The potential of green infrastructure in mitigating flood impacts: Focused on the mobility of low income and minority comunities

PORTLAND STATE UNIVERSITY

Research News

 

IMAGE: COURTNEY CROSSON AND UA ARCHITECTURE STUDENTS FACILITATE A MAPPING ACTIVITY TO IDENTIFY CURRENT FLOODING CHALLENGES AT A NEIGHBORHOOD MEETING. view more 

CREDIT: PHOTO BY EUGENE LEE

Short-term flooding from extreme storm events poses a serious transportation challenge in U.S. cities. This problem--which is anticipated to grow over the next century with our global climate crisis--is often hardest on vulnerable populations, including low-income and minority neighborhoods. The latest report from the National Institute for Transportation and Communities (NITC), led by Courtney Crosson of University of Arizona (UA), advances national research methods for assessing flood vulnerability and prioritizing transportation improvement investments to ensure that no community is left stranded when the next flood occurs.

Crosson and fellow researchers Daoqin Tong (Arizona State University) and Yinan Zhang (UA) conducted a flood vulnerability assessment of the City of Tucson, Arizona's multi-modal transportation system in low-income and minority neighborhoods. They identified priority locations for Tucson to invest in improvements to mitigate urban transportation system flooding, and are now working with city and regional agencies to implement those findings. This project also serves as a proof of concept to advance national research methods aimed at reducing the mobility impacts of chronic flooding.

Download the final report: https://ppms.trec.pdx.edu/media/project_files/NITC-SS-1262_Urban_Transportation_System_Flood_Vulnerability_Assessment_FZOGs2O.pdf

EFFECTIVE USE OF GREEN INFRASTRUCTURE IN LOW-INCOME NEIGHBORHOODS

Green infrastructure is a growing urban trend where stormwater is managed by expanding permeable areas of natural vegetation throughout a city. This approach to water management is intended to protect, restore, or mimic the natural water cycle. Crosson's research team found that building comprehensive neighborhood-scale green infrastructure in the right-of-way is effective at increasing multi-modal access in moderate flooding conditions.

This green infrastructure solution did not address the mobility issues that result from extreme flooding. Rather than municipalities selecting areas that have the highest volumes of flooding or the highest volume of resident complaints, funds for green infrastructure should be invested in low-income neighborhoods subject to moderate flooding in order to achieve the greatest improvement of multimodal access.

Of the areas studied, 93% were part of census tracts with median household incomes below the Tucson average. Researchers intentionally focused on low-income neighborhoods, since too often people living in those areas are hardest hit by the impacts of natural disasters. Previous research in this area has focused heavily on the vulnerability of the transportation infrastructure alone, largely ignoring the people in the communities. A NITC project funded in 2020 will develop a new methodology that incorporates community socioeconomic vulnerability in the evaluation of transportation infrastructure vulnerabilities for cities and regions facing hazards.

RESEARCH METHOD FOR ASSESSING FLOOD VULNERABILITY IN TRANSPORTATION INFRASTRUCTURE

Stage One - Estimate Flood Conditions in Low-Income Neighborhoods: Researchers estimated flood conditions for a 5-year, 1-hour storm event (meaning a flood from a rainstorm lasting one hour, of a size that occurs roughly every five years) using FLO-2D flood modeling software and a digital elevation model constructed using LiDAR data. This hydrological analysis was performed both at the city-scale and at a 20-foot grid resolution.

Stage Two - Identify Multimodal Transportation Priorities: The team then analyzed neighborhood transportation vulnerability. Using the results from their flood model, they looked at overall transportation system performance across three modes (driving, bicycling and transit). Data from the most recent 10 years of vehicular counts, bicycle counts, and bus stop ridership were used to identify the top ten priority locations for flood mitigation, based where usage was highest for each of the three modes.

Stage Three - Perform Green Infrastructure Scenario Analyses: Lastly, they took those top ten sites for each of the three modes of transportation and performed thirty green infrastructure scenario analyses. They wanted to see the change in transportation network accessibility after the same flood conditions, but with comprehensive neighborhood-scale green infrastructure in place. To do this, they used ArcGIS Hydrology Analysis to find the "pour points," or places where water flows out of the area. Then they altered their model to include roadside basins (following design standards from NACTO and Pima County) to control this flow.

Based on these model results, researchers identified five key green infrastructure design performance priorities.

