ROFLMAO
Trump demands reinstatement as 'rightful' president or 'a new Election, immediately!' as some Republicans seek distance from him



Nicole Gaudiano
Mon, August 29, 2022 

Donald Trump is seeking reinstatement as president or "a new Election, immediately!"

His statement follows news that Facebook limited the story of Hunter Biden's laptop in users' news feeds in 2020.

Trump is doubling down on false election fraud claims as some Republicans seek distance from the issue.

Former President Donald Trump demanded reinstatement as president or "a new Election, immediately" after news that Facebook temporarily limited a controversial story about Hunter Biden's laptop in users' news feeds before the 2020 election.

Trump was responding to Facebook, now Meta, CEO Mark Zuckerberg's comments on Joe Rogan's podcast that a New York Post story about the laptop "fit the pattern" of polarizing content, including "Russian propaganda," that the FBI had warned the company about. The laptop story had several red flags that raised questions about its authenticity and Facebook limited its reach on the site's news feeds for a few days.

Trump's statement on Truth Social doubles down on false election fraud claims as some Republicans, the Washington Post has reported, are trying to distance themselves from his personal grievances ahead of the midterm elections in November.

In his statement, Trump wrote in all capital letters that the "FBI BURIED THE HUNTER BIDEN LAPTOP STORY BEFORE THE ELECTION knowing that, if they didn't, 'Trump would have easily won the 2020 Presidential Election.' This is massive FRAUD & ELECTION INTERFERENCE at a level never seen before in our Country."

Trump continued: "REMEDY: Declare the rightful winner or, and this would be the minimal solution, declare the 2020 Election irreparably compromised and have a new Election, immediately!"



Facebook allowed users to share the story but it showed up less in people's news feeds, so it was seen less. During Rogan's program, Zuckerberg said he couldn't recall if the FBI warned him about the New York Post story specifically, but he thought the story "fit the pattern."

But Meta later tweeted that "nothing about the Hunter Biden laptop story is new" and that the "FBI shared general warnings about foreign interference — nothing specific about Hunter Biden."




Trump has been railing against the FBI since agents searched his Mar-a-Lago home earlier this month for classified documents.

Trump won't be reinstated after losing the election, although QAnon conspiracy theorists spread the idea a year ago. The New York Times' Maggie Haberman said last year that Trump was telling allies that he thought he'd be reinstated, as well.

Federal investigators are weighing possible charges related to Hunter Biden's business activities.

The president has not been implicated, CNN reported, but Republicans say they will ramp up their investigations of the Bidens if they win control of the House in the midterm elections.

Madagascar police shoot dead protesters seeking revenge for albino kidnapping

FRANCE 24 - Yesterday 

At least 18 people were killed in Madagascar on Monday when police opened fire on a what they called a lynch mob demanding that officials turn over to them four suspects held for allegedly kidnapping a child with albinism and killing the mother.

Madagascar police shoot dead protesters seeking revenge for albino kidnapping© Rijasolo, AFP

Dozens were wounded, some of them seriously.

"At the moment, 18 people have died in all, nine on the spot and nine in hospital," said doctor Tango Oscar Toky, chief physician at a hospital in southeastern Madagascar.

"Of the 34 injured, nine are between life and death," said the doctor giving graphic details of the injuries. "We are waiting for a government helicopter to evacuate them to the capital".

Around 500 protesters armed with blades and machetes "tried to force their way" into the station, a police officer involved in the shooting said, speaking on condition of anonymity.

"There were negotiations, (but) the villagers insisted," the officer told AFP over the phone from the town of Ikongo, 90 kilometres (56 miles) southeast of the capital Antananarivo.

Police first fired teargas and then rounds in the air to try to disperse the crowd, he said.

"They continued to force their way through. We had no choice but to defend ourselves," the officer added.

The national police in the capital confirmed the "very sad event", but only gave a toll of 11, with 18 injured.

Andry Rakotondrazaka, the national police chief, told a news conference that what happened was a "very sad event. It could have been avoided but it happened".

