In The News

Baby Milk Rationing: Chinese Fears Spark Global Restrictions

Celia Hatton April 22, 2013
Any food-safety crisis drives consumers to seek alternatives. A series of reports of contaminated infant formula since 2008 have driven Chinese mothers to look for foreign brands of infant formula – though after the Fukushima tsunami/nuclear disaster, the consumers quickly shifted from Japanese to US imports. Chinese consumers pay double the price for foreign brands. “Fearful of the dangerous...

WHO Puzzled by Deadly Chinese Bird-Flu Strain

Esther Fung April 22, 2013
A World Health Organization team of researchers is in China, trying to determine how a new strain of bird flu, H7N9, spreads. Human-to-human transmission would be dangerous, and researchers are investigating family members who share the flu strain. “So far, investigators have said they can't rule out limited person-to-person transmission, which could include unusually close contact, such as...

Baby Milk Rationing: Chinese Fears Spark Global Restrictions

Celia Hatton April 17, 2013
Any food-safety crisis drives consumers to seek alternatives. A series of reports of contaminated infant formula since 2008 have driven Chinese mothers to look for foreign brands of infant formula – though after the Fukushima tsunami/nuclear disaster, the consumers quickly shifted from Japanese to US imports. Chinese consumers pay double the price for foreign brands. “Fearful of the dangerous...

US Rice Imports “Contain Harmful Levels of Lead”

Jason Palmer April 11, 2013
Agricultural crops can absorb heavy pollutants from soil and water. A report at the American Chemical Society Meeting suggests that rice imports from Asia, Europe and Israel, can exceed what’s called the “provisional total tolerable intake” level of lead, set by the US Food and Drug Administration by a factor of 120, particularly for Asian consumers who tend to eat more rice, reports Jason Palmer...

CDC Begins Work on Vaccine for China Flu

Donald G. McNeil Jr, Andrew Jacobs April 8, 2013
US researchers are developing a vaccine to block H7N9 flu that’s killed six in China. China reports that “No cases of human-to-human transmission have been confirmed, even though China’s disease control agency has traced hundreds of people who had contact with the 14 known cases,” report Donald G. McNeil Jr, Andrew Jacobs for the New York Times. Global cooperation to tackle the flu is underway,...

Is a Pandemic Being Born?

Laurie Garrett April 4, 2013
Epidemiologists are investigating whether the deaths of three unrelated Chinese individuals, showing symptoms of respiratory distress and pneumonia, are connected to thousands of dead pigs, ducks and swans found in three rivers, the Huangpu, the Xiang and the Sichuan. The events may be unrelated or, if connected, could signal the start of a flu virus mutating and crossing species, suggests...

World With More Phones Than Toilets Shows Water Challenge

Randall Hackley March 21, 2013
Water is a necessity, but one that’s taken for granted. Randall Hackley, writing for Bloomberg about World Water Day, questions why the globe has 6 billion mobile phones when one out of three people do not have a toilet, and one out of seven lack access to safe drinking water. Water sanitation is a major contributing factor to high child mortality rates; more people die from sanitation-related...