FIVE KEY DESIGN PRIORITIES FOR GREEN INFRASTRUCTURE TO MAXIMIZE MULTIMODAL ACCESSIBILITY

These five principles can be used by transportation planners and engineers, hydrologists, flood managers, and urban designers when approaching and evaluating project sites and investments to maximize the impact on increased multimodal accessibility.

Prioritize Upstream Mitigation - Across the thirty scenarios, the priority segments with the greatest improved transportation access were in areas that had substantial upstream mitigation. This suggests that green infrastructure should not only be implemented directly adjacent to priority transit locations, but also (and sometimes more importantly) implemented upstream of the priority segment.

Prioritize Moderate Flooding - Across the thirty scenarios, the greatest impacts on improved transportation access were in areas that received moderate flooding, in comparison to areas of extreme flooding. Often municipalities and transportation agencies are motivated to place green infrastructure installations in rights-of-way adjacent to areas where there are the greatest flooding concerns and highest volume of resident complaints. But to help with extreme flooding, larger implementations (such as underground stormwater piping or large basins) would need to be implemented in concert with smaller investments. When budget is limited to neighborhood-scale investments, in order to visibly show an impact on reducing flooding and increasing accessibility to the multimodal network, moderately flooded sites are the best candidates.

Prioritize Network Gains - When selecting project sites, it is critical to consider the network gains that can be accomplished by concentrating the green infrastructure within an area. By addressing the flooding issue in one street or sidewalk segment, other downstream flooding concerns may be helped as well.

Prioritize Large Right-of-Way Areas - Across the thirty sites and segments, the largest impacts often occurred when there was a substantial amount of right-of-way available for implementation of green infrastructure. Taken into consideration with the other design principles, the area (and corresponding volume) of the available right-of-way can make a large difference in total flood reduction success.

Prioritize Pedestrian Travel Locations - The greatest impacts of green infrastructure on accessibility were in pedestrian access to bus stops. The width of these designated areas to mitigate were smaller in the pedestrian cases compared to bicycle and vehicle cases. Acting as a buffer between road and pedestrian walking areas, the green infrastructure most successfully supported greater access.

IMPLICATIONS FOR FUTURE RESEARCH AND PRACTICE

The research expects direct outcomes on future planning decisions made by the City of Tucson Department of Transportation, Tucson Water, Planning & Development Services, and Pima County Regional Flood Control District (RFCD). The NITC researchers on this project have met with the Director of Tucson Department of Transportation and RFCD, and the leadership of both agencies have expressed great interest in the research findings for upcoming decision-making around the allocation of green infrastructure funds for roadway flooding mitigation.

This research can serve as a proof of concept for a larger, long-term project to advance national research methods to reduce the impact of chronic flooding on the multi-modal transportation network. Future research should assess impact across time durations (rather than simple peak event calculations) and work to optimize green infrastructure implementation across multiple benefits for multiple modes of transportation (rather than individual modes).

By systematically prioritizing these projects in the right-of-way, cities can move toward increased transportation network accessibility and expanded equity.

This research was funded by the National Institute for Transportation and Communities, with additional support from Pima County Flood Control and Tucson Water.

The National Institute for Transportation and Communities (NITC) is one of seven U.S. Department of Transportation national university transportation centers. NITC is a program of the Transportation Research and Education Center (TREC) at Portland State University. This PSU-led research partnership also includes the Oregon Institute of Technology, University of Arizona, University of Oregon, University of Texas at Arlington and University of Utah. We pursue our theme -- improving mobility of people and goods to build strong communities -- through research, education and technology transfer.

###

 

Do big tadpoles turn into big frogs? It's complicated, study finds

According to the first research study addressing evolutionary rates of larval and adult life stages at a large scale, the two life stages do not evolve completely independently of each other, as was previously thought.

UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA

Research News

 

IMAGE: AN ADULT FEMALE REED FROG FROM CAMEROON. IN THIS AFRICAN FAMILY, ADULT AND TADPOLE BODY SIZES ARE CLOSELY RELATED AMONG SPECIES, SO THAT SPECIES WITH LARGER ADULTS HAVE LARGER TADPOLES... view more 

CREDIT: JOHN J. WIENS/UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA

If you have any children in your life, imagine for a moment that they don't look anything like their parents, they don't eat anything humans normally eat, and they're active only while adults sleep.