He said the police "did everything to avoid confrontation", including negotiating with the crowd,

"But there were provocations"... (and) there were people with "long-bladed knives and sticks", he said, adding others hurled stones towards the police.

"The gendarmes used tear gas. But that was not enough to stop the crowd from advancing. There was shooting in the air."

But in the end the gendarmes had "no choice but to resort to self-defence... and limit the damage by shooting".

The kidnapping took place last week, according to Jean-Brunelle Razafintsiandraofa, a member of parliament for Ikongo district.

Revenge attacks

Revenge attacks are common in Madagascar.

In February 2017, a mob of 800 people barged into Ikongo prison in search of a murder suspect they intended to kill.

They overpowered guards and 120 prisoners broke out of jail.

In 2013, a Frenchman, a Franco-Italian and a local man accused of killing a child on the tourist island of Nosy Be were burned alive by a crowd.

Some sub-Saharan African countries have suffered a wave of assaults against people with albinism, whose body parts are sought for witchcraft practices in the mistaken belief that they bring luck and wealth.

Albinism, caused by a lack of melanin, the pigment that colours skin, hair and eyes, is a genetic condition that affects hundreds of thousands of people across the globe, particularly in Africa.

Under The Same Sun, a Canada-based charity working to combat discrimination, has been logging cases of similar violence across Africa.

It ranks Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo, Malawi, Mozambique and Tanzania as the countries where such attacks are most prevalent.

Madagascar, a large Indian Ocean island country, is ranked among the poorest in the world.

(FRANCE 24 with AFP and AP)

The Samaritans offer support and advice to people feeling suicidal or vulnerable 24 hours a day, 365 days a year. Their website is https://www.samaritans.org, email address jo@samaritans.org or call free on 116 123

END U$ WAR ON DRUGS

No choice: Colombia's ex-guerrillas revert to coca, crime

David SALAZAR
Mon, August 29, 2022


When he laid down arms at the end of Colombia's decades-long civil conflict, Eiber Andrade did not expect to ever return to a life of crime.

Yet a mere five years later, the 24-year-old ex-guerrilla fighter makes a living from coca -- from which cocaine is derived -- in a region where the government's post-conflict commitment to peace and better living has yet to bear fruit.

After the 2016 peace agreement that saw the disarmament of the FARC guerrilla group and its withdrawal from the Catatumbo region near the border with Venezuela, Andrade tried his hand at agriculture.

The region is home to the world's largest concentration of coca crops -- a total of 40,084 hectares under cultivation in 2020 according to the UN.

It is also fertile ground for coffee, cacao and bananas, but none of these are as profitable.

Short on skills and capital, Andrade's brief foray into food farming failed -- making him one of many among the 13,000-odd disarmed FARC combatants unable to find a way to make a legitimate living.

Andrade, who became a guerrilla fighter at the tender age of 10, said he felt let down by the government.

The money he and other disarmed fighters were to have received as part of the peace deal never materialized.

And in the end, Andrade told AFP, he had no choice but to rejoin the criminal underworld and become a coca harvester.

He has a three-year-old daughter to take care of.

"The presidents we have had have not given us any help," Andrade said.
- 'May Petro help us' -


Other demobilized FARC fighters unable to find a niche in civilian life turned to violence.

Hundreds rejoined rebels battling other groups in a violent rivalry for control of drug and illegal mining resources and smuggling routes in the border region.

Colombia's new president, Gustavo Petro, has vowed to stop the violence and negotiate peace with the last recognized guerrilla group still fighting, the ELN.

He has denounced the failure of the war on drugs that presidents before him had waged with US backing at a cost of tens of thousands of lives among police, soldiers, judges, journalists, subsistence farmers and others over four decades.

Petro has said he wants no more coca growers in jail in Colombia, the world's biggest producer of cocaine, consumed mainly in the United States and Europe.

The country's first left-wing president has also urged cocaine-importing countries to shift the focus from dismantling production to diminishing consumption.

The 2016 peace agreement had envisaged a program of rural development to replace Colombia's lucrative drug trade with legitimate farming activities.

But with lagging funding for bridging projects, there has been no significant decline of coca production.

