Category Archives: Viva!

Nigeria: Lassa Fever Outbreak With 40 Fatalities

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Although endemic in West Africa, for the past three years Nigeria has seen a steady decline in the number of Lassa Fever cases  – and deaths – with the last significant outbreak reported in 2012.

Last year, Nigeria reported only 250 cases (likely a substantial under count) and 8 deaths.   By contrast – in 2012 – 117 deaths were recorded.

Lassa is a Viral Hemorrhagic Fever (VHF), although it is nowhere near as virulent as Ebola or Marburg. The Lassa virus is commonly carried by multimammate rats, a local rodent that often likes to enter human dwellings.

Exposure is typically through the urine or dried feces of infected rodents, and roughly 80% who are infected only experience mild symptoms.  The overall mortality rate is believed to be in the 1%-2% range, although it runs much higher (15%-20%) among those sick enough to be hospitalized.

Like many other hemorrhagic fevers, person-to-person transmission may occur with exposure to the blood, tissue, secretions, or excretions of an individual, although the CDC reassures:

Casual contact (including skin-to-skin contact without exchange of body fluids) does not spread Lassa virus. Person-to-person transmission is common in health care settings (called nosocomial transmission) where proper personal protective equipment (PPE) is not available or not used. Lassa virus may be spread in contaminated medical equipment, such as reused needles.

Over the past couple of days alarm bells have started ringing in Nigeria as it was revealed that 86 Lassa cases have been reported from 10 states over the past 6 weeks, and of those, 40 have died. 

An initial mortality rate (among hospitalized cases) of 46% –  roughly triple that normally expected. 

While this high mortality rate is getting a lot of press, this is a relatively small sample, there is often a bias towards identifying the most critically ill subset of patients early in any outbreak, and that there may be unreported co-factors at work here.

All of which could help to skew the mortality figures higher. 

Forty deaths in such a short time period, however, is a substantial jump over recent years. Last night (Friday), the Health Minister Isaac Adewole, speaking at a news conference, announced the latest case counts and called the number of deaths `unusual’. 

 This report from NAIJ.COM.

Lassa Fever Kills 40 In 10 States
 
Isaac Adewole, the minister of health, has confirmed that 40 people have died in Nigeria in a suspected outbreak of Lassa fever.

Speaking at a news conference in Abuja, the minister said: “The total number (of suspected cases) reported is 86 and 40 deaths, with a mortality rate of 43.2 percent.”

He also warned Nigerians that the disease has already spread to ten states in the six weeks since the first case was reported.

Seven of the affected states are in the north: Bauchi, Nasarawa, Niger, Taraba, Kano, Plateau and Gombe, while the remaining three are in the south: Rivers, Edo and Oyo.

(Continue . . . )

The twitter hashtag  #Lassafever  is seeing a lot of traffic overnight, with @EbolaAlert posting public health infographics and links.

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While Lassa is unlikely to spark a major epidemic, the same could have been said for Ebola a couple of years ago. Of late – when it comes to infectious diseases – conventional wisdom has suffered some setbacks.

So we’ll keep an eye on this outbreak, and I’ll report back any significant information.

Pinned to Feminista on Pinterest

Description: 10 Surprising Things American Women Couldn’t Do in the 1960s Marital rape wasn’t criminalized. Rape within the confines of marriage wasn’t recognized as a crime in all 50 states until 1993. Meaning, a women basically couldn’t refuse sex to her husband or legally fight back if he raped her.
By Ned Hamson
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Found on: http://bitly.com/1SGFz77

To The Lebanese & Arabs Mocking The Siege On Madaya And Its Starving People

do not turn away

A Separate State of Mind | A Blog by Elie Fares

Huddled in the Anti-Lebanon mountains, Madaya is a Syrian village housing tens of thousands of innocent people who are being starved to death at the hand of a siege enforced by the Lebanese allies of the Syrian regime. Their strife is not new. They’ve been going through hell for months, eating whatever they can get: leaves, dirt, cats, dogs. International aid groups are calling the famine there the tip of the iceberg of the crisis taking place in that village of 40,000 people, and no one has been able as of now to fully grasp the picture of the human tragedy taking place there.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words. Forgive the shock value of the following pictures, but the victims in Madaya deserve to have their voices heard on top of those belittling them for being forced to protractedly die.

Today, some Lebanese and other Arabs are pioneering once…

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Incoherence of blindness… extremism

نادية حرحش

Incoherence of blindness… extremism

Amid the race behind blood…

A state of madness is taking over the scene.

It is fanatically crazy. I don’t know where we are heading.

Everything is so mixed, we cannot differentiate anymore. Our extremism and theirs. Them and us.

What happened on the Greek airlines with the Arab passengers and the mad Israeli mass was by all means not different than the madness in opposing the Dabkeh in Bir Zeit University.

For the first instant. One would think… what? What are you talking about?

But if we just give our selves a passing breath of air we will realize that we are all driven by the same panic. A fear of something dark that will overwhelm our existence if we let go. We seem to protect ourselves with this shield of fear.