While that might sound like an idea from a work of surreal fiction, it's actually the norm rather than the exception in the animal kingdom. Most animals go through what biologists call a complex life cycle, starting as larvae that often have little, if anything, in common with their parents.

To become adults, they have to go through a process known as metamorphosis, which is one of nature's most remarkable feats. During this process, the larval bodies of many animal species undergo dramatic changes that turn them into adults that have little, if any resemblance with their juvenile stage. Butterflies may be the most familiar example of this. Yet, despite complex lifecycles being widespread, surprisingly little is known about how they evolve, specifically the extent to which evolution in one life stage impacts the others.

To better understand the evolutionary consequences of a complex life cycle across a large group of related species, University of Arizona biologists studied another familiar example: frogs and their tadpoles.

Tung Phung, Joao C. S. Nascimento and John J. Wiens of the UArizona Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology took a closer look at the evolution of body size across 542 frog species belonging to 42 families, most of which have a tadpole stage. The study, which was co-authored by Alexander Novarro of The Nature Conservancy, is published in the scientific journal Proceedings of the Royal Society B.

"We wanted to know, do large frogs have large tadpoles and small frogs small tadpoles, or are the sizes between the two decoupled?'" Wiens said, alluding to a prevailing hypothesis in evolutionary biology that states that larvae and adults should evolve rather independently, especially in species in which the two life stages have very different lifestyles.

If larval and adult stages evolve completely independently of each other, there should be little correlation between larval size and adult size among species. In other words, big frogs could have little tadpoles, and big tadpoles could become small frogs, with no relationship between the size of frogs and tadpoles.

The team scoured the scientific literature for data on the sizes of tadpoles and adult frogs for each species, assembled an evolutionary tree among the species, and applied statistical analytical tools.

The team discovered that while there is a striking amount of variability among frog families, the association is not completely random. Across frogs as a group, larval and adult body sizes are significantly and positively related.

"It's not just 'anything goes,'" Wiens said. "We included almost every family of frogs that has a tadpole stage, and we did find there is constraint. In some cases, it's really strong; adult size strongly predicts larval size in many of the families we looked at."

An adult sabinal frog from Mexico, with its tadpoles.

In other families included in the study, the researchers found the relationship to be much more variable. For example, in the spadefoot toad (Scaphiopodidae) family, species with large adults have small tadpoles and species with small adults have large tadpoles.

There was also variation in the relative size of adults and tadpoles among families. For example, the paradox frog, Pseudis paradoxa, is a species with normal-sized adults that develop from giant tadpoles that are three to four times bigger than the adult. On the other end of the spectrum are some giant South American toads, whose tadpoles are about a tenth the size of the adult.

"Overall, the size of tadpoles relative to adults changes widely across frogs, but why, we don't know," Wiens said.

The tiny, thumbnail-sized tadpoles of the cane toad grow into adults that are among the largest amphibians, requiring both hands to pick one up, according to John Wiens, who took this photo in Costa Rica.

The authors also compared the rates of evolution in body sizes between tadpoles and adults. These were found to be clearly decoupled. For example, in glass frogs, the tadpole stage runs a broad gamut of sizes, indicating it has been evolving very quickly, while the adults vary much less in size. Other groups, such as the true toads, have fast evolutionary rates in both stages, while yet others, such as the African bullfrogs, show the opposite pattern, with adults evolving fast and tadpoles changing slowly.

Once tadpoles, which are confined to water, morph into frogs that spend most of their time hopping around on land, their bodies undergo an extreme makeover: The tissues that make up their powerful tail, used to propel them underwater, are recycled into other tissues; appendages begin sprouting beginning with the legs, then the arms, and they lose their feeding apparatus. This feeding system usually consists of a big beak, bordered by five or more rows of tiny teeth, which themselves are surrounded by a ring of short, fleshy tentacles. Inside, a filter system uses streams of slime to extract food from the water. Some tadpoles seem to use the teeth and beak to scrape algae off of rocks. Others suck up decaying organic matter from the bottoms of their freshwater habitats. But some tadpoles are carnivorous and may even be cannibalistic.

"Their feeding mechanism is so weird that people still don't know exactly how it works or even what most tadpoles eat," Wiens said. "In adult frogs, the mouthparts are completely different, so they have to take this whole system down and rebuild during metamorphosis."