In 2020, the country had 142,783 hectares under cultivation, according to the latest UN report, compared to 146,139 hectares in 2016.

"May Petro help us," said Andrade. "If he does not, we will have to continue with these things."

Three other ex-guerrillas work with Andrade as coca pickers on a six-hectare estate in Catatumbo.

They earn about $3 per 10 kilograms of coca leaf harvested.
- 'Out of necessity' -

Last Friday, Petro visited the Catatumbo region for talks with coca growers on how best to ease their transition to legitimate and viable farming.

The president, who as a youngster belonged to an urban guerrilla group that later downed arms, wants to boost domestic food production at the same time.

But former FARC child soldier Carlos Abril, now 25, said he had heard similar promises before.

"We entered the (peace) process with joy, with the expectation that we are going to see a new Colombia, in peace," Abril told AFP.


Instead, he too had to become a coca harvester "out of necessity."

Elizabeth Pabon, leader of the Catatumbo small-scale farmers' association of mainly coca growers, welcomed Petro's stated aversion to the large-scale chemical or manual eradication of coca crops.

"It is a relief," she told the government delegation.

And Wilder Mora, leader of the COCCAM coca growers' grouping, said "we are willing to substitute" coca with other crops.

But he stressed could only happen with public investment, which coca-growers have been clamoring for since the 1990s.

das/jss/vel/ll/mlr/st

Ecuador investigates killing of four Galapagos giant tortoises

AFP - Yesterday 

Prosecutors in Ecuador on Monday announced an investigation into the alleged hunting and killing of four giant tortoises on the Galapagos Islands, a unique and fragile ecosystem considered a world heritage site.


Prosecutors in Ecuador said they have launched an investigation into the alleged hunting and killing of four giant tortoises in the Galapagos National Park© -

The prosecutor's office said on Twitter it was investigating the "suspected hunting and killing of four giant tortoises in the Galapagos National Park wetland complex."

A unit that specializes in environmental crimes is collecting testimonies from national park agents and appointing experts to carry out autopsies on the tortoises.

The park management has filed a complaint over the death of the animals, the Environment Ministry said on its WhatsApp channel.

The ministry did not specify which species the four tortoises belonged to, but said they had been hunted in the wetlands of Isabela Island, located 1,000 kilometers (600 miles) from the coast of Ecuador in the Pacific Ocean.

Hunting wild animals is punishable by up to three years in prison in Ecuador.

In 2019, a man who rammed a tortoise and damaged its shell was fined $11,000. That same year, another driver had to pay over $15,000 for running over and killing a native Galapagos iguana.

With an area of more than 4,500 square kilometers (1,800 square miles), Isabela is the largest island in the archipelago, and makes up 60 percent of the land surface of the remote oceanic chain.

The Galapagos archipelago is designated as a biosphere reserve for its unique flora and fauna. It was once home to 15 species of tortoises, three of which went extinct centuries ago, according to the Galapagos National Park.

In 2019, a tortoise of the species Chelonoidis phantastica was discovered on the island, more than a century after its supposed extinction.


EXTINCTION: 6 SPECIES WE RECENTLY LOST
Pinta giant tortoise
Lonesome George had reached celebrity status before he died in 2012. The tortoise was the last of his subspecies and an icon of his native islands ― the Galapagos. The tortoises were driven to extinction by whalers and ship merchants in the 19th century using the animals as food, along with deforestation of the islands
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China arrests hundreds over banking scandal that sparked rare protests

Mon, August 29, 2022


Chinese police have arrested more than 200 suspects linked to one of the country's biggest-ever banking scandals, which triggered rare mass protests.

Four banks in central China's Henan province suspended cash withdrawals in April as regulators cracked down on mismanagement, freezing the funds of hundreds of thousands of customers and sparking protests that at times ended in violence.

Police said Monday they had now arrested 234 people in connection with the scandal and that "significant progress" was being made in recovering stolen funds.

"A criminal gang... illegally controlled four village and town banks... and was suspected of committing a series of serious crimes," police in the city of Xuchang said in a statement on Monday.

