What to expect from the world's sixth mass extinction

Humans alive today are witnessing the beginning of the first mass extinction in 65 million years. What does biodiversity loss mean for us and the environment?


The impacts of biodiversity loss could have wide-ranging impacts

About 65 million years after the last mass extinction, which marked the end of dinosaurs roaming the planet, scientists are warning that we are in the early throes of another such annihilation event. Unlike any other, this sixth mass die-off — or Anthropocene extinction — is the only one caused by humans, and climate change, habitat destruction, pollution and industrial agriculture all play a hand.

In mass extinctions, at least three-quarters of all species cease to exist within about 3 million years. Some scientists believe that at our current rate, we could be on track to lose that number within a few centuries.

Over the next few decades alone, at least 1 million species are at risk of being wiped out. That's according to an estimate in a landmark report published in 2019 — but many scientists say it could well be an undercount.

Trying to predict the results of a complete collapse in biodiversity is almost a black art — ecosystems are incredibly complex.

Scientists agree, however, that there are several clear predictions should extinctions continue at this rate. And all the effects are inextricably linked, like a game of Jenga.
Loss of food security

"I think the first thing we'll see is that our food supply starts to dwindle quite markedly, because so much of our food depends on pollination," said Corey Bradshaw, a professor of global ecology at Flinders University in South Australia, who uses mathematical models to show the interplay between humans and ecosystems.


Bees play a vital role in ensuring our food security

About one-third of the world's food supply relies on pollinators such as bees, and, if they die out, agricultural yields could plummet, Bradshaw said.

Some crop pests may thrive as predators drop off, further impacting monoculture harvests.

And millions of people rely on wild species for nutrition and their livelihoods, particularly on coastal and inland fisheries, which are especially vulnerable to disappearing.

According to Bradshaw, this lack of food security, which will also be connected to increased drought and flooding, will hit poorer regions hardest — particularly sub-Saharan Africa and parts of Southeast Asia.
Soil fertility

The quality of soil is also expected to deteriorate if critical microorganisms die off. Though underrepresented in the data, some researchers believe they are potentially vanishing at a faster rate than other species. Their disappearance could lead to worsening erosion, which in turn results in more floods, as well as poorer fertility, which again impacts crop growth.

Healthy soils rely on microorganisms that some scientists say are dying out at rapid rates

Colman O'Criodain, the policy manager for conservation organization WWF International, said this was particularly dangerous.

"The organic matter in a way is kind of like the glue that holds everything together. If you think of it like a Christmas pudding, it has some dry ingredients like breadcrumbs and flour and dried fruits, but it's the eggs and the stout and so on that hold it together and make it soft and mushy and give it its shape," O'Criodain said.
Water shortages and natural disasters

A lot of the world's fresh water comes from wetlands that purify and redistribute this life source. The Himalayan water tower for example, which is fed by rivers and wetlands, supplies about two billion people. If systems like these collapse, as a result of impacts including algae blooms and receding vegetation, humanity could lose a lot of water for drinking and agricultural use.

As forests recede, rainfall patterns are likely to shift as evapotranspiration — the process in which moisture is returned to the atmosphere through evaporation and plant transpiration — is affected, further drying out the landscape, as has been seen in the Amazon.

The UN Food and Agriculture Organization estimates that about 10 million hectares (24 million acres) of forest were cut down annually from 2015.

The Amazon rainforest is under threat from deforestation

And with the loss of trees and vegetation — fundamental regulators of atmospheric carbon dioxide — climate change is expected to worsen, triggering more extreme weather events. Drier conditions and unhealthy forests also increase the risk of wildfire.

Meanwhile, crop failures and other ecological threats will likely trigger mass migrations as people escape famine and conflict over dwindling resources.
Loss of resilience and more pandemics

"What we have done as humans is simplify the whole planet, especially the production ecosystems, to such an extent that they have become vulnerable," Carl Folke, a transdisciplinary environmental scientist and the founder of the Stockholm Resilience Centre for research into sustainability science, told DW.

"Resilience is often called the science of surprise. If you are living with very stable conditions and everything is predictable, you don't need that buffer of biodiversity. But if you're living in more turbulent times with more unpredictable situations, that type of portfolio of options becomes extremely important," Folke said.

Teams of researchers around the world are studying species from which another pandemic could possibly emerge

Researchers have also warned that loss of biodiversity could lead to an increased risk of pandemics as wild animals and humans come into closer contact through habitat fragmentation and disruption of natural systems.

The oft-cited example of this already happening is the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa, believed to have been caused by children playing in a hollowed-out tree full of bats. Though the origin of COVID is still unclear, the results of some scientific studies link it to wild bats.
A fundamental loss of heritage, culture and the intangible

These effects are only those that can be quantified. For many conservationists and scientists, recklessly allowing species to go extinct is akin to vandalism. Even if we survive and avoid the catastrophic consequences, the world would be greatly and irreversibly diminished by mass extinctions.

