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Trash Piling UpOn Beaches
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Some 378,000 volunteers on average collected 182 pounds of trash for every mile of shoreline last September.
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The world’s beaches and shores are anything but pristine. Volunteers scoured 33,000 miles of shoreline worldwide and found 6 million pounds of debris from cigarette butts and food wrappers to abandoned fishing lines and plastic bags that threaten seabirds and marine mammals.
A report by the Ocean Conservancy, catalogues nearly 7.2 million items that were collected by volunteers on a single day last September as they combed beaches and rocky shorelines in 76 countries from Bahrain to Bangladesh and in 45 states from southern California to the rocky coast of Maine, AP reported.
“This is a snapshot of one day, one moment in time, but it serves as a powerful reminder of our carelessness and how our disparate and random actions actually have a collective and global impact,“ Vikki Spruill, president of the Ocean Conservancy said in an interview.
The 378,000 volunteers on average collected 182 pounds of trash for every mile of shoreline, both ocean coastlines and beaches on inland lakes and streams, providing a “global snapshot of the ocean trash problem.“
The most extensive cleanup was in the United States where 190,000 volunteers covered 10,110 miles--about a third of the worldwide total--and picked up 3.9 million pounds of debris on a single Saturday last September, according to the report.
That’s 390 pounds of trash per mile, among the highest rates of any country, said Spruill.
By comparison, volunteers in neighboring Canada collected 74 pounds per mile and those in Mexico, 157 pounds per mile, said the report. About 65 pounds of trash were collected per mile in China and 46 pounds per mile in New Zealand. Volunteers covered one mile in Bahrain and found 300 pounds of trash.
But Spruill said the volume of trash collected tells only part of the story. It’s the items that are found that tells us about the behavior of people enjoying the beaches and coastlines of the world.
“It represents a general carelessness we have. ... We’re the bad guys. Trash doesn’t fall from the sky. It actually falls from our hands,“ said Spruill.
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Misleading Medical Research Common
The world’s beaches and shores are anything but pristine. Volunteers scoured 33,000 miles of shoreline worldwide and found 6 million pounds of debris from cigarette butts and food wrappers to abandoned fishing lines and plastic bags that threaten seabirds and marine mammals.
A report by the Ocean Conservancy, catalogues nearly 7.2 million items that were collected by volunteers on a single day last September as they combed beaches and rocky shorelines in 76 countries from Bahrain to Bangladesh and in 45 states from southern California to the rocky coast of Maine, AP reported.
“This is a snapshot of one day, one moment in time, but it serves as a powerful reminder of our carelessness and how our disparate and random actions actually have a collective and global impact,“ Vikki Spruill, president of the Ocean Conservancy said in an interview.
The 378,000 volunteers on average collected 182 pounds of trash for every mile of shoreline, both ocean coastlines and beaches on inland lakes and streams, providing a “global snapshot of the ocean trash problem.“
The most extensive cleanup was in the United States where 190,000 volunteers covered 10,110 miles--about a third of the worldwide total--and picked up 3.9 million pounds of debris on a single Saturday last September, according to the report.
That’s 390 pounds of trash per mile, among the highest rates of any country, said Spruill.
By comparison, volunteers in neighboring Canada collected 74 pounds per mile and those in Mexico, 157 pounds per mile, said the report. About 65 pounds of trash were collected per mile in China and 46 pounds per mile in New Zealand. Volunteers covered one mile in Bahrain and found 300 pounds of trash.
But Spruill said the volume of trash collected tells only part of the story. It’s the items that are found that tells us about the behavior of people enjoying the beaches and coastlines of the world.
“It represents a general carelessness we have. ... We’re the bad guys. Trash doesn’t fall from the sky. It actually falls from our hands,“ said Spruill.
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Highest RentsIn Hong Kong
Hong Kong has the world’s priciest apartment rents, with the lease for a three-bedroom unit costing more than $9,700 on average a month, a survey said.
Singapore, which positions itself as a Southeast Asian business hub, saw Asia’s biggest year-on-year rental increase of more than 30 percent last year, the survey by human resources firm ECA International showed, AFP reported.