While the huge variability in tadpole size relative to adults makes frogs especially interesting to Wiens and his research team, he said another reason for choosing frogs for this study was their status as endangered animals that are highly beneficial to the natural environment.

Of the more than 7,200 frog species that have been described, most live in the tropics, and many have been disappearing at an alarming rate, Wiens said. This is worrisome as they play critical roles in ecosystems across the globe - for example, acting as a natural pest control.

"Many of them eat insects that destroy crops, so they are really useful that way," he said.

While the current study is limited to amphibians, it does open up questions for other groups of animals, said the paper's first author, Tung Phung, a first-year doctoral student in Wiens' lab who did most of the work while still an undergraduate.

"Our study is the first to address evolutionary rates of larval and adult life stages at a large scale," he said.

###

Quality over quantity in recovering language after stroke

New Edith Cowan University (ECU) research has found that intensive therapy is not necessarily best when it comes to treating the loss of language and communication in early recovery after a stroke

EDITH COWAN UNIVERSITY

Research News 

IMAGE: ECU RESEARCHERS HAVE FOUND THAT INTENSIVE THERAPY IS NOT NECESSARILY BEST FOR TREATING THE LOSS OF LANGUAGE AFTER STROKE. view more 

CREDIT: EDITH COWAN UNIVERSITY

New Edith Cowan University (ECU) research has found that intensive therapy is not necessarily best when it comes to treating the loss of language and communication in early recovery after a stroke.

Published today in the International Journal of Stroke, the research found that unlike physical and motor skill rehabilitation, recovering lost language caused by a condition known as aphasia after stroke is a marathon, not a sprint. It also showed that early intervention is crucial.

Lead author, Associate Professor Erin Godecke from ECU's School of Medical and Health Sciences, said the findings have important implications for the treatment of aphasia because they mean service delivery options are likely to change.

"Previously people with aphasia got the majority of their therapy in the first 6-8 weeks after stroke," Professor Godecke said.

"Our research shows that there is no benefit to this. It is likely that the same therapy could be spread over a longer period to enhance recovery, rather than getting a burst at the start and very little over the next months or years," she said.

Aphasia is a neurological disorder affecting spoken language, comprehension, reading and writing. It affects one third of around 17 million people worldwide who experience stroke each year and is treated with speech therapy.

Early care is vital, but not intensity

Professor Godecke said aphasia therapy and early intervention are vitally important for recovery outcomes after stroke. However, increasing the intensity of the treatment doesn't equate to better results.

"We found that when we provided early aphasia therapy people had a massive increase in their ability to communicate at 12 and 26 weeks after their stroke. They could talk better and had less difficulty finding and using the right words.

"Importantly though, we also found that if we provided around 10 hours of therapy per week versus nearly 23 hours a week the results weren't any different. We didn't see any harm, but we didn't see any benefit," Professor Godecke said.

Language recovery is different to motor recovery

Professor Godecke said the way people recover motor skills after a stroke is different to how they regain language.

"We tend to believe that more intensive is always better. However, we're beginning to see data emerge to show us that language recovery might behave a little differently to motor recovery functions such as walking, moving your arm or sitting up," she said.

"We don't need quite as intensive a regimen for language as we do for walking recovery. We might need the same amount of treatment, just spread over a longer period."

Professor Godecke said the difficulty level, or intensity, of the aphasia therapy needs to be tailored to what the person can tolerate.

"Because language is a higher order function and it involves more thinking time and cognitive skill, having breaks between sessions may help consolidate learning," Professor Godecke said.

"It's akin to running on a treadmill - you can only run on the treadmill if you can walk.

"There's no benefit having someone run at full speed when you can have them run at a moderate pace, get the learning they need, retain it for longer and build on it," she said.

VERSE study a world first

The Very Early Rehabilitation for Speech (VERSE) study at ECU is the first international aphasia trial. The study aimed to determine whether intensive aphasia therapy, beginning within 14 days after stroke, improved communication recovery compared to usual care.

Researchers recruited 246 participants with aphasia after stroke from 17 acute-care hospitals across Australia and New Zealand. Participants either received the usual level of aphasia therapy, or one of two higher intensity regimens.

The ECU study found early intensive aphasia therapy did not improve communication recovery within 12 weeks post stroke compared to usual care.

###

The study 'A Randomised Control Trial of intensive aphasia therapy after acute stroke: The Very Early Rehabilitation for SpEech (VERSE) study' will be published in The International Journal of Stroke.

