14-Year-Old Wins National Spelling Bee With 'Psammophile'

2023 Scripps National Spelling Bee champion talks about win GMA  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psammophile

Psammophile - Wikipedia

A psammophile is a plant or animal that prefers or thrives in sandy areas. Plant psammophiles are also known as psammophytes. 

This Year’s Spelling Bee Champion Didn’t Schweat the Schwa

After three years of studying, it took Dev Shah about 45 seconds to reach the apotheosis of his craft and become the national champion on Thursday night.

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Dev Shah Becomes 2023 Spelling Bee Champion
The eighth grader from Florida won the Scripps National Spelling Bee — and $50,000. The winning word was “psammophile,” an organism that prefers or thrives in sandy areas.

“If you spell this next word correctly, we will declare you the 2023 National Spelling Bee champion: psammophile.” “Psammo, meaning ‘sand,’ Greek? Oh.” “Wait a second.” [chuckle] “Psammo, meaning ‘sand,’ Greek?” “Yes.” “Phile, meaning ‘lover,’ Greek?” “You’re on the right track.” “Can I please have all the information?” “Psammophile is a noun from Greek. A psammophile is an organism that prefers or thrives in sandy soils or areas.” “Psammophile. May I please have the sentence?” “Any psammophile, for example, a cactus, would flourish in the Arizona desert. Can you say it for us?” “Psammophile. Psammophiles.” “Psammophile.” “P- S- A- M- M- O- P-H- I-L-E, psammophile.” “That is correct.” [crowd cheering] “The hug from Charlotte and Morgan Fitzgerald Middle School celebrates in Largo, Florida. He had family watching in New Jersey and in India. His friends from back home celebrating, his father, Deval; his mother, Nilam; and little brother Neil. They’ll be talking about this for the rest of Dev’s life. Your 2023 Scripps National Spelling Bee champion.

The eighth grader from Florida won the Scripps National Spelling Bee — and $50,000. The winning word was “psammophile,” an organism that prefers or thrives in sandy areas.CreditCredit...Shuran Huang for The New York Times

By Remy Tumin, Maria Cramer and Maggie Astor
June 2, 2023

After 14 rounds of words like “probouleutic” and “zwitterion” and “schistorrhachis,” Dev Shah, an eighth grader from Florida, had to wait through one more commercial break. If he spelled the next word correctly, he would win the Scripps National Spelling Bee.

“Psammophile,” a plant or animal that prefers or thrives in sandy areas, would determine his fate.

He asked for all the word’s information — its definition, part of speech, orthography, use in a sentence — but he didn’t need it, evidenced by a slight smile as he spoke. After three years of studying, it took him about 45 seconds to reach the apotheosis of his craft and become the champion on Thursday night.

“It’s surreal,” he said as he held the coveted Scripps cup, the official championship trophy. “My legs are still shaking.”

Dev, 14, outlasted 228 other competitors, including 10 finalists on Thursday night, to win $50,000 in cash and a commemorative medal. Charlotte Walsh, an eighth grader from Virginia who finished in second place, will receive $25,000.

The moment was a culmination for Dev, who began competing in spelling bees in third grade and has studied 10 hours each day for the past year, according to his mother. When his parents rushed the stage to hug him, he felt overwhelmed, Dev said in an interview after the competition.

“It gave me the reassurance that I should never give up, no matter what,” he said Thursday night.

A fan of Roger Federer and the movie “La La Land,” Dev had competed in previous national spelling bees, tying for 76th place in 2021 and 51st place in 2019. In 2022, he did not make it out of the regional competition in his home state. The lone Floridian in the finals, Dev, from Largo, outside St. Petersburg, gave the state its first winner since 1999.

Because he is in eighth grade, this was his last year to compete, and he bested beasts of the dictionary like “chiromancy,” “schistorrhachis” and “aegagrus.”

The competition has become more difficult in the last two years, as its organizers have added new rules to challenge the spellers and to avoid a repeat of 2019, which ended with an eight-way tie after four hours that exhausted the bee’s list of challenging words.

In 2021, organizers introduced a vocabulary round, in which spellers have to identify the correct meaning of the word. Last year, they introduced the spell-off, an intense showdown in which the remaining spellers have 90 seconds to spell as many words correctly as possible. Harini Logan, an eighth grader from San Antonio, won by correctly spelling 21 words.