China's rural banking sector has been hit hard by Beijing's efforts to rein in a property bubble and spiralling debt in a financial crackdown that has had ripple effects across the world's second-largest economy.

Regulators have been gradually offering repayments to depositors since mid-April.

On Monday, the Henan banking and insurance regulator promised to repay those who had deposited between 400,000 and 500,000 yuan ($57,900 to $72,300) starting this week.

Depositors who owed smaller amounts were repaid earlier.

The size and scale of the fraud dealt an unprecedented blow to public confidence in China's financial system, analysts have said, with the banks involved allegedly operating illegally for more than a decade.

A July 10 mass demonstration by depositors in Henan's provincial capital, Zhengzhou, was violently quashed, with demonstrators forced onto buses by police and beaten, according to eyewitness accounts given to AFP and verified photos on social media.

prw/oho/cwl

French-Indian textile designer brings back Mughal patterns



Laurence THOMANN
Mon, August 29, 2022 


Textiles designer Brigitte Singh lovingly lays out a piece of cloth embossed with a red poppy plant she says was probably designed for emperor Shah Jahan, builder of the Taj Mahal, four centuries ago.

For Singh -- who moved from France to India 42 years ago and married into a maharaja's family -- this exquisite piece remains the ever-inspiring heart of her studio's mission.

The 67-year-old is striving to keep alive the art of block printing, which flourished in the 16th and 17th centuries under the conquering but sophisticated Mughal dynasty that then ruled India.

"I was the first to give a renaissance to this kind of Mughal design," Singh told AFP in her traditional printing workshop in Rajasthan.


Having studied decorative arts in Paris, Singh arrived aged 25 in 1980 in western India's Jaipur, the "last bastion" of the technique of using carved blocks of wood to print patterns on material.

"I dreamed of practising (miniature art) in Isfahan. But the Ayatollahs had just arrived in Iran (in the Islamic revolution of 1979). Or Herat, but the Soviets had just arrived in Afghanistan," she remembers.

"So by default, I ended up in Jaipur," she said.
- 'Magic potion' -

A few months after arriving, Singh was introduced to a member of the local nobility who was related to the maharaja of Rajasthan. They married in 1982.

At first, Singh still hoped to try her hand at miniature painting.

But after scouring the city for traditional paper to work on, she came across workshops using block printing.

"I fell into the magic potion and could never go back," she told AFP.

She started by making just a few scarves, and when she passed through London two years later, gave them as presents to friends who were connoisseurs of Indian textiles.

Bowled over, they persuaded her to show them to Colefax and Fowler, the storied British interior decorations firm.

"The next thing I knew, I was on my way back to India with an order for printed textiles," she said.

Since then, she has never looked back.
- Soul comfort -

For the next two decades, she worked with a "family of printers" in the city before building her own studio in nearby Amber -- a stone's throw from Jaipur's famous fort.


It was her father-in-law, a major collector of Rajasthan miniatures, who gave her the Mughal-era poppy cloth connected to Shah Jahan.

Her reproduction of that print was a huge success the world over, proving especially popular with Indian, British and Japanese clients.

In 2014, she made a Mughal poppy print quilted coat, called an Atamsukh -- meaning "comfort of the soul" -- that was later acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum in London.

Another piece of her work is in the collection of the Metropolitan Art Museum in New York.
- 'Sophistication of simplicity' -

Singh starts her creative process by handing precise paintings to her sculptor, Rajesh Kumar, who then painstakingly chisels the designs onto blocks of wood.

"We need a remarkable sculptor, with a very serious eye," she said.


"The carving of the wood blocks is the key. This tool has the sophistication of simplicity."

Kumar makes several identical blocks for each colour used in each printed fabric.

"The poppy motif, for example, has five colours. I had to make five blocks," he said. "It took me 20 days."

At Singh's workshop, six employees work on pieces of cloth laid out on tables five metres (16 feet) long.

They dip the blocks in dye, place them carefully on the cloth, push down and tap.

The work is slow and intricate, producing no more 40 metres of material every day.

Her workshop makes everything from quilts to curtains and rag dolls to shoes.

Singh just finished another Atamsukh for a prince in Kuwait.