I HAD A STROKE TWO WEEKS AGO

I DID NOT SUFFER 

PERMANENT SPEECH APHASIA 

HOWEVER I HAVE PHYSICAL THERAPY

FOR MY HAND AND WALKING

People who don't believe in God may get better sleep, study says

Atheists and agnostics are much more likely to sleep like an angel than Catholics and Baptists, a new study finds.

It included more than 1,500 participants in the Baylor University Religion Survey who were asked about their religious affiliation, behaviors and beliefs, as well as their average nightly sleep time and difficulty getting to sleep.

While 73% of atheists and agnostics said they got seven or more hours of nightly sleep, only 63% of Catholics and only 55% of Baptists said they got at least seven hours of sleep a night, preliminary data show.

Seven or more hours of sleep a night is recommended by the American Academy of Sleep Medicine, or AASM, for good health.

RELATED Report: Humanists and non-religious people face discrimination in 8 countries

Catholics and Baptists were also more likely to report having difficulty falling asleep than atheists and agnostics.

Study participants who said they slept seven or more hours per night were much more likely to believe that they would get into heaven, compared to those who got less sleep.

However, beliefs about getting into heaven weren't linked with difficulty falling asleep at night.

RELATED Finding purpose in life can improve health, study says

The researchers said that better sleep results in a more optimistic outlook and that in this study, that manifested as people believing they'd get into heaven.

"Mental health is increasingly discussed in church settings -- as it should be -- but sleep health is not discussed," said study author Kyla Fergason, a student at Baylor University in Waco, Texas.

"Yet we know that sleep loss undercuts many human abilities that are considered to be core values of the church: being a positive member of a social community, expressing love and compassion rather than anger or judgment, and displaying integrity in moral reasoning and behavior," Fergason said in AASM news release.

RELATED More Americans choosing no religion, may lack community connection

"Could getting better sleep help some people grow in their faith or become better Christians? We don't know the answer to that question yet, but we do know that mental, physical and cognitive health are intertwined with sleep health in the general population," she noted.

The findings were recently published in an online supplement of the journal Sleep, and were presented last week at the virtual annual meeting of the Associated Professional Sleep Societies.

More information

RELATED WWII: No atheists in foxholes, or even 50 years later

The National Sleep Foundation has more on sleep.

Copyright 2020 HealthDay. All rights reserved.

upi.com/7035781

New bio-containment unit protects health workers from COVID-19

A new individual bio-containment unit can protect healthcare workers lacking PPE from COVID-19 infection, a new study has found. Photo courtesy of the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center

Sept. 3 (UPI) -- A new individual bio-containment unit designed to protect healthcare workers from COVID-19 blocks 99.99% of the airborne respiratory droplets that spread the virus, a study published Thursday by the journal Annals of Emergency Medicine found.

The unit is intended for use at facilities with coronavirus patients, particularly those in which personal protective equipment, or PPE, is in short supply, according to the researchers from the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center and the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command's Army Research Laboratory, who developed it.

It's designed to protect staff member as they intubate patients who require mechanical ventilation support to breathe, the researchers said.

Intubation involves inserting a breathing tube down a patient's throat, and places doctors and nurses at risk for infection as viral particles are released into the air during the process, they said.

RELATED CDC: Nearly 30% of health workers with COVID-19 didn't know they had it

"The ability to isolate COVID-19 patients at the bedside is key to stopping viral spread in medical facilities and onboard military ships and aircraft," Cameron Good, a research scientist at the Army Research Laboratory, said in a statement.

Earlier attempts to minimize exposure to healthcare workers involved placing a plexiglass intubation box over a patient's head and shoulders, according to Good and his colleagues.

RELATED PPE shortages, little guidance plague home health workers during pandemic

However, the device wasn't able to keep aerosol droplets from leaking out and exposing caregivers to the virus, they said.

Because of concerns about the potential of airborne viruses to leak from the plexiglass boxes, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration recently revoked its Emergency Use Authorization for these enclosures.

The individual bio-containment unit is designed to suck contaminated air out of the box with a vacuum and trap infectious particles in a filter before they seep into the room.

RELATED Study: COVID-19 risk 3 times higher for front-line health workers

For this study, researchers used a simulated patient -- a mannequin placed inside the unit -- and piped in an oil-based aerosol, which formed tiny droplets in the air, similar in size to the virus particles in breath that spread COVID-19, the researchers said.