The 2023 finals began with 11 spellers, the youngest of them Sarah Fernandes, an 11-year-old from Omaha. More than half were eighth graders and seasoned competitors by the bee’s standards, representing a vast swath of the United States.

Despite their experience, there were some expected stumbles.

The schwa — the “uh”-like sound that can be represented by any vowel in the English alphabet, also known as the bane of competitive spellers’ existence — knocked out several finalists, as it routinely does.

In the 12th round, the insidious schwa claimed two victims: Vikrant Chintanaboina (“pataca,” which he misspelled as “petaca”) and Aryan Khedkar (“pharetrone,” which he misspelled as “pharotrone”).

The final three spellers were Charlotte, who last year tied for 32nd place, and Surya Kapu, a 14-year-old eighth grader from Salt Lake City, who finished in a tie for fifth place in 2022.

Surya fell to “kelep,” the word for a Central American stinging ant, denying Utah its first national title and leaving Charlotte and Dev in the final high-stakes duel.

He went first, correctly spelling “bathypitotmeter,” an instrument that measures the velocity and temperature of water at certain depths.

Charlotte got the word “daviely,” which means listlessly.

“Oh my god,” she said as she struggled, misspelling it D-A-E-V-I-L-I-C-K. Mary Brooks, the main judge, rang the bell, giving Dev his chance to avoid the spell-off.

When Jacques A. Bailly, the bee’s pronouncer, presented psammophile, Dev said he immediately recognized the two roots, despite having never heard it before.

Deval Shah, Dev’s father, said once his son “got on a roll, he would be unbeatable,” adding that the words would unfold like “a slow flow, as if a symphony is going.”

Mr. Shah first noticed Dev’s “remarkable memory” when he was 3 years old and became fascinated with a geography program on an iPad. His parents eventually channeled that curiosity into spelling, with Mr. Shah as his first coach.

Scott Remer, his current coach, said it was clear that Dev felt strong about his ability to spell the word Dr. Bailly threw at him.

“He has a capacious memory, a real love of language and he was resilient,” he said. “I couldn’t be prouder.”

On Friday, Charlotte, the runner-up, described how nervous she was before the finals.

“I felt like I didn’t really deserve to be there,” she said. “But getting second helped me prove to myself that I did deserve it, and that I should trust in my own skill.”

With his two biggest stressors — middle school and the spelling bee — behind him, Dev was looking forward to going home next week and doing “normal stuff” with his friends. For now, he was still letting the drop of confetti sink in.

“At the end of the day, it's your word that matters,” he said. “It’s not like a soccer team. If the other team is better than your team, it affects how the game goes. With spelling, it only matters what word you get and if you can last long enough.”

The New York Times

The symbol of the GOP should be a crying baby banging a rattle

Opinion by Douglas MacKinnon, opinion contributor • June 3,2023

The Hill


Ihave maintained for years that the symbol of the Republican Party should not be the elephant, but rather a crying baby banging a rattle.

I bring this up again because there is seemingly not a week that goes by when some Republican or conservative isn’t whining: “The left controls Google; the left controls YouTube; the left controls the media; the left controls academia; the left controls corporate America; the left controls entertainment; the left controls …”

Cry me a river. Guess what? It’s your fault.

Over the course of the last several decades, the left has gained majority control over what I call the “five major megaphones of our nation”: the media, academia, entertainment, science and medicine.

And you know what? Good for them.

None of that happened in a vacuum. With eyes wide open, Republicans, conservatives and people of traditional faith either ignored the takeover or were not bright enough or committed enough to their cause to compete for the leadership and influencer roles in those critically important arenas.

Was there eventually some discrimination in the hiring and firing of some Republicans, conservatives and people of traditional faith as the left gained control of those megaphones? I and others would say “yes,” but ultimately … so what?

Liberals have a point of view. Activists have a point of view. If they happen to insert themselves into a company or industry, human nature dictates that not only will that point of view come with them, but that they will mostly surround themselves with like-minded individuals.

Instead of pointing fingers and throwing tantrums in their sandbox, Republican and conservative leaders might want to ask themselves: “Why did we ignore those ‘megaphones’ these last few decades? Why didn’t we recognize the massive power those arenas have to influence and bring change? Why did we stand on the sidelines and do nothing?”


While Republicans, conservatives and people of faith prepped for the culture wars — or least pretended to via massive fundraising campaigns — certain liberal and Democratic-leaning entrepreneurs looked toward the future of business and technology, identified critical gaps and opportunities, and went about creating transformative companies.