The most tragic losses could be those we cannot even see.

"Think about the consequences of extinction as burning an art gallery. So you're not even thinking about a potential direct value at all, but you're thinking about the intangible loss of the World Heritage," said Thomas Brooks, the chief scientist at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

"Remember, any single species is a product of millions of years of evolution. You're looking at the loss of what makes humanity part of the planet. You're looking at what makes us whole," he continued.



Conservationists are calling for large swaths of the earth to be turned into actively managed conservation areas

Can species loss be reversed?

Despite these catastrophic predictions, there is some cause for optimism. If humans do something.

"There are what sometimes appear to be insurmountable odds facing conservation of life on Earth. But, on the other hand, there are also very many inspiring stories of success, and examples of cases where people have been able to turn the tide, to put in place actions that allow the curve to be bent or the trends to go in the right direction," Brooks said.

And Brooks is intimately familiar with the challenges faced. The IUCN painstakingly produces the Red List, which forms the fundamental basis of scientific insights into species loss.

Research shows that conservation efforts work. A recent study found that had it not been for conservation interventions, losses would have been three to four times worse since 1993.

Scaling up conservation success stories — such as the reintroduction of beavers in Europe — appears to be a key weapon in the battle against biodiversity loss.

Elizabeth L. Bennett, the Wildlife Conservation Society's vice president for species conservation, is adamant that setting aside large conservation areas can make a significant difference to biodiversity.

"If it's in the right places and very well planned and very well managed, then it will certainly help a lot," she said.

As a first step to that goal, the Wildlife Conservation Society is pushing for the adoption of the "30 by 30" agreement at the Kunming Convention on Biological Diversity (COP15) in spring, in which 30% of lands and seas would be placed under protection by 2030 — roughly double what the world has now.

Achieving that would be a good start, but any agreements struck at COP15 will only be the beginning of a long journey.

As the WWF's O'Criodain put it: "We all look back to when we passed our final exams and we thought for certain that the world was our oyster. Really, it's one step, but there's still plenty of time to mess up our lives."


7 WAYS HELPING THE ENVIRONMENT WILL BENEFIT HUMAN HEALTH
Link between CO2 and less nutritious food
Cutting greenhouse gas emissions would not only slow global heating, it would also ensure our food remains nutritious. When plants absorb excess CO2, they produce less protein and fewer nutrients like zinc and iron. Deficiencies in those nutrients can result in many health problems, especially in children. If CO2 keeps rising, hundreds of millions more people will face chronic undernutrition.
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COVID two years on: World still awaits answers about virus origin

Two years after China reported the first COVID death in Wuhan, it remains difficult for the world to get a clear picture about the origin of SARS-CoV-2.



Public health experts have different views on whether it is still possible to trace the origin of the virus

Tuesday marks two years since the first known death in the COVID-19 pandemic was reported in the central Chinese city of Wuhan. It was here that the virus was first detected and began spreading among the population on a large scale.

Since then, more than 5 million people have died across the world, and more than 300 million people have been infected.

Despite the huge cost that the world has paid over the past two years, the international community is still seeking answers about the initial outbreak that took place in China.

US President Joe Biden ordered the American intelligence community to conduct investigations into the origin of the virus , while the World Health Organization (WHO) has repeatedly urged Beijing to share data about the initial outbreak in Wuhan.
No clarity on virus origin

Last January, the WHO sent a team of scientists to China to carry out an investigation, a process that was closely scrutinized by the Chinese government.

The team concluded that it was extremely unlikely that the virus leaked from a lab. The team also claimed that the virus may have jumped from animals to humans.

The results were met with skepticism and experts urged the WHO to launch further investigations after failing to provide clear evidence about the origin of the virus. Even though the WHO tried to revive the investigation, China has rejected the global health body's plan, emphasizing that Beijing can't accept another origin-tracing probe.

Zeng Yixin, the vice minister of the National Health Commission, said in July 2021 that China had always supported "scientific virus tracing," but that Beijing was opposed to politicizing the tracing work.

Two years since China reported the first COVID death, public health experts have different views on whether it is still possible to trace the origin of the virus.

"If this is a naturally occurring epidemic and if China had no system to track and detect it in 2020, it will be impossible to trace what happened in Wuhan two years ago," said Mei-Shang Ho, a research fellow at the Institute of biomedical sciences at Academia Sinica in Taiwan.

"Another scenario would be that the virus was leaked from a lab, and the only possible way for us to know more about the origin of the virus would be if someone is willing to share the information with the outside world," she added, pointing out that "Chinese authorities may try to cover it up and the researchers may not have the power to disclose the information."