"The important thing is to keep the know-how alive," she said.

"More precious than the product, the real treasure is the savoir faire."

lth/stu/mca/cwl

A dancing Hillary Clinton comes to Finnish leader's defense


Sun, August 28, 2022 


"Keep dancing," former US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton tweeted Sunday, lending her personal support to Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin, whose taste for partying has drawn global attention.

Clinton's post included a photo of herself, dancing with a big smile on her face in a crowded club during a 2012 trip to Colombia while still secretary of state. It concluded with the words "Keep dancing, @marinsanna."

Marin quickly responded, tweeting back, "Thank you @Hillary Clinton," and including a heart emoji.

A recently leaked video showed Marin dancing and partying with a group of friends and celebrities.


Critics said it showed inappropriate behavior for a prime minister, while others -- now including Clinton -- have defended the 36-year-old politician's right to enjoy a private event with friends.

Marin told fellow members of her Social Democratic party that it was important to cut loose at times.

"I am human. And I too sometimes long for joy, light and fun amidst these dark clouds," said Marin, the world's youngest prime minister. She added that she had not missed "a single day of work."

But she encountered further blowback when a photo emerged of two women lifting their tops during a party at the prime minister's residence in July.

Marin again apologized.

Clinton, who is 74, headed the State Department from 2009 to 2013 under president Barack Obama.

In 2016, she was the Democratic candidate for US president. Though heavily favored, she lost to real estate magnate Donald Trump in a stunning upset.

Thousands of Orthodox Serbians march against EuroPride

Sun, August 28, 2022 

Thousands of Orthodox Christians marched in Belgrade Sunday to warn against holding EuroPride, despite the Serbian authorities' decision to cancel the pan-European gathering of the LGBTQ community next month.

Carrying icons, crosses and religious flags, protesters marched through the city centre while praying and chanting before gathering outside the cathedral of St Sava.

President Aleksandar Vucic on Saturday announced that he had decided, in consultation with the government, that the pride parade would be "postponed or cancelled".

Vucic said it was not possible to "handle everything" at a time when Serbia was "pressured with all kinds of problems", underlining recent tensions with former province Kosovo and concerns over energy and food.

But EuroPride organisers vowed to press on with the parade.

"Pride will go ahead as planned on September 17," Belgrade Pride coordinator Marko Mihailovic said.

Addressing the crowd on Sunday, Serbian Orthodox Bishop Nikanor hailed the authorities' decision to reverse "the desecration of our country, our Church and our family".

For him, it was an "abnormality" which should be treated as in the Russia of President Vladimir Putin -- whom he referred to as "the tsar of the planet", according to video footage on the Glas Javnosti news site.

In 2013, Russia introduced a law banning LGBT "propaganda" aimed at minors, punishable with fines and imprisonment.

Bishop Nikanor said the faithful were ready to take to the streets again to "put themselves before those who intend to destroy the values of Serbia".

The first two Belgrade Pride marches, in 2001 and 2010, were marred by violence. The parade has been organised regularly since 2014 but with a large law enforcement presence.

bur-rus/jnd/mtp/dva

Thousands of homophobes protest EuroPride event that’s already been postponed

AMELIA HANSFORD AUGUST 29, 2022

Thousands of religious and right-wing Serbians have marched in Belgrade to protest an upcoming EuroPride event… that’s already been postponed.

Anti-LGBTQ+ protestors took to the streets of the country’s capital on Sunday (28 August) to oppose plans for the city to host EuroPride on 17 September – the event is hosted in a different European country each year.

The march was led by clergy from the Serbian Orthodox Church but was also attended by several other groups sharing similar sentiments. Bishops in the march told Reuters the Pride event threatened their view of traditional family values.

Some held signs saying things like “save our children,” while others carried crosses and pictures of significant religious figures.

The day before the march, Serbian president Aleksandar Vučić had said the event would be postponed or cancelled, citing fears right-wing activists would attempt to dismantle the celebration.

“It will happen but in some other and happier time,” he said in a statement, while the Belgrade Pride director Marko Mihailovic said the government couldn’t cancel the event, only “try to ban it”.