Whoops.

No one at the time was stopping conservative and Republican-leaning entrepreneurs from doing the same except … themselves. They may have talked a good game when it came to “capitalism” and the “free market system,” but it was often left-leaning businesspeople who continually beat them to the punch.

Republicans, conservatives and people of faith are not without the means to succeed in these arenas. They simply lack the will.

There is no dearth of money floating around the country today in Republican, conservative and faith-based circles. And yet, so many from those demographics seem much more willing to make millions in profits via those “nasty far left Big Tech sites” than to try to create their own. The same is true for the creation of entertainment sites, media companies and academic institutions.

Conservatives seem all too happy to take the crumbs swept off the table.

The left can — and should — rightfully declare: “You hate us and ours so much? Build your own and get off our backs.”

Will they? Elon Musk and Twitter aside, almost never.

There is very little mystery in all of this. Republicans and conservatives may be loath to admit it, but Democrats, liberals and the far-left not only tell you right up front who they are, what they believe, what they want and how they plan to achieve it, but generally support each other through the always-contentious process.

Whine, slam your baby rattle and kick sand all you want, but the liberals you condemn for censoring and shadow-banning you did in fact create often brilliant companies via thousands of hours of sweat equity while pulling together the financial backing not only to make them a reality but to make them multi-billion-dollar successes.

Didn’t Republicans used to call that achieving the American dream?

The time has long since come for Republican leaders and their plutocrat financial backers to climb out of the sandbox, wipe away their pitiful tears, throw away their baby rattles, take responsibility for their decades of non-action and actually build something of their own for a change.

If not, they really need to put a cork in it.

Douglas MacKinnon, a political and communications consultant, was a writer in the White House for Presidents Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush, and former special assistant for policy and communications at the Pentagon during the last three years of the Bush administration.

Deaths of despair: How income inequality puts Canadian youth at risk

Story by Claire Benny, PhD Candidate, Epidemiology, University of Alberta 

• Sunday, May 28,2023

THE CONVERSATION

Income inequality is the gap between the highest and lowest earners in a given area. It can contribute to people's risk of poor health, and specifically mental health.© (Shutterstock)

Income inequality has been linked to poor physical and mental health in past research, but more recent evidence suggests the issue of income inequality may be much more severe than previously expected.

While completing my PhD in epidemiology at the University of Alberta, I published a study highlighting an association between experiencing income inequality in youth and deaths of despair among young Canadians.

Deaths of despair are deaths attributable to suicide, drug overdose and alcohol-related liver disease. These deaths are on the rise in Canada, and finding points of intervention is key to reducing the burden of this crisis.

In collaboration with my doctoral supervisor, Roman Pabayo, I led a study on a representative sample of Canadian youth and followed them up over a 13-year period to calculate average hazard for deaths of despair. The study sample included 1.5  million Canadians between the ages of 0 and 19 from 2006 to 2018.

Income inequality and health


Areas where income inequality is higher are less likely to have the type of social programs that are key to improving the health of communities.© (Shutterstock)

Income inequality is the gap between the highest and lowest earners in a given area. It can contribute to people’s risk of poor health, and specifically mental health, in a few key ways.

First, in areas with higher income inequality, people are less likely to relate to their neighbours, regardless of whether they earn more or less income than they do. This can lead to social comparisons, which are detrimental for mental health and self esteem.

Secondly, this lack of connection with those around you — also called “social cohesion” — can cause mistrust and ill feelings about others. This in turn can lead people to become withdrawn or isolate themselves. Lack of social cohesion and isolation are both risk factors for poor mental health and substance use.

Finally, areas where income inequality is higher are less likely to have the type of social programs that are key to improving the health of communities. For example, divesting in mental health services and supports can lead to worsened mental health, and removal or lack of harm reduction services and mental health services can put people at a higher risk of deaths of despair.

Income inequality and deaths of despair

Deaths of despair are on the rise in Canada. Specifically, drug overdose death events have increased so rapidly that the drug poisoning crisis has been referred to as an epidemic. This is a major concern, as these deaths have strong impacts on the well-being of communities, families and friends; but also because this crisis doesn’t appear to be ending anytime soon.

The impact the crisis is having on young Canadians is especially important, considering that unfamiliarity with substances, lower tolerance and risk-taking behaviours may leave them at an increased risk for drug overdose. Further, suicide is a leading cause of death among young people in Canada, indicating a critical need to intervene.