A highly politicized issue

Some experts think the highly politicized nature of the investigation has made it difficult for scientists to gain insights into the origin of COVID.

"From the beginning, it was pretty much politicized, and that largely disabled any investigation into the source of the virus," said Xi Chen, an associate professor of health policy and economics at the Yale School of Public Health.

"I don't know how this can be solved and how the international community can rebuild the trust to restart or initiate this effort to trace the source of the virus, as well as how to avoid this from happening in the future," he told DW.

Chunhuei Chi, director of the Center for Global Health at Oregon State University in the US, says that the most serious mistake committed by China is not its refusal to share information about the origin of the virus, but its attempt to suppress information about its spread among the population in Wuhan in the initial stage.

"We have evidence suggesting that the virus had started spreading in Wuhan in November 2019, so why did the Chinese government cover it up in the first place?" he said. "It caused both the Chinese people and the whole world to suffer. Their initial decision to hide these facts is the typical way that authoritarian governments have been reacting to the crisis."

Two years after the outbreak began in Wuhan, China has once again imposed strict measures on several cities to curb the spread of coronavirus variants within its border. About 13 million people in the Chinese city of Xi'an went into lockdown last month, and some have posted information about alleged human rights violations on Chinese social media.

Officials have faced complaints from the city residents over chaotic handling of the lockdown, including poor access to food and daily essentials.

On Tuesday, at least 5 million residents in the Chinese city Anyang in Henan Province were also ordered to stay home by local authorities as the province became the latest hotspot for China's domestic outbreak.

Some have argued that these strict measures reminded them of the strategies that the Chinese authorities used in Wuhan two years ago.

Experts also have different explanations as to why China is still upholding the "zero COVID" strategy two years after the virus first emerged.

Beijing has long touted its strict response to COVID as preferable to the at times lax and chaotic measures overseas.

The country's official tally since the start of the pandemic — just over 100,000 COVID cases — is a fraction of the record one million cases logged by the US in a single day earlier this month. The official death toll has stayed under 5,000.

The country effectively cut itself off from the world in March 2020, and virtually banned foreigners from entering. Since then, travel restrictions have eased slightly.

But international tourism is non-existent and the government has said it will not renew expiring Chinese passports unless the holder has a good reason for travel.

Mei-Shang Ho believes that one major reason for Beijing's zero COVID strategy is the upcoming Winter Olympics in Beijing, as Chinese authorities want to make sure that the event won't be derailed by the virus outbreaks.

"They want to continue to hold the Winter Olympics regardless of the price they may have to pay," she told DW.

Reopening not on the agenda

Xi Chen from Yale thinks Beijing's persistence in sticking with the zero COVID strategy reflects the gap between different cities' facilities and coping mechanisms.

"There is a huge variation in terms of how authorities in different cities might handle the pandemic," he told DW.

"If China reopens too soon, some parts of the country will not be able to manage it as well as the other parts. It's something that looks alarming to them so they are trying to maintain the zero COVID policy. They don't know exactly what could happen," he added.

Furthermore, the emerging variants have convinced Beijing to believe that the pandemic will last much longer, Chen said. "That's why they have strengthened their strategies in dealing with COVID because this is something they have learned from other countries' experiences."

With the highly transmissible omicron variant now spreading in several parts of China, Chen thinks it will be more than one year before China puts reopening on its agenda.

"The issue of reopening is almost like a taboo in China as journalists don't ask relevant questions and no one is making predictions about what might happen if China decides to reopen," he said. "It might happen in China one year from now, but it's definitely not on the agenda for 2022."

Edited by: Srinivas Mazumdaru

Another Taiwanese fighter jet crashes into sea after leaving for training mission
By UPI Staff

The Taiwanese F-16 fighter, similar to this one, went down in the water about 30 minutes after it left Chiayi air base in southern Taiwan, officials said. 

 File Photo by Ritchie Tongo/EPA-EFE

Jan. 11 (UPI) -- After multiple crashes over the past year, Taiwan's military said on Tuesday that it's suspending combat training for its fleet of F-16 fighter jets after another plane crashed into the sea.

Officials said an F-16V, the latest and most technologically advanced fighter in Taiwan's fleet, dropped off radar screens about 30 minutes after departing Chiayi air base in the southern part of the island.

Authorities said the plane, which carried one pilot, was participating in a training mission when it disappeared. Crews have yet to find any trace of the jet.

Officials said the crashed plane was upgraded recently with new weapons and electronics by manufacturer Lockheed Martin. It was one of two dozen commissioned by Taiwan's air force.

Taipei's military will now inspect its remaining F-16s, officials said. A cause of the crash Tuesday wasn't immediately clear.

China, which claims Taiwan as a territory, has sent warplanes near Taiwanese airspace in recent months.