European Pride Organisers Association (EPOA) president Kristine Garina responded to the news, saying the Serbian president could not “cancel someone else’s event”.

“EuroPride in Belgrade will not be cancelled and will bring together thousands of LGBTI+ people from across Europe with LGBTI+ people from Serbia and the wider western Balkans,” the Latvian activist said.

Garina also claimed that the ban would violate Serbia’s commitment to the European Convention of Human Rights, saying: “Aside from the illegality of such a ban, it must be noted that those opposing EuroPride in Belgrade are using tired old tropes, inaccuracies and downright lies to discredit what is, in fact, a celebration of human rights and equality.”

The country has been attempting to join the European Union since 2009, but negotiations are ongoing and have involved improving human rights. Its history of banning Pride parades in the past has received criticism from several European human rights organisations – this includes marches in the early 2000s that were embroiled in violence from anti-LGBTQ+ protesters.

But after some peaceful Serbian Pride parades, EuroPride had allowed Belgrade to be considered as a candidate to host the 2022 event.

In a letter to the EPOA, former prime minister Ana Brnabić wrote: “The government I lead is committed to ensuring the full respect of human rights and of all citizens and we hereby promise to help the Belgrade Pride organising team in ensuring a safe and successful organisation of EuroPride in Belgrade in 2022.”

WORK TO RULE BY ANY OTHER NAME

'Quiet quitting' raising a din in stressful US workplaces

Brian KNOWLTON
Sun, August 28, 2022 


They are drawing a line at the 40-hour work week, limiting after-hours calls and emails and generally, if softly, saying "no" more often -- some American workers are embracing the concept of "quiet quitting" as they push back against what some see as the stifling trap of constant connectivity.

Maggie Perkins -- who lives in Athens, Georgia -- was racking up 60-hour weeks as a matter of course in her job as a teacher, but the 30-year-old realized after her first child was born that something was wrong.

"There's pictures of me grading papers on an airplane on the way to vacation. I did not have a work-life balance," Perkins explains in a TikTok video about how she chose -- though she did not have a name for it back then -- to begin "quiet quitting."


Perkins told AFP she eventually left her job to pursue a PhD, but remains an advocate for her former colleagues -- producing videos and podcasts with practical tips on making their workload fit inside their workday.

"Adopting this 'quiet quitting' mindset really just means that you are establishing a boundary that helps you to do your job when you are paid to do it -- and then you can leave that, and go home and be a human with your family," she says.
- Work-life balance or slacking? -

The buzzword seems to have first surfaced in a July TikTok post.

In the words of user @zaidleppelin, "You're not outright quitting your job but you're quitting the idea of going above and beyond. You're still performing your duties but you're no longer subscribing to the hustle culture mentality that work has to be your life."

That post went viral, drawing nearly a half-million likes. Responses bubbled over with a sense of shared resentment -- and newspaper columnists spilled ink all summer trying to decipher the phenomenon.

For the debate soon erupted: Are "quiet quitters" merely trying to draw boundaries in pursuit of a reasonable work-life balance, more associated with a European lifestyle than with always-on US work culture?

Are they slackers with a trendy new name? Or are they people at genuine risk of burnout -- who would do best to quit outright?

Data suggests the need for greater balance is real.

On-the-job stress rose from 38 percent of those polled in 2019 to 43 percent the following year as Covid-19 upended the world of work, Gallup found, with women in the United States and Canada facing the most pressure.

Similar dynamics helped fuel the "Great Resignation" -- the surge in employees leaving or switching jobs amid pandemic-related pressures.

Many "quiet quitters" say they are perfectly willing to work hard, but only for the hours the job is meant to entail. Their motto: "act your wage."

Some observers are skeptical, of course, contending that offices have always had their share of clock-watchers and prickly workers claiming certain tasks are not their responsibility.

Going further, Arianna Huffington, founder of the Huffington Post, panned the phenomenon as "a step toward quitting on life."

But former US labor secretary Robert Reich summed up the -- forceful -- counterargument, saying "Workers aren't 'quiet quitting.' They're refusing to be exploited for their labor."
- 'Six months of dread' -

A case in point: the experience of Bess, who asked not to be identified by her real name, illustrates how Covid allowed some jobs to spill far outside their normal boundaries.