The results of this new study also showed that higher levels of income inequality in youth are associated with an increased hazard of death from any cause, deaths of despair and drug overdose in young Canadians.

Urgent need for services

My colleagues and I are continuing this work by investigating income inequality and deaths of despair in other populations by using other indicators of social equity. We are also investigating more harms we suspect are associated with income inequality, such as hospitalizations owing to despair.

This line of work shows the urgent need for increased access to health services such as counselling and harm reduction, particularly in areas of higher income inequality, to reduce the risk of deaths of despair in these spaces.

The study results should be communicated to policymakers, who inform discussions on reducing income inequality and harms due to drug overdose, suicide and alcohol-related liver disease. Programs to mitigate this problem may include cash transfer programs, increases to minimum wage, or universal basic income programs to reduce the gap between the highest and lowest earners.

This article is republished from The Conversation, a nonprofit news site dedicated to sharing ideas from academic experts.

Read more:

Income inequality and COVID-19: We are in the same storm, but not in the same boat

Canada’s fiscal update falls short in facing climate change and income inequality

Claire Benny receives funding from the Women and Children's Health Research Institute (WCHRI).

Minnesota plans rewrite of rules for copper-nickel mining near popular wilderness

AP • Thursday, June 1,2023


ST. PAUL, Minn. (AP) — Minnesota regulators have concluded that state rules governing where copper-nickel mines can be built are insufficient to protect the pristine Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness from noise and light pollution, creating another potential obstacle to the proposed Twin Metals mine in northeastern Minnesota.

But the Department of Natural Resources declined as part of that decision Wednesday to declare a watershed that flows into the Boundary Waters off-limits to copper-nickel mining altogether, which had been a goal of the environmental group that challenged the regulations, Minnesota Public Radio reported.

“We concluded that Minnesota’s nonferrous mine siting rule is largely protective of the Boundary Waters … but should be reopened to better address the potential for mining-related noise and light impacts,” DNR commissioner Sarah Strommen said in a statement.

Twin Metals, a proposed underground mine near Ely, outside the wilderness, was already in trouble. It suffered a major blow last year when President Joe Biden's administration canceled two federal mineral rights leases that were critical to the project, a decision the company is challenging in court. Then the administration moved in January to ban new mining projects upstream from the Boundary Waters in the Ely area for 20 years.

Mining is already banned within the Boundary Waters, a million-acre wilderness of lakes and rivers that attracts visitors from around the world to its 1,200 miles of canoe routes. It's also prohibited in a narrow buffer zone surrounding the wilderness.


To address the potential noise and light impacts of mining, the DNR will write new rules to expand the existing buffer to provide a greater setback from the Boundary Waters. DNR Deputy Commissioner Barb Naramore said the rulemaking would take around 18 to 24 months. The process would help determine how large the buffer zone needs to be and whether it would include the Twin Metals site.

Wednesday's decision stems from a lawsuit filed in 2020 by Northeastern Minnesotans for Wilderness, which argued that the DNR’s 30-year old rule governing where nonferrous (non-iron) mines can be located was insufficient to protect the Boundary Waters because it would allow mines to discharge pollution upstream from the wilderness.

But the DNR said in its decision, filed in Ramsey County District Court, that Minnesota already applies the most protective water quality standards available, and that no mine would be issued a permit if it would have a measurable impact on the waters of the wilderness area.

Ingrid Lyons, executive director of the Campaign to Save the Boundary Waters, said her group is encouraged that the DNR recognized that its existing rules are inadequate but feels the DNR is out of step with scientific research on the risks to water quality.

Twin Metals, owned by the Chilean mining giant Antofagasta, said it’s reviewing the order but added that the state’s rules “establish some of the most rigorous standards in the world."

Both sides have 30 days to challenge the DNR’s decision.

The Associated Press

Mini-satellites by Canadian university students set for ‘exciting’ space mission

Story by Saba Aziz • June 3,2023

The Canadian CubeSat Project provides teams of students in post-secondary institutions with the unique opportunity to design and build their own miniature satellite called a CubeSat.© Credit: Canadian Space Agency

Canadian university students are setting their sights on space exploration, with the launch of miniature cube-shaped satellites that they designed and built over the past five years.

Teams from Concordia University, the University of Manitoba, the University of Saskatchewan, York University and Western University will see their work make its way to the International Space Station on Saturday.

