Mohammed al-Harazi told AFP.

The message of peace is more important than ever, the cyclists said.

Tens of thousands of people, mostly civilians, have been killed in Yemen since 2015, when a Saudi-led coalition intervened to support the internationally recognised government after Iran-allied Huthi rebels took control of Sanaa the year before.

Yemen, the poorest country in the Arabian Peninsula, is devastated by conflict, but the cyclists hope to show another side of the nation Mohammed HUWAIS AFP

A UN-brokered agreement reached in 2018 between the warring sides offered some hope, but a peaceful settlement has yet to materialise.

© 2021 AFP

UNION WILL HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY ABOUT IT 

Delta Air Lines to levy $200 a month fee on unvaccinated workers

Issued on: 25/08/2021 

Delta Air Lines is the latest major US company to encourage vaccinations, with the aim of returning business to normal Patrick T. Fallon AFP/File

Washington (AFP)

Delta Air Lines in November will start charging unvaccinated workers $200 each month to cover the cost of care should they contract Covid-19, CEO Ed Bastian said Wednesday.

"This surcharge will be necessary to address the financial risk the decision to not vaccinate is creating for our company," he said in a memo to employees.

It was the latest move by a major American company to encourage vaccinations, some of which have gone as far as mandating the shots.

While the air carrier said 75 percent of its workforce has been vaccinated against the coronavirus, the new, more infectious variant -- which Bastian refrained from referring to by its more common name "Delta" -- is creating new issues for the company.

"In recent weeks since the rise of the B.1.617.2 variant, all Delta employees who have been hospitalized with Covid were not fully vaccinated," he said.

The average cost for hospitalization was $50,000 per-person, Bastian added.

"While we can be proud of our 75 percent vaccination rate, the aggressiveness of the variant means we need to get many more of our people vaccinated, and as close to 100 percent as possible."

He pointed to this week's announcement that the Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine had received full approval from US regulators as proof the shots are safe and effective.

In addition to the monthly fee, unvaccinated workers immediately will be required to wear masks, and next month will be subject to weekly testing.

After September 30, pay protections will be provided only to fully vaccinated workers should they fall ill with a breakthrough case of Covid-19, he said.

© 2021 AFP

WILDFIRES & CLIMATE CHANGE

MEA CULPA
Greece wildfires: PM admits mistakes were made

Greece's prime minister says more could have been done to prepare for this year's devastating fire season.



Greek authorities are scrutinizing the management of the devastating wildfires

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said that despite a good level of preparation for the fire season, efforts still fell short.

Addressing a parliamentary debate on the management of the wildfires, Mitsotakis said: "We had prepared well. But not well enough to deal with this phenomenon."

The prime minister said government would closely review its response in order to identify problem areas that could be corrected.


Mitsotakis told lawmakers there was a greater need for more firefighting aircraft, and that an authority would be established to help better coordinate emergency teams in future. He added that the early warning text message system had contributed to limiting casualties.

Climate change a key concern

In August, Greece recorded its hottest temperatures since 1987.

Mitsotakis said that in the first few days of the month, emergency services were called up to manage nearly 1,300 wildfires.

Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis said there is a need for more firefighting aircraft and better coordination

Around 60 fires were burning every day, with deliberate acts of arson seen in many instances.

The prime minister said the emergency showed a need for a radical shift to tackle global warming.

Dealing with the crisis "is forcing us to change everything; the way we produce agricultural products, how we move around, how we generate energy and the way we build our homes," he told the parliament.

Watch video04:03
Greece wildfires: Residents return to cinders

A summer of devastation

The fires have devastated large tracts of forests, land and homes. The island of Evia, and parts of the Peloponnese were among the areas worst hit.

An aid package of €500 million ($587 million) has been approved to help some of the worst affected areas. The prime minister said that all those who had been affected would receive help to rebuild their homes.

Mitsotakis also thanked the multinational response involving 23 countries, including Germany.

On Monday, firefighters were sent to tackle a blaze in the southern part of Evia, which they managed to contain after a few hours.

kb/nm (dpa, Reuters)

Wildfires in Russia spread to central regions

Issued on: 25/08/2021 - 

Wildfires have ravaged Sibria this summer 

Dimitar DILKOFF AFP/File

Moscow (AFP)

Russia's central regions on Wednesday battled "extreme" wildfires fuelled by an unusual heatwave that comes after forest fires linked to climate change ravaged Siberia for most of the summer.

Authorities were fighting 15 wildfires in the Urals region of Sverdlovsk, the emergencies ministry said.

The region -- which lies on the border of Europe and Asia -- faced "extreme fire hazard" due to a heatwave, it added.

