In The News

Our Moral Superiority About Sex Is Proving Deadly

Saral Boseley November 28, 2006
Western nations like the US and the UK have split personalities when it comes to sex. Western cultures are obsessed with the topic, allowing it to dominate the media, consumer products and everyday life – yet their politicians and professionals are quick to criticize or advise developing nations about high rate of AIDS or promiscuity. A series published in the journal “Lancet” suggests that the...

Tripping on the Tightrope

Graham Usher November 13, 2006
Citizens of Muslim countries increasingly question who exactly are the targets in the US-led “war on terror.” In late October, three US-made missiles struck a madrassa in Bajaur, not far from the border of Afghanistan, killing more than 75 men under the age of 20. US and Pakistan leaders insisted the religious school was a training site for suicide bombers. Pakistani citizens suspect that the US...

A Small Charity Takes Lead in Fighting a Disease

Stephanie Strom August 8, 2006
Diseases that are common among the world’s poor, such as black fever, are not on Big Pharma’s priority list. For the first time, with the help of the Gates Fund, a small charity is bringing a cure to market. Despite skepticism from other researchers, the non-profit Institute for OneWorld Health, based in San Francisco, tackled black fever, the second largest parasitic killer in the world after...

Gates Won't Fund AIDS Researchers Unless They Pool Data

Marilyn Chase July 21, 2006
The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, run by the chairman of the Microsoft Corporation, will deliver $287 million in five-year grants to researchers working to produce an AIDS vaccine. The caveat: Grantees must agree to pool their results. Fragmented and overlapping work in the area of AIDS research has hindered progress toward a vaccination for the virus that affects 40 million people around...

Desert Cities Are Living on Borrowed Time, UN Warns

John Vidal June 9, 2006
Desert cities all over the globe move closer to becoming completely unlivable. Rising temperatures and lack of rain in such areas from Phoenix in the US to Riyadh in Saudi Arabia are affecting as many as 500 million people worldwide with rising water tables beneath irrigated soils, leading to increased salinization. This phenomenon affects large tracts of land all over central and south Asia,...

The Pope Considers a Life-Saving New Policy

May 2, 2006
For more than 25 years, AIDS has killed millions around the globe. The leading cause for AIDS transmission is unprotected sex, but the influential Catholic Church has refused to allow condoms under any circumstances, including preventing the spread of disease. In response to the AIDS crisis, the Catholic Church could edge toward a somewhat more lenient stance on condom use. Despite church...

The World’s Drinking Glass Is More Than Half Full

G. Jeffrey Macdonald February 14, 2006
Throughout the developing world, about 700 million people have acquired household access to drinking water since 1999. According to the WHO and UNICEF, more than half of people around the globe now have drinking water piped into their homes. In rural developing regions, women typically collect household water. Eliminating the trek to and from the nearest water source, sometimes up to ten miles...