The unit trapped more than 99.99% of the simulated virus-sized particles and prevented them from escaping into the environment, they said.

In contrast, outside of the passive intubation box, maximum aerosol concentrations were observed to be more than three times higher than inside the box, the simulation showed.

In addition to protecting providers during intubation, the unit also can provide negative pressure isolation of awake COVID-19 patients, supplying an alternative to scarce negative pressure hospital isolation rooms, as well as helping isolate patients on military vessels, the researchers said.

"Having a form of protection that doesn't work is more dangerous than not having anything, because it could create a false sense of security," said co-author David Turer, a plastic surgeon who recently completed his residency at the University of Pittsburgh and now is at the University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center.

Turer and colleagues submitted an emergency use authorization application for the individual bio-containment unit to the FDA several months ago, and they are preparing to manufacture the devices for distribution.

If the agency grants the authorization, hospitals and military units will be able to use the device to protect healthcare workers caring for COVID-19 patients.

"It intentionally incorporates parts from outside the medical world," Turer said. "So, unlike other forms of PPE, demand is unlikely to outstrip supply during COVID-19 surge periods."

Study: Mexico, U.S. have had most health workers die of COVID-19

Registered nurse Wendy Gould inspects N95 masks at Saint Louis University Hospital in St. Louis, Mo., on April 23. Amnesty's report Thursday said about 1,100 front-line health workers in the United States have died from COVID-19. File Photo by Bill Greenblatt/UPI | License Photo

Sept. 3 (UPI) -- More front-line workers have died of COVID-19 in Mexico and the United States than any other nations, according to a report by Amnesty International Thursday.

Amnesty's report said at least 7,000 health workers worldwide have died so far, with Mexico and the United States combining to account for nearly one-third of that total. The report cites about 1,300 front-line worker deaths in Mexico and 1,100 in the United States.
The nations with the next-highest tolls are Britain (649), Brazil (634), Russia (631) and India (573).

"For over seven thousand people to die while trying to save others is a crisis on a staggering scale," Amnesty International Head of Economic and Social Justice Steve Cockburn said in a statement. "Every health worker has the right to be safe at work, and it is a scandal that so many are paying the ultimate price."

Cockburn called for "global cooperation to ensure all health workers are provided with adequate protective equipment, so they can continue their vital work without risking their own lives."

The human rights organization said many of the deaths in Mexico were among hospital cleaners, who are especially vulnerable to infection due to a lack of protective gear.

The Mexican government has insisted for months that hospital workers have enough protective equipment, but medics have staged several protests in Mexico City to display what they called substandard gear.

Officials at the Pan American Health Organization said this week health workers have so far accounted for one in every seven COVID-19 cases in the United States and Mexico.

"We have the highest number of healthcare workers infected in the world," organization Director Carissa Etienne said. "Our data shows that nearly 570,000 health workers across our region have fallen ill and more than 2,500 have succumbed to the virus."

Etienne said scarce supplies of protective equipment early in the pandemic and slow implementation of triage protocols later contributed to the high infection rate among front-line workers, as hospitals became overcrowded and exposed them to the virus.

RELATED Study: COVID-19 risk 3 times higher for front-line health workers

Korean doctors call off strike, reach agreement with government

Health Minister Park Neung-hoo (R) and Choi Dae-zip, head of the Korean Medical Association, shake hands after signing an agreement Friday to end a nationwide strike by trainee doctors. Photo by Yonhap


SEOUL, Sept. 4 (UPI) -- Thousands of striking South Korean doctors are ready to return to work as the Korean Medical Association and the ruling Democratic Party came to an agreement Friday that put a halt to the government's medical reform plans.

South Korean interns and residents have been on strike since Aug. 21 in response to governments plans introduced in July that would have increased medical school admission quotas by 4,000 over the next decade.

CRAFT UNIONISM

The five-point agreement signed Friday morning by the KMA and DP said discussions would start from scratch after the COVID-19 pandemic subsides, with special commissions to be formed that include doctors, politicians and health officials.

Later in the day, KMA President Choi Dae-zip signed another agreement with Health Minister Park Neung-hoo to end the strike and call on trainee doctors to return to work.