Tuesday's crash is the latest accident for Taiwan's air forces. Last year, another F-16 went down after leaving Hualien air base and two F-5E fighters crashed into the sea after they collided in mid-air.

Navy to empty fuel tanks at Hawaii storage depot after leak threatened water supply

Members of Hawaii's Board of Water Supply visit the Red Hill Underground Fuel Storage Facility near Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. 

File Photo courtesy U.S. Navy Pacific Fleet/Wikimedia Commons

Jan. 11 (UPI) -- A top naval official said Tuesday that the U.S. Navy will empty fuel storage tanks at a base in Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, after a leak weeks ago threatened a supply of water.

Hawaii's Health Department ordered that the underground tanks at the Red Hill Bulk Fuel Storage Facility be emptied. The Navy could have appealed the order, but Rear Adm. Blake Converse, deputy commander of the U.S. Pacific Fleet, told a congressional hearing on Tuesday that the order will be carried out.

"Yes, we are in receipt of the emergency order issued by the Hawaii Department of Health, and we are taking action because it is a lawful order to comply with," Converse told the House armed services subcommittee Tuesday, according to The Hill.

Rear Adm. Blake Converse told lawmakers Tuesday that the Navy will complete an order to empty underground fuel tanks. 

File Photo by Mass Communication Specialist 2nd Class Shaun Griffin/U.S. Navy

In November, 14,000 gallons of jet fuel leaked at the storage facility and forced 3,500 military families out of their homes between Thanksgiving and Christmas.

Hawaii's order requires the Navy to develop a plan to fix the leaky tanks and perform other maintenance, as well as installing a water filtration system at the contaminated spots.

The storage facility sits directly above a ground aquifer that is the principal source of drinking water for the Hawaiian island of Oahu.

Climate change could end Maine's lobster boom, some fear

As lobster haul numbers in Maine have declined for the last five years, some are wondering how climate change could affect one of the region's largest industries. 

Photo by Christopher Bartlett/Maine Sea Grant

BANGOR, Maine, Jan. 11 (UPI) -- Among the deep underwater valleys off Maine's craggy, crooked coast crawls one of the must lucrative species in American waters -- Homarus americanus, the American lobster.

For almost 20 years, record haul numbers padded the pockets of Maine lobstermen, but with landings declining for five straight years, many wonder how the industry will survive the impacts of climate change.

Last year, Maine's commercial lobstermen landed $500 million worth, and many of the most successful lobstermen pocket upward of $500,000 each.

Data show the Gulf of Maine is rapidly warming, pushing lobsters farther north and into deeper waters, forcing lobstermen and researchers to grapple over exactly how long the boom times will last and whether they can be prolonged.

RELATED Federal appeals court reinstates ban on lobstering in Gulf of Maine

"We're not too hot for lobsters in any way shape or form, but it is getting hotter, especially in the southern part of their range," Damian Brady, an associate professor of oceanography at the University of Maine, told UPI.

In the beginning, warming proved a boon for Maine's lobster fishery. Lobsters need cold water, but not too cold.

Bolstered by friendlier water temperatures and a dearth of predators, thanks to dwindling Atlantic cod stocks, Maine's lobster population exploded in the 1980s.

By the '90s, that explosion was showing up in the traps of Maine lobstermen. For nearly two decades, lobstermen were landing more and more lobsters each year. As lobster fisheries farther south collapsed, Maine lobstermen were striking it rich.

"Most of these guys from 1995 to 2010, they only know increase, they have laid out their future based on that experience," Brady said.

Good times aren't over

RELATED Maine lobsterman finds ultra-rare 'cotton candy' lobster

Lobstermen are still catching a lot and turning solid profits, but haul numbers have been declining since 2016.

It's not clear whether lobster numbers are shrinking, or the bottom feeders are just getting slightly harder to find.

"We still don't quite understand how much of the spawning biomass we are retaining year after year," Brady said.

Between 2004 and 2013, surface waters in the Gulf of Maine warmed just over 5 degrees Fahrenheit, but data for water temperatures below the surface is sparser. There is evidence, however, that lobsters are on the move.

According to Brady, lobsters used to be concentrated in waters 150 feet deep and shallower. Now, lobsters are mostly found in waters between 250 and 320 feet deep.

That means some lobstermen are having to venture farther from shore. They're buying bigger boats, setting deeper traps and spending more on equipment and fuel.

Lobstermen know the Gulf of Maine is changing, but it's not exactly clear to what extent the lobster stock is in jeopardy -- at least in the short term.

Long Island die-off

In 1999, Long Island Sound's lobster population suffered a massive die-off, with 80 percent of the region's disappearing, and the population never recovered.