A month later those mini-satellites will be deployed into their final orbit, allowing the students to collect data and imaging from space.

The launch from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida is part of the Canadian CubeSat Project that started in 2018, involving more than 2,000 students across Canada.

Its aim is to boost interest in science, technology, engineering and mathematics while involving students in real space missions.

“(It’s) a very exciting moment for students in Canada who wish and dream of working in the space industry,” said Tony Pellerin, a Canadian Space Agency (CSA) manager and technical lead of the project.

Video: NASA video shows sizes of biggest black holes in space

Each satellite, which is roughly the size of a Rubik’s cube - will carry out a separate mission that will last about one to two years.

The team from Concordia built an imaging satellite that could help analyze the effects of climate change on Earth.

Gabriel Dubé, project manager at Space Concordia and a third-year electrical engineering student, said they will be taking images of the Earth to analyze aerosol particles that can be used to study climate change. A secondary mission will also conduct radiation analysis in its orbit, he told Global News

“One of the big advantages and ... really cool thing about this project is we get a lot of practical experience, which is something that's a bit difficult to get with the normal degree because there are so many theoretical things that we do in classes,” Dubé, 21, said.

York University's satellite will observe snow and ice coverage in northern Canada to paint a better picture of climate change impacts on the region.

Video: Space exploration is in ‘a new era’ thanks to privatization: Canadian astronaut

Meanwhile, students at the University of Manitoba will be looking at space weathering through their satellite, called "IRIS."

Phillip Ferguson, an associate professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at the U of M, said the satellite has several space rocks inside of it and they will monitor how the space weather changes their optical properties, like colors and reflectance.

This will offer important insights into the origins of asteroids and how space conditions affect their composition.

Mitesh Patel, a research associate and mechanical engineering technician at the U of M, helped test IRIS's hardware and software as well as the assembly of the satellite.

As an international student, the 26-year-old said he’s relishing the opportunity to get hands-on space experience.

“I never thought when I came (to Manitoba) from Kenya that I would have something that I made go to space,” Patel told Global News.

Video: Satellite designed by University of Saskatchewan engineering students to be launched into space

A satellite from the University of Saskatchewan will collect radiation data.

Dustin Preece, one of the technical project managers, said the cube satellite project has been a life-changing experience for him and many other students involved.

“Finding out as a student at USask that I could be a part of a project that would send a research satellite to space was an opportunity that fulfilled one of my life’s earliest goals,” he told Global News.

The CubeSat project has already sent seven student-made satellites to space, and after Saturday that number will move up to 12.

A total of 15 Canadian colleges and universities have been selected and awarded grants by the CSA, ranging from $200,000 to $250,000.

-- with files from Brody Langager

Webb Takes Portrait of Star-Studded Barred Galaxy

Story by Isaac Schultz • Yesterday 

NGC 5068, as seen by Webb's MIRI and NIRCam instruments.

© Image: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, J. Lee and the PHANGS-JWST Team

NGC 5068, as seen by Webb’s MIRI and NIRCam instruments.

The Webb Space Telescope is on a tear, imaging regions of star formation across the cosmos. Its latest target? The barred spiral galaxy NGC 5068—a bedazzled conglomeration of gas and stars 17 million light-years from Earth.

Launched in December 2021, Webb has been making scientific observations since July 2022. It’s uniquely capable of seeing some of the oldest, most distant light, which it does at infrared wavelengths. Taking data on this ancient light clues astronomers into the formation and evolution of the universe as we know it.

But besides that ancient light, Webb is examining a bevy of cosmic objects, from distant supernovae to planets in our own solar system. Its perceptive vision can cut through clouds of gas and dust that obscure regions of star formation from more veteran telescopes, like the Hubble Space Telescope.

Bit by bit—image by image—the telescope is providing new data about how the universe works. Some of Webb’s coolest and most remarkable images to date can be seen here.

Enter NGC 5068. Sitting in the constellation Virgo, the barred spiral galaxy is filled with yellower dust and fiery regions of gas in Webb’s view. The image is a close-up, showing the galaxy’s core and part of one of its arms. Stars pepper the image’s foreground.

This image is a composite of images taken with two imagers aboard Webb, the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) and the Mid-Infrared Instrument (MIRI). Combining the powers of the two instruments offers a holistic view of the region. The image by NIRCam emphasizes the foreground stars, while MIRI’s image reveals the larger structure of the galaxy, as well as a couple of asteroid trails (which appear as blue-green-red dots).


