Category Archives: Around the World

Erhöhte Ruthenium-Werte – kein Unfall in einem Kernkraftwerk

Deutsche Welle: Französischer Bericht über Nuklear-Vorfall: Erhöhte Radioaktivität kam aus Russland oder Kasachstan. “Ende September hatten Wetterstationen in Westeuropa erhöhte Werte von radioaktivem Ruthenium-106 gemessen. Pariser Experten glauben nun eine Erklärung gefunden zu haben.”

Bericht vom 09.10.2017: Was ist Ruthenium-106? “Seit Tagen werden in Europa winzige Mengen Radioaktivität in der Luft gemessen. Das Ruthenium-106 soll irgendwo aus dem Ural stammen. Einen Atomunfall schließen Experten aus. Es soll harmlos sein. Und sonst?”

Näheres zu Ruthenium und der Immission im September/Oktober bei Wikipedia.

Hintergrund:

Die Zeit: Ruthenium: Leicht erhöhte Radioaktivität aus dem Ural. “Rätselhaft, aber wohl harmlos. Seit Tagen werden in Europa winzige Mengen Radioaktivität gemessen. Strahlenexperten vermuten, dass das Ruthenium-106 aus dem Ural kommt.” Meldung vom 08.10.2017.

“Von den Partikeln gehe keine Gefahr aus. Ihre Konzentration in der Luft sei sehr gering. “Selbst bei konstanter Einatmung über den Zeitraum von einer Woche ergibt sich daraus eine Dosis, die niedriger ist als die, die durch die natürliche Umgebungsstrahlung in einer Stunde aufgenommen wird”, heißt es in einer Mitteilung des Umweltministeriums. Die gemessene Dosis ist 100.000 mal kleiner als jene, ab der Maßnahmen zum Schutz der Bevölkerung notwendig seien.”

Defeating Shingles

The New York Times: No Excuses, People: Get the New Shingles Vaccine.

“Dr. William Schaffner, preventive disease specialist at the Vanderbilt University School of Medicine, said, “This vaccine has spectacular initial protection rates in every age group. The immune system of a 70- or 80-year-old responds as if the person were only 25 or 30.“

“This really looks to be a breakthrough in vaccinating older adults,“ agreed Dr. Jeffrey Cohen, a physician and researcher at the National Institutes of Health.

What’s causing the enthusiasm: Shingrix, which the pharmaceutical firm GlaxoSmithKline intends to begin shipping this month. Large international trials have shown that the vaccine prevents more than 90 percent of shingles cases, even at older ages.”

Link via MetaFilter.

I will keep an eye on when this vaccine will be available here in Germany for sure.

Hier in Deutschland bzw. in der EU ist Shingrix noch nicht zugelassen, aber die Zulassung wurde bereits im November 2016 bei der EMA beantragt und wird für 2018 erwartet. (Quelle: Robert Koch Institut)

“I can haz all your votes”

The Economist: Once considered a boon to democracy, social media have started to look like its nemesis.. “An economy based on attention is easily gamed.”

“Facebook and Google account for about 40% of America’s digital content consumption, according to Brian Wieser of Pivotal Research, a data provider[.]
[…]
Adult Americans who use Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp spend around 20 hours a month on the three services. Overall, Americans touch their smartphones on average more than 2,600 times a day (the heaviest users easily double that). The population of America farts about 3m times a minute. It likes things on Facebook about 4m times a minute.

The average piece of content is looked at for only a few seconds. But it is the overall paying of attention, not the specific information, that matters. The more people use their addictive-by-design social media, the more attention social-media companies can sell to advertisers—and the more data about the users’ behaviour they can collect for themselves. It is an increasingly lucrative business to be in. On November 1st Facebook posted record quarterly profits, up nearly 80% on the same quarter last year. Combined, Facebook and Alphabet, Google’s parent company, control half the world’s digital advertising.”

“Extremely likely” means a probability between 95 and 100%

If baffles me that there are still people denying the human influence on climate even though many studies show that it is extremely likely. I mean, if it is extremely likely that you will sustain serious injuries or die when jumping out of a third floor window, would you take the chances and jump?!

Part of the problem seems to be that many people don’t know enough about statistics, and that some politicians don’t trust the scientific method.

NPR The Two-Way: Massive Government Report Says Climate Is Warming And Humans Are The Cause.

“It is “extremely likely” that human activities are the “dominant cause” of global warming, according to the the most comprehensive study ever of climate science by U.S. government researchers.

The climate report, obtained by NPR, notes that the past 115 years are “the warmest in the history of modern civilization.” The global average temperature has increased by about 1.8 degree Fahrenheit over that period. Greenhouse gases from industry and agriculture are by far the biggest contributor to warming.

The findings contradict statements by President Trump and many of his Cabinet members, who have openly questioned the role humans play in changing the climate.

“I believe that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do,” EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt said in an interview earlier this year. “There’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact.”

That is not consistent with the conclusions of the 600-plus page Climate Science Special Report, which is part of an even larger scientific review known as the fourth National Climate Assessment.
[…]
The report states that the global climate will continue to warm. How much, it says, “will depend primarily on the amount of greenhouse gases (especially carbon dioxide) emitted globally.” Without major reductions in emissions, it says, the increase in annual average global temperature could reach 9 degrees Fahrenheit relative to pre-industrial times. Efforts to reduce emissions, it says, would slow the rate of warming.
[…]
The report has been submitted to the Office of Science and Technology Policy at the White House. Trump has yet to choose anyone to run that office; it remains one of the last unfilled senior positions in the White House staff.”