Images on social media Tuesday showed flames on either side of a federal highway between regional capital Yekaterinburg and the Urals city of Perm, forcing the road shut for most of the day, according to reports.

Fires had meanwhile grown so intense in Mordovia, a region southeast of Moscow, that firefighters were forced to escape from a "ring of fire", the ministry said Wednesday.

And in the Nizhny Novgorod region east of Moscow, nine planes provided by the emergencies ministry, the defence ministry and the Russian National Guard had dropped 129 tonnes of water onto a large wildfire spreading to neighbouring Mordovia.

Authorities had deployed 1,200 firefighters to put out the blaze, the emergencies ministry said.

President Vladimir Putin on Tuesday pledged hundreds of millions of dollars to protect the country's forests, saying the nation must learn from the "unprecedented" wildfires that engulfed swathes of Siberia.

In the country's largest and coldest region of Yakutia, fires have burned through an area larger than Portugal.

The emergencies ministry said Wednesday that there were 50 forest fires now buring in the region.

Officials in hard-hit regions have called for resources and economic support from Moscow to deal with the damage.

Experts blame the huge fires that have ripped across Russia's vast territory in recent years on climate change, negligence and underfunded forestry management services.

Russia's forestry agency says fires this year have torn through more than 173,000 square kilometres (67,000 square miles), making it the second-worst season since the turn of the century.

A former sceptic of man-made climate change, Putin has called on authorities to do everything possible to help Russians affected by the gigantic fires.

© 2021 AFP

Provence wine producers weigh up losses after deadly wildfires in France

Issued on: 24/08/2021 - 

Winegrower Pierre Audemard lost half his vines and all of his outbuildings and wine stocks in the wildfires 

© Screengrab France 2 Marseille
Text by: Alison Hird with RFI

Winemakers in southeastern France who lost vines and equipment in recent wildfires are devastated as prospects of harvesting grapes for the popular rosé wine go up in smoke.

Wildfires that swept across the hilly region close to the French Riviera are now under control, firefighters said on Monday.

The blaze claimed two lives and scorched more than 7,000 hectares of land.

Some 5,000ha were lost in the Var region, which produces the Côtes de Provence rosé wine that is particularly popular in the United States.

Two hundred of the region’s 4,000 producers are believed to have been badly affected.

“We estimate around 1,000 hectares of vineyards have been affected in the Côte de Provence area,” Eric Pastorino, president of Provence's wine producers' association, the CIVP, told RFI.

Losses of up to €2 million

Winemaker Pierre Audemar lost all his equipment and half of his grape harvest to the flames.

“It’s not possible,” he told France Info television three days after the fire, gazing at the charred remains of his Domaine de la Giscle winery and the stock of 2019 wine stacked up in metal crates now burned to a cinder.

He hopes insurance will cover the economic blow of between “1.5 million and 2 million euros”.

Harvest blues

Paul Giraud also lost all his farming equipment and property. His 25 hectares of vines produce red, white and rosé Côtes de Provence in the hills behind Saint-Tropez,

"I no longer have a grape harvesting machine, a backhoe, a loader for the vineyard, a motor mower. Everything has been burnt," he told France Info.

“I’m a wreck, completely confused,” the 70-year-old said, looking around aimlessly in his La Tourre estate in the hills of the Massif des Maures.

“We harvest at the beginning of September. How am I going to manage? I have nothing left."

World's rich and famous converge on France's rosé vineyards in Provence

Even winegrowers who were fortunate not to lose their estates are concerned that the proximity of the fires will have tainted their grapes with smoke.

"We are only a few days away from the harvest, which is bound to be damaged,” said Guillaume de Chevron Villette, owner of the Reillanne winery.

“We produce a quality rosé wine, so the challenge will surely be to eliminate the risk of a burnt taste in the wine," he told AFP.

An estimated 1,000 hectares of vineyards have been damaged in fires in the Var region, where the much-prized Cotes de Provence rosé wine is produced. 

© Screengrab France 2 Marseille

A protected area

This part of southeastern France has regular droughts, strong winds and is densely populated, making it particularly at risk from wildfires.

There is also a “lack of maintenance around the plots,” said Chevron Villette. “As we’re in a protected area, we can’t clear the bush”.

The Massif des Maures has been designated a protected area because it is the natural habitat of the rare Hermann’s tortoise.

The National Federation of Agricultural Workers’ Unions (FNSEA) said in a statement that in view of climate change it was "urgent to reconsider the ways we preserve biodiversity in areas like this, which are particularly vulnerable to fire”.
Can French wine survive the climate change fiasco?