The same view of the galaxy as seen by MIRI alone.© Image: ESA/Webb, NASA & CSA, J. Lee and the PHANGS-JWST Team

There’s an extensive thought process behind what filters are applied in Webb imaging, and what aspects of each image to highlight when visible light colors are assigned to the infrared wavelengths the observatory takes in. Last year Gizmodo spoke to Webb’s image processors to learn about how they choose what parts of an image to emphasize, and how.

The NGC 5068 image was collected along with images of 18 other star-forming galaxies, which astronomers are combining with existing data on over 40,000 star clusters, nebulae, and molecular clouds taken by Hubble, the Very Large Telescope, and the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter array.

Taken altogether, these catalogs are deepening astronomers’ knowledge of how stars (and what kinds) take shape in different recesses of space. With Webb’s perceptive gaze, scientists are cutting through the gas and dust that has literally clouded understandings in the past.

Group suing Arkansas says book ban law seeks to ‘criminalize librarians’

Story by Erum Salam in New York •  The Guardian

Yesterday 

Photograph: Katie Adkins/AP

A coalition of publishers, booksellers, librarians and readers filed a lawsuit on Friday against the Arkansas state government, over a book ban law set to go into effect in August.

Related: Illinois set to become first state to end book bans

Carol Coffey, the president of the Arkansas Library Association and lead plaintiff, told the Guardian: “Library workers across Arkansas are rightly concerned that the overly broad edicts of Act 372 will prevent them from serving their patrons as they have always done, by providing a wide variety of materials to fill their information needs, and perhaps more importantly, materials that allow each child to see themselves in the books in their library.”

The plaintiffs argue the new law is illegal because it is a direct attack on free speech guaranteed by the first and 14th amendments to the US constitution.

They call Act 372 a censorship law that seeks to “ban books in libraries and criminalize librarians”.

Related video: Illinois bill will cut off public funding to libraries that ban books 

(Straight Arrow News)  Duration 1:56  View on Watch

Coffey said: “The primary mission of the Arkansas Library Association is to support libraries and library workers and to defend intellectual freedom. We join in this lawsuit because it is the best way for us to fulfill our mission.”

Act 372 was signed on 31 March by Sarah Huckabee Sanders, once White House press secretary under Donald Trump and now Arkansas’s Republican governor.

The law will subject librarians to criminal charges if they are found to have furnished any item deemed “harmful to minors”.

Democracy Forward, a non-profit legal advocacy group, is leading the legal action on behalf of the coalition which also includes the Central Arkansas Library System.

In the filed complaint, the legislation is described as a “vague, sweeping law that restrains public libraries and booksellers”.

Proponents of the new law say it will protect children from “indoctrination” and shield them from issues surrounding the teaching of race and racism in US history, sexual orientation and gender identity.

The Arkansas law is one of several in Republican-led states. Other lawsuits against such laws have been filed across the US.

Last month, the writers’ organization PEN America and the publishing company Penguin Random House filed suit against a Florida school district, for implementing book bans.

On Friday, Coffey told the Guardian: “My hope is that all residents of Arkansas and the US will be able to read freely, that all parents will be able to make the choices they believe best for their families and that those choices will not be limited by the desires of a few outspoken people who believe they know best for everyone.”

ALL IS VANITY

It’s Time To Enforce Rules Against Cancer-Causing Tanning Beds

Story by Refinery29 Staff • Tuesday, May 30, 2023

Welcome to Sun Blocked, Refinery29’s global call-to-action to wake up to the serious dangers of tanning. No lectures or shaming, we promise. Instead, our goal is to arm you with the facts you need to protect your skin to the best of your ability, because there’s no such thing as safe sun.

Let’s state the obvious: Using a tanning bed is life-threatening. The reality is that just one tanning bed session before age 35 can increase your chances of developing melanoma by 75%. And yet we continue to tan. According to the American Academy of Dermatology Association, 40% of 18 to 25 year olds are unaware of the risks of tanning (including premature aging and an increased chance of developing melanoma skin cancer). In fact, 20% say that getting a tan is more important than preventing skin cancer. It’s clear that we have a serious public health problem on our hands — and it’s time to do something about it.