RELATED Seoul lawmaker backtracks suggestion doctors be sent to North Korea

South Korean President Moon Jae-in reacted with relief on Friday, saying the agreement would "greatly reduce the public's anxiety" over the strike during the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.

"I now look forward to the government and the medical community working together to overcome the severe situation of the coronavirus," he said in remarks relayed by presidential spokesman Kang Min-seok.

South Korea has been battling a surge in COVID-19 cases since mid-August linked to outbreaks at a conservative Presbyterian church and a large anti-government rally held in Seoul.

RELATED South Korea president threatens action against doctors on strike

The country has seen triple-digit daily infection numbers for the past three weeks, with widespread clusters and untraceable cases alarming health officials.

On Friday, South Korea reported 198 COVID-19 cases, continuing a slowing trend in new infections over recent days. Health officials decided to extend heightened social distancing rules for another week in the Seoul area, restricting restaurant operating hours and requiring chain coffee outlets to offer take-out service only.

Moon said he hoped the agreement between doctors and the government would "be the foundation for a better future."

"I hope this will be an opportunity to advance our healthcare system to the next level," he said.

The government has argued that reforms are necessary to prepare for future public health emergencies such as another pandemic, as well as to help rectify a regional imbalance between medical care available in Seoul and the rest of the country.

In addition to adding new doctors, the government had planned to establish a new public medical school, extend national health insurance coverage to Korean traditional medicine and expand telemedicine services.

CRAFT UNIONISM
Doctors and medical students have countered that South Korea does not need more doctors but a better distribution of existing resources across specialties and geographical location.

"Improving the qualities of resident training and working environment through constant communication with doctors should be on the top of the action list," Park Jee-hyun, president of the Korean Intern and Resident Association, a group that represents the striking junior doctors, said in a statement earlier this month.

CRAFT UNIONISM

Some of the trainees disavowed Friday's pact, with dozens coming out to protest at the Korea Health Promotion Institute in Seoul against what they called a "hasty agreement."

Public sentiment had turned against the doctors' strike amid reports of medical services being disrupted around the country and fear of the growing pandemic.

A survey by pollster Realmeter released Thursday found that 55.2% of respondents said they didn't agree with the doctors' strike, while just 38.6% agreed.

Environmental groups slam oil industry for betting $400B on plastics

Children play amid a dumping ground for plastic waste near the Arabian Sea coast in Mumbai, India. File Photo by Divyakant Solanki/EPA-EFE

Sept. 4 (UPI) -- A London think tank said Friday the oil industry is investing $400 billion in plastics to help make up for anticipated losses in transportation, against efforts worldwide to mitigate proliferation of plastic waste.

A report by Carbon Tracker and environmental group SystemIQ said oil companies expect growth in plastics will be the largest driver for oil demand by 2040. The report said, however, the fiscal support runs counter to global campaigns for sustainable environmental change.

Major oil companies are expected to make large investments in virgin plastics, for example, as more electric vehicles hit the road and reduce the need for transportation-related oil.

"The oil industry is pinning its hopes on strong plastics demand growth that will not materialize, as the world starts to tackle plastic waste and governments act to hit climate targets," the groups said. "This risks $400 billion worth of stranded petrochemical investments, increasing the likelihood of peak oil demand."

The report said 36% of plastic is presently used only one time and 40% of the plastic produced ends up polluting the environment. Less than 10% of plastics are recycled, it noted.

"The plastics industry is a bloated behemoth, ripe for disruption," the report said. "Plastics impose an externality cost on society of at least $1,000 per ton, or $350 billion a year, from emitting carbon dioxide, associated health costs from noxious gases, collection costs and the alarming growth in ocean pollution."

Carbon Tracker strategist Kingsmill Bond said there's a breakdown between what oil companies need to profit from plastics and global efforts to slow pollution.

"The oil industry has polluted with impunity for 70 years but now they are going to be made to pay, by hook or by crook, for the huge costs that put on society," Bond said. "Remove the plastic pillar holding up the future of the oil industry, and the whole narrative of rising oil demand collapses."

The European Union this summer proposed a tax of $944 per ton for unrecycled plastic waste after China said it would ban single-use plastics in major cities by the end of this year and nationwide by 2022.