Some winegrowers are now asking for a change in regulations so that landowners near protected forest areas be allowed to clear bushes and create firebreaks.

"We want at the very least to be able to plant vines in the bushes to stop the spread of ashes,” said Benoît Ab-der-Halden, director of Chevron Villet, which represents 14 vineyards in Le Var.
Up to 5 years for next crop

In the meantime, the worst-hit winegrowers will have to wait several years before their next crop of rosé grapes can be harvested.

“When you lose a vineyard you have to leave the ground to rest, then replant,” says Pastorelli. With three years for the vine to start producing again, it will take "five years in all to produce Côtes de Provence wine".

Frost that devastated French vineyards linked to climate change

Fire is only the latest disaster to strike French wine producers.

In April, heavy frosts destroyed buds on vines in Burgundy, Bordeaux, Languedoc and the Rhône valley.

Deemed a natural disaster, the French government promised the affected farmers and winemakers one billion euros in aid.

OOPS, WELL THAT WAS DUMB

#OnlyFans reverses sexually explicit content ban

Issued on: 25/08/2021 - 

Valery Lopez is seen in a cellphone screen as she poses for pictures with a photographer during a photoshoot to make content for her OnlyFans profile, in Caracas, in December 2020.

 Cristian HERNANDEZ AFP

Paris (AFP)

OnlyFans, the platform where creators can share erotic photos and videos for a fee, on Wednesday reversed its decision to prohibit sexually explicit content.

The UK-based company said it would "continue to provide a home for all creators", backtracking on an announcement last week that would have seen many adult performers booted from the site.

"We have secured assurances necessary to support our diverse creator community and have suspended the planned October 1 policy change," the company posted on Twitter. "OnlyFans stands for inclusion."

OnlyFans soared in popularity during the pandemic as bored millions looked to the internet for distraction. It now counts some 150 million users worldwide.

Top stars include celebrities like rapper Cardi B and the boxer Floyd Mayweather as well as well-known porn stars, but the site is also used by ordinary people looking to supplement their income.

"OnlyFans' initial decision to ban adult content was surprising, considering the amount of revenue generated for the platform by adult content creators," said Scarlett Woodford, an analyst at Juniper Research who tracks the adult entertainment industry.

The company's founder and CEO Tim Stokely initially tied the decision to threats from major banks to cut ties with OnlyFans, lest they damage their reputation.

Explaining the ban to the Financial Times, Stokely said: "we had no choice — the short answer is banks."

Banks would "cite reputational risk and refuse our business", he said, adding that OnlyFans pays more than one million creators $300 million every month via the banking sector.

- Prudish payment processors -

It was not the first time an internet platform has blamed pressure from banks for a ban on explicit content. Patreon, another website where fans can support creators, announced a similar move in 2017.

"Credit card companies and financial institutions consider adult entertainment to be a high-risk sector," Woodford explained -- not least due to the high rate of transactions that people dispute, claiming they were accidental.

Payment processing firms and investors are also increasingly worried that they could be accused of funding illegal material that makes its way online.

Visa and Mastercard temporarily banned payments to sites owned by porn giant MindGeek last year, over reports that it was hosting non-consensual "revenge porn".

And this month, US lawmakers demanded an investigation into alleged child pornography posted on OnlyFans.

- 'Damage already done' -

The "no porn" policy had been met with widespread anger from sex workers' groups, who said OnlyFans had built its success on the work of adult performers -- taking 20 percent of their earnings through the site -- only to betray them.

Critics also said OnlyFans had offered financial security and a safe working environment to sex workers, who would find themselves in a vulnerable position after the ban.

Wednesday's announcement was met with a mixture of hurt and relief from OnlyFans performers.

"What a tumultuous time it has been for us, hopefully they can be a bit more forward with us from now on," tweeted Jonas Jackson, who describes himself as a "pansexual model".

But others said they had already taken their business elsewhere.

"You have proved that not only are you untrustworthy but you are willing to put millions of creators out of a job," tweeted one performer. "Damage already done."

Over the past week OnlyFans had shown signs of an attempted rebrand, pitching itself as a more family-friendly site where people might go to subscribe to videos by their favourite chefs or yoga instructors.

But the internet had been awash with jokes predicting its inevitable demise, with many comparing it to Tumblr.

The blogging site enjoyed cult status among teens in the early 2010s before banning "adult" posts in 2018 -- only to suffer an immediate 30 percent drop in visits, according to internet traffic monitor SimilarWeb.

"Tumblr and OnlyFans hanging out after they both banned porn," read one widely-shared tweet, depicting two side-by-side gravestones.

© 2021 AFP