That’s why Refinery29 is partnering with the Skin Cancer Foundation to call on the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to finalize rules first proposed in 2015 that would prohibit minors from using tanning beds and require an acknowledgement of the associated risks from adult users, among other changes, as soon as possible. Enforcing such rules could save lives and reduce the number of melanoma skin cancer cases across the country, especially among younger people whose risk for harm increases with tanning bed use during adolescence.

This action is not impossible. Currently, 44 states and the District of Columbia ban or regulate indoor tanning devices for those who are age 18 and under, joining countries like Brazil and Australia, which have done so, too. Now, we need enforceable measures that will protect us nationally. Enacting these rules would be an important step forward in the fight against skin cancer.

We hope that you’ll join us in voicing your support of banning tanning bed use for minors in the US by signing this letter to the FDA. Remember, no tan is ever worth the risk.

Inuit, environmental groups praise cruises for agreeing to avoid Eclipse Sound

Story by The Canadian Press • June 3, 2023

Inuit, environmental groups praise cruises for agreeing to avoid Eclipse Sound© Provided by The Canadian Press

POND INLET, Nunavut — A marine conservation charity and Inuit hunters are praising cruise operators for agreeing to avoid a Nunavut waterway where thousands of narwhal migrate each summer.

The Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators recently said its members' ships would not travel through Eclipse Sound this summer and instead go through the Pond Inlet strait.

Oceans North and the Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Organization had requested the move as numbers of summering narwhal in the area off the northeastern coast of Baffin Island have decreased, which they say is due to increased shipping traffic.

“Narwhal continue to decline in our area and have not bounced back to historical numbers as we had hoped," David Qamaniq, chair of the hunters and trappers organization, said in a news release. "We thank the cruise ship operators for working with us this year to protect the animals that remain."

Aerial surveys have shown a drop in the number of narwhal migrating to Eclipse Sound from Baffin Bay. Surveys conducted for Baffinland Iron Mines Corp, which operates the Mary River Mine, estimate numbers decreased from 5,019 in 2020, to 2,595 in 2021. The company said, however, its 2022 estimate shows an increase to 4,592.

Fisheries and Oceans Canada estimated there were more than 12,000 narwhal in Eclipse Sound in 2016 and more than 20,000 in 2004.

"This area historically is some of the most important narwhal habitat anywhere in the world," said Chris Debicki, Ocean North's vice president of policy development, noting Milne Inlet, a small arm of Eclipse Sound, is a critical calving area.

"Displacing narwhal from that area not only moves narwhal out of their preferred habitat, but also potentially makes it much harder for harvesters to participate in narwhal hunts."

Hunters from Mittimatalik, or Pond Inlet, rely on narwhal for food, livelihoods and culture.

While cruise ships avoiding Eclipse Sound will make a difference, Debicki said, they make up just a fraction of ship traffic. The Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators said its ships accounted for 14 per cent of those travelling through the area last year with 15 ships making 26 trips. It said 14 of its members have planned 32 stops in Pond Inlet this summer.

Oceans North said the majority of ships are travelling to and from the Mary River Mine, with 44 vessels making 76 trips in Eclipse Sound and adjacent fiords in 2022, or around 40 per cent of all ship traffic.

A report from working groups from the North Atlantic Marine Mammal Commission and Canada/Greenland Joint Commission on Beluga and Narwhal published earlier this year concluded increased shipping traffic is "by far the most likely cause" of declining narwhal numbers in Eclipse Sound, particularly from the iron ore mine.

Baffinland has criticized the report and said factors other than shipping may have led to the decrease. It said that includes changing ice conditions and predator-prey dynamics, which the report disputes.

Baffinland spokesperson Peter Akman said the company welcomes the decision by the cruise operators association and "any measures that protect marine life and balance the needs of the local community as a whole."

He noted Baffinland has several voluntary mitigation measures including the use of convoys, avoiding restricted areas, using a fixed shipping route and capping vessel speeds at nine knots. Akman added the company employs six full-time and four part-time Inuit shipping monitors in Pond Inlet.

Last summer the company raised concerns about cruise ships travelling too fast in the area. Akman said it has continued to reach out to Oceans North, the Association of Arctic Expedition and Cruise Operators and cruise ships approved to travel through the community this summer to support its marine mitigation measures.

Baffinland, which began operations in 2015, has a request with the Nunavut Impact Review Board to increase the amount of ore its allowed to ship from the mine to six million tonnes from 4.2 million tonnes, as it has been permitted annually since 2018, using up to 84 ore carriers. It is additionally asking to ship ore that was stranded at the Milne port last year, as well as any that could be left behind at the end of this year's shipping season.