Antidepressant use rising in U.S., 

mostly in women, CDC says

The number of people in the United States taking antidepressant drugs has increased over the last decade -- with larger increases among men than women -- according to new CDC data. Photo by Sasint/Pixabay

Sept. 4 (UPI) -- Nearly 18% of all adult women in the United States used antidepressant medication between 2015 and 2018, compared to just over 8% of men, according to data released Friday by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

Overall, during the decade between 2009-2010 and 2017-2018, antidepressant use increased to 14% from 11%, the agency found. Use increased more for women -- to 19% from 14% -- than for men -- to 9% from 7%.

In 2018, slightly more than 7% of adults in the United States said they suffered from a "major depressive episode," the agency said.

The findings are based on an analysis of data from the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey for the 10-year period between 2009 and 2018.

Depression is a mental health disorder in which sufferers experience a persistent depressed mood or loss of interest in activities, causing significant impairment in daily life, according to the National Institute of Mental Health.

Antidepressant medications are used to reduce the symptoms of depression, and include selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors, or SSRIs, and serotonin and norepinephrine reuptake inhibitors, or SNRIs.

From 2015 through 2018, antidepressant use increased with age and was highest among women aged 60 and over, at slightly more than 24%, the CDC found.

RELATED U.S. depression rates are triple pre-pandemic levels

In addition, use of the drugs was higher among non-Hispanic White adults, at 17%, compared with non-Hispanic Black adults, at 8%, and non-Hispanic Asian adults, at 3%.

Adults with at least some college education were more likely to use antidepressants than those with a high school education or less, the agency said.

Accused Kenosha, Wis., shooter's attorney resigns from role in $700,000 defense fund

Black Lives Matter supporters gather at the site where Jacob Blake was shot while President Trump visited Kenosha, Wis., on Tuesday. Photo by Alex Wroblewski/UPI | License Photo


Sept. 5 (UPI) -- An attorney for a teen accused of shooting protesters in Kenosha, Wis., has resigned from his position with a defense fund that has raised more than $700,000 for his client.

Attorney John Pierce, the lead attorney for Kyle Rittenhouse, 17, said Friday, that he resigned to avoid any "appearance of conflict," amid accusations that he has failed to pay about $65 million in debts.

Pierce and his firm have been accused of defaulting on millions of dollars from the firm's financiers, according to court documents.

Virage Capital Management claims Pierce's law firm defaulted on debt that current and former attorneys said built up over the past year.

RELATED 17-year-old arrested in shooting deaths at Wisconsin protest

Pierce said earlier this year that he failed to pay $4 million as part of a separate agreement with Karish Kapital for cash advances, according to court documents in New York. A Karish attorney said the judgment hasn't been satisfied.

Authorities indicted his client, Rittenhouse, last week on five charges, including two counts of homicide, related to a shooting on Aug. 25 that killed two people and injured a third during a protest in Wisconsin.

Rittenhouse, an Illinois resident, is accused of killing Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, and injuring Gaige Grosskreutz, with an AR-15 style rifle near the Civic Center Park in Kenosha, where protesters had gathered.

Black Lives Matter protesters were rallying to demand justice after an officer fired seven shots at close range of the back of Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old Black man, on Aug. 23, in front of his children, leaving him paralyzed from the waist down.

Pierce has said that Rittenhouse acted in self defense.

The fund for his client, called the #FightBack Foundation, was incorporated in Texas effective Aug. 12., according to the Texas Comptroller of Public Accounts, which was prior to the shooting with a broader mission to "bring lawsuits to stop the left's lies."

RELATED Democratic nominee Joe Biden to visit Kenosha, Wis., Thursday

Pierce was one of the co-founders of the foundation that has raised more than $700,000, along with Lin Wood, an attorney who won notoriety for representing Richard Jewell, who was falsely accused in the 1996 Atlantic Olympic bombing.

Wood, who is now the foundation's controlling member, said he had "no concerns" about Pierce's financial troubles.

"If everybody who needed a lawyer was forced to hire a pristine firm, nobody would ever be able to hire a lawyer," Wood said.

RELATED Trump promises millions to Kenosha, Wis., to rebuild after protests

Pierce's firm has also represented President Donald Trump's personal lawyer, Rudy Giuliani.

Trump embraced Pierce's argument that Rittenhouse acted in self-defense on Monday.

"I guess he was in very big trouble," Trump said. "He would have been, he probably would have been killed."

On Tuesday, Trump visited Kenosha and promised millions in funding to rebuild after protests he described as "domestic terror."