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Flu and colds are back with a vengeance — why now?

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  Restrictions to curb the spread of COVID-19 markedly   blunted the spread of other respiratory illnesses . Influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV) — a seasonal virus that usually causes mild cold-like symptoms, but that can be dangerous for young children and older adults — all but disappeared in 2020 and early 2021. Now, in the Northern Hemisphere, RSV is surging, and the hospitalization rate for flu in the United States is higher for this time of year than it has been since 2010. Why exactly are these surges happening now? And what’s in store for future winters? “These viruses are coming back, and they’re coming back with a vengeance,” says Scott Hensley, an immunologist at the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. “It is possible that this year will be sort of the granddaddy of them all in terms of flu.” Hensley says that this is because the population “is more immunologically naive than what we would expect in most years”. Normally, children get infected by their se
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Chances of finding COVID-virus ancestor ‘almost nil’

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The Giant Bacteria Discovered-5,000 Times Bigger Than Normal

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Cyberattacks increasingly hobble pandemic-weary US schools

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UAE’s Ras Al-Khaimah 2022 New Year’s fireworks break 2 Guinness World Records

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Glaciers in Himalayas melting at ‘exceptional’ rate

  Glaciers  in the  Himalayas  are shrinking far more rapidly than glaciers in other parts of the world, threatening the  water supply  of millions of people in Asia, new research warns. The study, led by scientists at the University of Leeds, found that in recent decades, Himalayan glaciers have lost ice 10 times more quickly than they have on average since the Little Ice Age, when glaciers expanded around 400-700 years ago. The ice loss is occurring so quickly, the research team described the rate as “exceptional”. The researchers reconstructed the extent and ice content of 14,798 Himalayan glaciers to reveal how large they were during the Little Ice Age. The model revealed that the glaciers we see today have now lost around 40 per cent of their area, shrinking from a maximum of 28,000 square kilometres to around 19,600 sq km today. During that period, they are believed to have lost up to 586km cubed of ice – the equivalent of all the ice contained today in the central European Alps,
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G7 backs Biden infrastructure plan

  The G7 group of rich nations has agreed plans to set up an alternative to China’s belt and road initiative as part of a broad push back against Beijing covering human rights, supply chains, support for Taiwan and demands to reveal more about the origins of the Covid-19 pandemic. Some G7 leaders, however, including the Italian prime minister, Mario Draghi, the current chair of the G20, have urged  Joe Biden  not to push competition with China to the extent that it prevents cooperation on other vital issues such as the climate crisis. The EU is also pressing the US to back a legally binding code of conduct for the South China Sea that Beijing has been negotiating with regional powers. Draghi, an Atlantacist, has shifted Italy away from the near pro-China policies of the previous Italian government led by the Five Star Movement, but argues that the  G7  has a balancing act to pull off in challenging and cooperating with Beijing. Germany, often cautious about confronting China, has been
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Could dumping save the Coral-reef?

  Continually dumping crushed rocks from a bulk carrier along a  Great Barrier Reef  shipping route could counteract the acidification of ocean water caused by fossil fuel burning, but would come with unknown side effects on the marine environment and coral reefs, according to a study from Australia’s science agency. In what is described as a “first order assessment”, scientists at  CSIRO  found it was theoretically possible to turn back the clock on the effect of decades of fossil fuel burning, but the radical step came with “as yet unquantified risks”. As well as causing the atmosphere and oceans to warm, increasing levels of CO2 in the atmosphere from fossil fuel burning has changed the pH of the ocean, making it harder for corals to form their skeletons – a process known as calcification. The lead scientist in the study, Dr Mathieu Mongin, said researchers were now being forced to consider the viability of radical interventions to save the reef because of a lack of global action on