Though some lobstermen claimed an influx of insecticides -- sprayed to combat mosquitoes carrying the West Nile virus -- sickened the region's shellfish, most scientists agree some combination of warming and disease killed off the sound's lobsters.

Neither scientists nor Maine lobstermen expect lobsters in the Gulf of Maine to befall such a fate.

The Gulf of Maine, which receives a healthy supply of frigid water from the Arctic, is much bigger and deeper than Long Island Sound. But the episode is a reminder of what a dramatic fishery collapse can look like.

Scientists say that should Maine's lobster stocks plummet, it will likely be a result of secondary stressors -- warming combined with some other unforeseen ecological shift.

Still, researchers hope analysis of lobster stock declines farther south will reveal indicators that can be used in Maine to identify risk.

Precise data tough to find

Lobster catches are weighed when they are landed and sold, but that doesn't help scientists figure out exactly where most lobsters are being caught and how that's changing over time.

There's a healthy collaboration between lobstermen and marine biologists at the University of Maine and other local research institutions, but fishermen are not obliged to share data with the kind of specificity that ecological modelers would prefer.

"We've only had 10% random reporting of lobster hauls this year," Amalia Harrington, a project coordinator at Maine Sea Grant, told UPI.

"There's a history of distrust between lobstermen and federal scientists and regulators. There's this fear that the data will be used against them," Harrington said.

Harrington facilitates collaboration between lobstermen and researchers who are trying to study the biological, economic and social impacts of ecosystem change in the Gulf of Maine.

Industry leaders say the relationship between researchers and lobstermen is strong, and that lobstermen will soon be required to share all of their lobster haul data.

"There is a lot of collaborative research and trust in the scientific process used to assess the lobster stock," Patrice McCarron, executive director of the Maine Lobstermen's Association, told UPI. "There is also excellent communication from scientists back to the industry on the status of ongoing research."

"The lack of adequate temporal-spatial data on the lobster fishery has been a challenge," said McCarron. "But that relates more to the size of the fishery and resource and technology limitations than anything else."

Beginning in 2023, lobstermen will required to report 100% of landings data -- to the chagrin of some in the industry, according to Harrington. Lobstermen in other Atlantic states have been sharing all of their data since 2007.

"Some fishermen have been harvesting from the same areas their grandfathers and great-grandfathers fished, so there is a sense of territoriality and confidentiality of great areas that they do not want to share," Harrington said.

Data sharing helps

To encourage more data sharing, Harrington and Brady said researchers need to offer lobstermen more ownership over their data and treat data collection as a true team effort, not a one-way transaction.

"A lot of times, scientists quite rightly get accused of taking the data and going home," Brady said. "So the number one way to foster collaboration is to come back to them with the data and show it to them."

Lobstermen and researchers can work together to make sense of the data, Brady said.

"After the data is collected and processed, the researchers will share the results in a way that allows for some level of anonymity," said Harrington.

It's not just the study of lobsters for which researchers need more data -- it's the study of lobstermen, too.

Harrington, McCarron and others say understanding the vulnerabilities of the lobster industry's social and economic web -- the relationships linking fishermen with people, businesses and communities on land -- is just as important as modeling Maine's lobster stocks.

In fact, the people and the communities that rely on lobsters may be at greater risk than the shellfish, they say.

"The social structures are actually more vulnerable than the biological resource itself," Carla Guenther, chief scientist at the Maine Center for Coastal Fisheries, told UPI.

If climate change makes lobsters too expensive to profitably harvest, the knock-on economic and social impacts could prove devastating.

"We are trying to create the social and economic indicators that can work as a counterpart to the lobster larvae surveys," said Guenther.

To identify those indicators, Harrington, Guenther and others are working to better understand the full scope of the lobster industry.

"We really don't have a great handle on the trickle down economic impacts of the Maine lobster industry," Harrington said. "On top of the landings value, it's estimated that the lobster industry brings in another $1 billion to the state."

What's to be done

Researchers and policy makers know that the Gulf of Maine is changing, as do lobstermen and industry leaders.

"There are a lot lobstermen who acknowledge climate change -- most of them, probably -- and there are a lot of well intentioned and thoughtful lobstermen out there that realize what is happening," Brady said. "It's just not clear what they can do about it."

Previous studies suggest traditional fisheries management tools, such as limits on harvesting egg-bearing females, are likely to have a limited impact on the trajectory of Maine's lobster population.

"The processes affecting the trajectory of this population happen at these early ages, and it seems that conservation measures on harvesting may be moot," Andrew Goode, a former lobsterman and now a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Maine, told UPI in an email.

"A theory behind reductions in lobster has to do with food limitation when they're larvae swimming in the water. If they are becoming food limited, increased abundance of lobster larvae would likely not translate into more adults because there is only so much food to sustain X number of larvae," Goode said.