She was hired shortly before the pandemic in a job originally meant to involve regular trips to Germany.

But, she told AFP, Covid left her stuck in her New York apartment, having to take phone calls as early as 3:00 am due to the time difference.

Out of self-preservation, she began to dial back her efforts -- which her American friends had trouble understanding.

"There is that stigma -- you put your blood, sweat and tears into your job in the US, and if you don't work, you don't deserve to be here," she said.

"After six months of dread," Bess explains, she simply stopped answering emails for several weeks -- and ultimately parted ways with her company.

Philip Oreopoulos, a labor economist at the University of Toronto, said one solution is better communications to clarify employer expectations before accepting a job.

"If you need to be on call at home, then they should clearly state that," he said.

And if things do get out of hand -- and quiet quitting won't fix the problem -- aggrieved workers do have one asset to fall back on: a historically low unemployment rate.

"Come to an employer and say, 'I have an opportunity with another firm and I'm thinking of taking it,'" Oreopoulos said. "It's a good time in general to be asking for a raise."

bbk/caw/ec/sst

Water flouridation: Effective prevention for tooth decay and a win for the environment - Trinity research

Research findings also strengthen the case internationally for water fluoridation programmes to reduce dental decay, particularly in the most vulnerable populations.

Peer-Reviewed Publication

TRINITY COLLEGE DUBLIN

Trinity College Dublin researchers collaborating with University College London have demonstrated for the first time the low environmental footprint of water fluoridation compared to other preventive measures for tooth decay. The study is published in the British Dental Journal  today [Monday 29th August 2022].

Water fluoridation is regarded as one of the most significant public health interventions of the twentieth century. But as the climate crisis worsens, the contribution of healthcare and the prevention of disease to the crisis must be considered. Action is urgent.

Influenced by this urgency, researchers quantified the environmental impact of water fluoridation for an individual five year-old child over a one-year period and compared this to the traditional use of fluoride varnish and toothbrushing programmes, which take place in selected schools across the UK, and internationally.

Today, over 35% of the world’s population have access to water fluoridation, with studies showing significant reductions in dental caries. Whilst data on the clinical effectiveness and cost analysis of water fluoridation are available, there has been no data regarding its environmental impact up to now.

To quantify this impact, the research team performed a Life Cycle Assessment  (LCA) by carefully measuring the combined travel, the weight and amounts of all products and the processes involved in all three preventive programmes (toothbrushing, fluoride varnish programmes and water fluoridation) . Data was inputted into a specific environmental programme (OpenLCA) and the team used the Ecoinvent database, enabling them to calculate environmental outputs, including the carbon footprint, the amount of water used for each product and the amount of land use.

The results of the study, led by Brett Duane, Associate Professor in Dental Public Health at Trinity College, concluded that water fluoridation had the lowest environmental impact in all categories studied, and had the lowest disability-adjusted life years impact when compared to all other community-level caries prevention programmes. The study also found that water fluoridation gives the greatest return on investment.

Considering the balance between clinical effectiveness, cost effectiveness and environmental sustainability, researchers believe that water fluoridation should be the preventive intervention of choice.

This research strengthens the case internationally for water fluoridation programmes to reduce dental decay, especially in the most vulnerable populations.

Associate Professor Duane said: 

“ As the climate crisis starts to worsen, we need to find ways of preventing disease to reduce the environmental impact of our health systems. This research clearly demonstrates the low carbon impact of water fluoridation as an effective prevention tool. “

Professor Paul Ashley, Senior Clinical Lecturer (Honorary NHS Consultant), UCL Eastman Dental Institute added:

“Renewed efforts should be made to increase access to this intervention.”

Ends

 

---

JOURNAL

BDJ

DOI

10.1038/s41415-022-4251-5 

METHOD OF RESEARCH

Data/statistical analysis

SUBJECT OF RESEARCH

People

ARTICLE TITLE

The environmental impact of community caries prevention - part 3: water fluoridation