The survey covered 2007 and is based on lease prices for a three-bedroom apartment in popular expatriate areas, ECA International said.
Asian cities, led by Hong Kong, accounted for six out of the top 10 locations that have the world’s most expensive rentals for three-bedroom apartments, it said.
Other Asian cities in the top 10 global list are Mumbai which ranked sixth, Seoul seventh, Singapore ninth, and Ho Chi Minh City 10th.
Monthly rentals in Asia were on average $3,820, well above the global level of $2,950, said ECA International.
Globally, Moscow ranked second, followed by New York City, Tokyo, and London in fifth spot, said ECA International.
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Poisonous Algae
A pollution-linked algae bloom has reappeared in China’s third-largest lake, prompting renewed fears for the drinking water supplies of millions of residents, state press said .
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Illegal Cod Fishing Criminal
Illegal fishing of cod and pollock in the Arctic is a transnational crime that is putting the health of fisheries at risk, a report published by conservation group WWF shows.
The illegal activity is also adding pressure on fish stocks that are already feeling the impact of climate change, said the report.
Some 70 percent of the world’s white fish supply originates from the Arctic. Among these are the Russian Alaska pollock and Barents Sea cod which account for about a quarter of the world’s white fish supply, AFP reported.
In 2005, over 100,000 tons of illegal cod valued at 225 million euros ($350 million) were caught in the Barents Sea.
France Targets Pro-Anorexia Websites
The French National Assembly adopted a bill that would make it an offence to encourage anorexia or extreme thinness through “death messages“ on websites, magazines and in advertisements.
Health Minister Roselyne Bachelot said the legislation would help stop messages disseminated on the Internet through pro-anorexia websites providing advice to girls on becoming ultra-skinny, reported AFP.
“Encouraging young girls to lie to their doctors, advising them on foods that are easier to regurgitate and inciting them to beat themselves up each time they eat is not freedom of expression,“ Bachelot told lawmakers.
“These messages are death messages. Our country must be able to prosecute those who are hiding behind these websites,“ she said.
Under the measure that must now win approval from the Senate to come into force, offenders could face jail sentences of up to two years and 30,000 euros ($47,387) in fines.
A three-year jail term and 45,000 euros in fines could be sought against offenders if the incitement leads to death.
Between 30,000 and 40,000 women suffer from anorexia in France.
Most Older Suicide Victims Not on Medicine
Just one in five adults, 55 years and older, who commit suicide are using antidepressants at the time of their death, according to a report in the Journal of Epidemiology and Community Health.
The findings also indicate that antidepressant use accounted for only 10 percent of the drop in suicide rates seen in this study of Danish individuals between 1996 and 2000.
The results suggest that other factors are largely responsible for the decline in suicide rates, Dr. A. Erlangsen, from the University of Aarhus in Denmark, and colleagues state, Reuters reported.
During the 5-year study, which involved over 2 million people, suicide rates in older men fell by 9.7 suicides per 100,000 people. Antidepressant users contributed to this drop by 0.9 suicides.
In women, rates decreased by 3.3 suicides per 100,000 people with antidepressant users accounted for only 0.4 of the decline in suicides.
The results suggest that the success of suicide prevention strategies is likely to be limited if the strategies rely solely on increasing the use of antidepressant medications, the authors conclude.
Gossip Could Influence Generosity
Worried about what people are saying about you? Concerns about gossip could influence behavior, including generosity, researchers said.
“As it turns out, the act of gossip can indeed be quite powerful,“ said Jared Piazza of Queen’s University in Belfast, Northern Ireland.
Piazza and Jesse M. Beringa studied the reactions of 72 college students who were asked to distribute tokens with a monetary value between themselves and someone else, Reuters wrote.
Half of the group were also told their decision would be discussed with a third party.
“Participants who were told that the receiver would be communicating their economic decision with the third party were significantly more generous in their allocations of the tokens than participants who were not led to believe that their decisions would be discussed,“ Piazza and Beringa said in the study published in the journal Human Behavior. Although gender did not play a major role in the study, men were slightly more generous than women.
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