With or without clarity on what lobster stocks will look like in the short-term, the industry is preparing for leaner years.

"I think most people agree that there will be a softening of lobster landings moving forward," McCarron said. "But the lobster industry has been expecting landings to soften since the late 1990s, only to see them continue to increase. It's never been an issue of if, but rather when."

Hot milk and grooming for camels at Saudi luxury 'hotel'



Hot milk and grooming for camels at Saudi luxury 'hotel'A Saudi man tends to a camel at the "hotel" during the King Abdulazziz Festival at Rumah east of Riyadh (AFP/Fayez Nureldine)

Haitham El-Tabei
Tue, January 11, 2022, 9:05 AM·3 min read

With heated stalls and hot milk, life couldn't get more glamorous for Saudi Arabia's most beautiful camels when they stay at a luxury compound near Riyadh.

For 400 riyals (just over $100) a night, the camels are trimmed, scrubbed and pampered before taking part in beauty contests, where millions of dollars are at stake.

The camels, many of which are rented, are checked closely for Botox and other illegal enhancements which could see them thrown out for cheating.

And it's all done in a Covid-safe environment to prevent any disruptive outbreaks.

The Tatman, described as the first hotel for camels, is an open-air desert compound near the annual King Abdelaziz Festival, which has prizes totalling $66.6 million.

It's a logical step for the lucrative industry in the well-heeled Gulf, where camels are prized as a symbol of traditional life.

The animals are judged on attributes including their lips, necks, humps and colouring, and wins are highly prestigious for their owners.

Omair al-Qahtani, who is Saudi, checked 80 camels into the Tatman for 16 days, saying it would cost him $160,000-213,000.

The facility is "very comfortable, as the camels remain under their care and undergo regular medical examinations", the 51-year-old businessman told AFP.

It has 120 enclosures, including singles and doubles, each equipped with plastic containers for water and fodder. Check-out is 12:30 pm.

During their stay, 50 workers look after the animals and are kept under strict sanitary conditions to minimise the risk of Covid cases.

- 'Obsession with camels' -

In years past, Qahtani and his assistants would set up tents near the festival, tending to and feeding the camels themselves.

Many of the four-legged guests are competitors in Mazayen al-Ibl contest, the world's biggest camel beauty pageant and a highlight of the King Abdelaziz Festival.

Mohamed al-Harbi, media chief of the camel club that organises the competition, said the group dreamed up the hotel "to protect and preserve camels and also to reduce the burden on the owner".

He said the hotel was popular, bringing in revenues of more than $1.6 million.

Money is no object for some attending the festival, which features well-appointed buildings and tents in the middle of the desert, and booths for luxury car-makers Rolls-Royce and BMW.

Saudi enthusiasts can spend hundreds of thousands of dollars on camels entered into the contests, where unscrupulous competitors sometimes seek an illegal advantage.

Forty-three dromedaries were drummed out of the festival when camel checkers spotted infringements such as Botox, silicone and fillers injected into lips, humps and tails.

But Harbi said the hotel provides a "check" so that people "can find any tampering early", reassuring them their rented beasts won't be sent packing.

Qahtani said this is a big advantage, as doctored camels can attract fines of up to $26,000.

The competitions "reinforce the obsession with camels in Saudi Arabia", Harbi said.

ht/sy/th/dv

MERS ORIGINATED IN SAUDI ARABIA IN  CAMELS AND WAS PASSED ON TO HUMANS

Molière: 400 years as master of the French stage


AFP
11 January 2022

A bust shows the famous French playwright, Molière. Today would 

have been his 400th birthday. (Photo by BERTRAND GUAY / AFP)

Tuesday marks the 400th birthday Molière - a playwright who many consider as the French Shakespeare. Here's everything you need to know about the man who remains central to French culture today.

Today would have been the 400th birthday of one of the most celebrated French writers of all time.

When the French refer to their native tongue, it is the “language of Molière” – the name of a playwright who remains as central to their culture as Shakespeare in the English-speaking world.

Here’s what you need to know on the life and legacy of France’s most illustrious writer.

A little-known star

Molière, real name Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, left zero trace of his personal life: no journal, correspondence or even notes on his work. The only of his four children to survive to adulthood, lost his manuscripts.

We don’t know the source of his stage-name — which refers to a quarry — nor his date of birth (we have only a baptism certificate, dated January 15, 1622, that was discovered two centuries later in 1820).

As eldest son, he stood to inherit a comfortable living from his father as chief upholsterer and valet to the king, but gave it up to be an actor.

It caused his father much strife: he was forced to buy his son out of prison after his first company, The Illustrious Theatre, fell into debt.

Molière fled Paris at 23, spending the next 13 years with a travelling troupe.

Success on the road won him a return to Paris and a successful audience for the young king, Louis XIV, that earned him a powerful patron even though he faced constant battles with censors.