Oceans North and the Mittimatalik Hunters and Trappers Organization have called on the federal government to issue an interim order under the Canada Shipping Act to close the Eclipse Sound and adjacent fiord system this summer to all non-essential vessels and enforce a speed limit of nine knots. They said Transport Canada should also work with Baffinland to reduce shipping through Eclipse Sound and Milne Inlet.

"We believe these to be the minimum steps needed toward reducing the risk of extirpation of the Eclipse Sound narwhal population," a March letter from the organizations states.

Transport Canada did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published June 3, 2023.

— By Emily Blake in Yellowknife

This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Meta and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

The Canadian Press

Ethnic cleansing continues in Tigray, despite truce: Report

Yesterday 

Ethnic cleansing campaigns have continued in Ethiopia's Tigray region, despite a November 2022 peace agreement, according to a new report by Human Rights Watch.

"The November truce in northern Ethiopia has not brought about an end to the ethnic cleansing of Tigrayans in Western Tigray Zone," Laetitia Bader, deputy Africa director for Human Rights Watch, said in a statement. "If the Ethiopian government is really serious about ensuring justice for abuses, then it should stop opposing independent investigations into the atrocities in Western Tigray and hold abusive officials and commanders to account."MORE: Ethiopians abroad celebrate Christmas with hope and angst after November cease-fire in Tigray

The new report highlights that Tigrayans have suffered forced expulsions and deportations, torture, death and life-threatening treatment that "may amount to the crime against humanity of extermination" on the basis of their identity.

The Ethiopian military entered Tigray, a semi-autonomous region in the northern part of the country, on Nov. 4, 2020, in response to claims the Tigray People's Liberation Front attacked a military base in the region, according to the country's prime minister.


Internally Displaced People (IDP), fleeing from violence in the Metekel zone in Western Ethiopia, collect water from taps in a camp in Chagni, Ethiopia, Jan. 28, 2021

.© Eduardo Soteras/AFP via Getty Images

The war in Tigray is estimated to have claimed the lives of up to 600,000 civilians between November 2020 and August 2022, according to researchers from Belgium's Ghent University. Han Nyssen, senior professor of geography at Ghent University, told ABC News in January that the true scale of death in Ethiopia's Tigray region remains hard to ascertain.

"We [still] have almost no view of what happens in Western Tigray," he said.MORE: After ending Ethiopia's trade status, US weighs sanctions, genocide designation over Tigray war

Human Rights Watch conducted dozens of interviews with witnesses, victims and humanitarian aid staff in gathering information about the bleak conditions for Tigrayans.

"The [militias] came into my home and said I need to leave because it's not our land," a woman from the town of Adebai who was forced to flee toward Sudan told Human Rights Watch on the condition of anonymity. "They would knock at midnight and say Tigrayans can't come back."



Displaced people from Western Tigray stand at the door of a classroom in the school where they are sheltering in Tigray's capital Mekele on February 24, 2021

.© Eduardo Soteras/AFP via Getty Images

More than a thousand Tigrayans have been arbitrarily detained from September 2022 to April 2021, in the Western Tigrayan towns of Humera, Rawyan and Adebai, according to the report. One interviewee who was held at Bet Hintset prison told Human Rights Watch that detainees endured poor treatment, with many dying due to lack of food and medication.

The African Union, which convened the peace talks alongside members of the high-level, AU-led Ethiopian Peace Process panel, reached a "cessation of hostilities agreement" on Nov. 2, 2022. It said at the time it marked an "important step in efforts to silence the guns."



People organize piles of items during an items distribution by an international non-governmental organization for Internally Displaced People (IDP) fleeing from violence in the Metekel zone in Western Ethiopia, in Chagni, Ethiopia, Jan. 28, 2021.© Eduardo Soteras/AFP via Getty Images

Many of the displaced -- which the U.N. registered as 47,000 in eastern Sudan as of October 2022 -- told Human Rights Watch that they felt unsafe returning home due to intimidation from abusive officials and security forces that remain in the region.

The Human Rights Watch has called on the Ethiopian government to "suspend, investigate and appropriately prosecute" commanders and officials who are implicated in the abuse of human rights in Western Tigray.

"If the Ethiopian government is really serious about ensuring justice for abuses, then it should stop opposing independent investigations into the atrocities in Western Tigray and hold abusive officials and commanders to account," Bader said.