Despite the myth, he did not quite die on stage, but shortly after a performance — as the hypochondriac character Argan no less — at home on the Rue de Richelieu on February 17, 1673.

World’s oldest theatre company

La Comedie-Francaise was created by King Louis XIV in 1680, seven years after Molière’s death, as a merger between his troupe and another.

The longest-running theatre company in the world, it is known as “La Maison de Molière” and has performed his work every single year since its formation.

Based since 1799 on the Rue de Richelieu, close to the Louvre, it now employs 400 people, including 60 actors, and has a costume department comprising 50,000 items.

Memorable characters

Molière created characters who often take their foibles to extremes, but allow us to laugh at our universal human failings in the process.

Perhaps best-known is Tartuffe, from the play of the same name — a fraud who disguises himself as a priest to convince a naive, wealthy aristocrat into handing him his fortune and daughter’s hand in marriage, even as he chases after his wife.

The play is seen as practically inventing the “comedy of manners” that satirises the moral hypocrisies of high society.

Though Moliere is not thought to have been particularly anti-religious himself, “Tartuffe” scandalised the Catholic Church and became a key text in the anti-clerical movement of the following centuries.

Among other key characters is the money-obsessed Harpagnon, from “The Miser”, who exhorts his servants “not to rub the furniture too hard for fear of wearing it out”.

The hypochondriac Argan from “The Imaginary Invalid” is another eternal character that Moliere used to satirise quacks in the medical profession who exploited people’s fear of death.

Does the land of Shakespeare care for 400-year-old Moliere?

AFP-January 11, 2022 

An anthology of French playwright Moliere’s plays in English and French dating from 1732. (AFP pic)

PARIS: American actor Denis O’Hare could sense the ghost of Moliere smiling as he rode his co-star Olivia Williams like a horse on stage at London’s National Theatre.

Usually a rather cerebral place, the National’s audience was in stitches as O’Hare’s character Tartuffe, from the classic 17th-century French play, tried to disguise his adulterous antics as a bit of horseplay.

“The comedy translates across the centuries if you know what you’re doing,” O’Hare told AFP.

“Some of the funny was based on language, and some of it on sheer idiocy… But there are also great moments of pathos and human emotion that make it all the richer.”

That hit production of “Tartuffe” in 2019 was a reminder that Moliere, France’s most celebrated playwright who turns 400 this week, can resonate in the land of Shakespeare.

It was not always the case.

“It used to be a box office manager’s nightmare to have a Moliere production. You often had more people on stage than in the theatre,” said Noel Peacock of the University of Glasgow, an expert on Moliere translations.

In the 1980s, one “Sunday Times” critic even feared that Moliere was an obstacle to a united Europe: “How can you trade freely with a nation whose best comedy does not travel?”

But since those times, there has been a “complete turnaround”, said Peacock.

There have been dozens of British productions in recent years, with three major versions of “Tartuffe” in London alone between 2016 and 2019.

He is attracting celebrities: Keira Knightly played in “The Misanthrope” in 2009 and David Tennant, of “Doctor Who” fame, in “Don Juan” in 2017.

Highly adaptable

Peacock credits fresh translations that worried less about linguistic accuracy than capturing Moliere’s spirit with helping to bring out the universal truths in his work.

“Tartuffe is a rogue, a rascal, a hustler,” O’Hare agrees. “But he’s also a truth-teller in the great tradition of the French clown. He upends society’s norms and conventions.”

That has made him highly adaptable to modern scenarios. The Royal Shakespeare Company recently relocated “Tartuffe” to a British-Pakistani family in Birmingham, where the commentary on religious hypocrisy found fresh relevance.

Denis O’Hare played a memorable Tartuffe in a version that shifted the action to Brexit-era London. (AFP pic)

But it’s not just the English-speaking world that has embraced Moliere, whose real name was Jean-Baptiste Poquelin, of late: translations have proved popular in Germany, Russia, Japan and beyond.

A recent French book about Moliere in the Arabic world found he had been performed in the region since at least 1847 and had become the “godfather of theatre” in many countries.

“Moliere’s plays have been extremely important internationally. He even provided the foundation for some national theatres who adapted his plays to their local languages and cultures,” said Agathe Sanjuan, conservator of the Comedie-Francaise in Paris, the longest-running theatre company in the world that has performed Moliere’s work every year since its formation in 1680.

It was always a tougher sell in England, of course, where he had to compete with the Bard, though adaptations of Moliere were appearing there as early as the 1660s, according to Peacock.

However, he found more success in Scotland, Peacock added, which had a “Shakespeare-sized hole to fill” and where Moliere’s “biggest advantage was that he wasn’t English”.

U.S. Mint begins shipping quarters featuring Maya Angelou
By Megan Hadley



The Mint announced last year that several notable women would be featured in the quarter program, including Angelou, Chinese American film star Anna May Wong and former astronaut Sally Ride. Image courtesy U.S. Mint


Jan. 11 (UPI) -- The U.S. Mint says it has begun shipping a new quarter that features poet Maya Angelou, which is the first U.S. coin ever to honor a Black woman.

Angelou's quarter is part of the America Women Quarters Program, which will feature a number of historical figures.

The Mint says that coins featuring other prominent American women will also begin shipping later this year and continue through 2025.

"Each 2022 quarter is designed to reflect the breadth and depth of accomplishments being celebrated throughout this historic coin program. Maya Angelou, featured on the reverse of this first coin in the series, used words to inspire and uplift," Mint Deputy Director Ventris Gibson said in a statement Monday.

Angelou, who died in 2014 at the age of 86, was an author and social activist. Her autobiography I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, was nominated for the National Book Award.

In her lifetime, Angelou received more than 20 honorary degrees from institutions such as Boston College and Tufts University, and was granted the first lifetime Reynolds Professorship of American Studies at Wake Forest University in 1982.

The Mint announced last year that it would include several notable figures in the quarter program, including Chinese American film star Anna May Wong, former astronaut Sally Ride and Wilma Mankiller, the first woman to be elected principal chief of the Cherokee Nation.

The program was established by the Circulating Collectible Coin Redesign Act of 2020, and requires that five prominent American women be recognized on quarters between 2022 and 2025.

Read More

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https://www.usmint.gov/news/press-releases/united-states-mint-begins-shipping-first-american-women-quarters-program-coins

Polish court dismisses charges against writer who called President Duda a 'moron'
By UPI Staff


Polish President Andrzej Duda speaks during a press conference. Charges against a writer who called Duda 'a moron' were dropped on Monday. File Photo by Andrzej Lange/EPA


Jan. 11 (UPI) -- A Polish Charges dismissed charges against a well-known writer who called Poland's President Andrzej Duda a moron on social media.

Writer Jakub Zulczyk faced up to three years of prison for insulting Duda in a social media post, but a regional court in Warsaw dropped the charges on Monday and decided to discontinue the case.

Judges cited free speech rights and said a conviction could lead to preventing people from criticizing authority in the future.

Judge Tomasz Julian Grochowicz said public figures like the president were at a larger risk of public criticism and that Zulczyk didn't commit any crimes.

Zulczyk's comment was a response to Duda's reaction to U.S. President Joe Biden's electoral victory.

Duda tweeted that he would await the nomination by the Electoral College. People criticized the tweet, saying that Duda suggested the victory wasn't definitive.

In a Facebook post, Zulczyk said Biden clearly won the election and that Duda was "a moron."

Zulczyk said he was probably the first writer in the country to be tried for writing something insulting.

Poland had broad insult laws including offending religious views or the country's flag, but those in violation of those laws are usually handed fines or community service punishments.

Gallup poll: Americans reading fewer books than in previous years
By Rich Klein

A new Gallup survey finds many Americans read fewer books last year -- in any format, whether print, electronic or audio. File Photo courtesy of Amazon

Jan. 10 (UPI) -- Americans read an average of 12.6 books during the past year, according to a new Gallup poll released Monday.

That represents the lowest number of books read compared to any previous survey dating back to 1990, Gallup said. In three polls conducted between 2002 and 2016, Gallup surveys showed that Americans read an average of 15.2 books per year.

"It is unclear from these data if the declines in book readership are occurring because of a lack of interest in books, a lack of time to read books, or perhaps COVID-19-related disruptions in lifestyle activities or access to books," the pollster said. "It is also uncertain at this point whether the declines in book reading mark a temporary change or a more permanent one."

The results are based on a Dec. 1-16 poll of a random sample of 811 adults living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. The participants were asked how many books they "read -- either all or part of the way through" in the past year -- including electronic books and audiobooks.

The decline in book reading is mostly a function of how many books readers are consuming, rather than fewer Americans reading at all, Gallup said in a news release issued with the poll.

The 17% who said they did not read any books in the past year is in line with the 16% to 18% measured in 2002 to 2016 surveys, Gallup said.

Gallup reported that 27% of respondents said they read more than 10 books, down 8 percentage points since 2016 and lower than every prior measure by at least 4 points.

College graduates, women and older Americans also are reading a bit less.

For example, those 55 and older went from a previous average of reading 16.7 books to 12. There has been little change in the average number read by those younger than 55.

The survey's margin of error is plus or minus 4 percentage points.

A poll from the Pew Research Center last week found that more people are reading electronic books, about 30%. That survey found Americans reach an average of 14 books last year in any format, the same as its findings in 2011.