To arrive a level of radical extremism that cannot but defined by “apartheid”…

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AFRICA/EGYPT – Coptic Patriarch Tawadros: terrorism does not make any distinction between Christians and Muslims

Cairo – Terrorism “does not make any distinction between Christians and Muslims”, and even when it is fueled by religious ideology, it indiscriminately affects all believers in God, fomenting sectarian strife where people kill each other for “human stupidity” for “money” or to assert “their interests”. This is what Coptic Orthodox Patriarch Tawadros II said during some interviews released on Thursday, January 7th by different Egyptian media, including the al-Ahram daily newspaper. During his intervention, the Primate of the Orthodox Coptic Church developed some thoughts on the positive contribution that religions can give to help people to live the fullness of their humanity and live together in peace, insisting on the fact that he does not fear terrorism only for the suffering it causes Christians, but because it affects the whole Country. Pope Tawadros has at heart, as Head of the largest Church in the Middle East, the stability and security of all of Egypt.
Meanwhile the positive comments regarding the words that Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi delivered on the occasion of his participation at Christmas eve, celebrated by Pope Tawadros in St Mark’s cathedral in Cairo on Wednesday, January 6 continues in the Coptic Church. The Head of State at the end of the celebration said that he is committed to speeding up procedures for the repair of destroyed churches especially during the riots in August 2013, when about fifty institutions and Christian places of worship were attacked and devastated by gangs of thugs linked to the Muslim Brotherhood and the Salafis.

ASIA/IRAQ – Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr: return the homes illegally stolen from Christians

Baghdad – The Chaldean Christian politician Pascale Warda, former immigration minister in the first government of transition following the fall of Saddam Hussein’s regime, has publicly expressed her satisfaction regarding Shiite leader Muqtada al-Sadr’s stand on the issue which recently claimed the need to return to their rightful owners homes and property illegally stolen in recent months from Christian families in Baghdad, Kirkuk and other Iraqi cities. As reported by Iraqi media, including the website ankawa.com, Pascale Warda has asked all Iraqi citizens to support the reinstatement of the rights of the Christians owners supported by Muqtada al-Sadr and also civil society organizations such as Hammurabi Association for Human Rights and the Coordination of Iraqi women have mobilized.
The phenomenon of the homes of Christians illegally stolen managed to take hold thanks to collusion and coverings of corrupt and dishonest officials, who put themselves at the service of individual frauds and organized groups of fraudsters . The “legalized” theft of the properties belonging to Christian families is closely linked to the mass exodus of Iraqi Christians, following the US-led military intervention to overthrow the regime of Saddam Hussein. Scammers take possession of homes and property which have remained empty, counting on the easy prediction that none of the owners will come back to reclaim the property. MPs and Christian associations have long appealed to the local administrative institutions, asking them to strike down the phenomenon of false certifications.
Muqtada al-Sadr is the leader of the Sadrist Movement, the party to which at least thirty Iraqi lawmakers belong. He was also the founder of the Mahdi Army, the militia – officially disbanded in 2008 – created in 2003 to fight the foreign forces in Iraq after the fall of Saddam Hussein.

A Native Perspective on the Renaming of Denali

Mt. Denali

Mt. Denali

Guest Commentary

Published January 7, 2016

On Monday, September 1, during a trip to Alaska, President Obama announced that the highest peak in North America would be officially restored to the Koyukon Athabascan name of Denali which means “the tall one.” This is the name the Athabascan people have used for the mountain for centuries. In 1896, a prospector emerged from exploring the mountains of central Alaska and received news that William McKinley had been nominated as a candidate for President of the United States. In a show of support, the prospector declared the tallest peak of the Alaska Range as “Mt. McKinley”—and the name stuck.

Mark Charles

Mark Charles

McKinley became our 25th President, and was tragically assassinated just six months into his second term. But he never set foot in Alaska—and for centuries, the mountain that rises some 20,000 feet above sea level, had been known by another name—Denali.  Generally believed to be central to the Athabascan creation story, Denali is a site of significant cultural importance to many Alaska Natives.  (White House Fact Sheet)

Many articles have been written about the significance restoring the name Denali has had for the Athabascan people. But in this piece I would like to acknowledge that this name change has been a passionate issue for the natives of Alaska for a long time and therefore reflect on the significance their efforts have had for the rest of the country.

“They’ll leave”

The post A Native Perspective on the Renaming of Denali appeared first on Native News Online.

Planting food justice from Hawai’i to Mexico

Mexican corn farmer




Sin maíz, no hay pais. Without corn, there is no country. That’s what Adelita San Vicente Tello and small farmers from across Mexico chanted as they stood up to Monsanto’s risky efforts to grow and test genetically engineered (GE) corn seeds. These crops in the field could contaminate and jeopardize traditional varieties, and the source of farmer livelihoods.

Next week, as part of a global Food Justice Summit in Hawai’i, San Vicente Tello — an agronomist and leader of Semillas de Vida (Seeds of Life) — is joining three women from across the globe to share their stories and their life’s work for a better food system. And I am lucky enough to join them.

Hawai’i has become a flashpoint both because it’s an epicenter of GE seed production and because locals have been building a strong movement to challenge corporate, industrial agriculture. Three islands have already passed some form of law to protect vulnerable communities from use of the hazardous pesticides that accompany GE crops, although pesticide corporations have tried to tie these policies up in court.

The cost of corporate control

Most genetically engineered crops being tested in Hawai’i are designed to either contain an insecticide or be resistant to a chemical herbicide — like Monsanto’s RoundUp or Dow’s 2,4-D. And these engineered traits are often “stacked” on top of each other, licensed and cross-licensed by a handful of multinational corporations that rule global markets. The “Big 6” — Monsanto, Dow, DuPont, Syngenta, Bayer and BASF — own and manufacture a majority of the world’s seeds and pesticides, with all but one of them testing seeds on farmland in Hawai’i. Monsanto alone owns over a quarter of the global seed market, and it’s all about to get more concentrated if Dow and DuPont’s recently publicized merger goes through. 

Pesticides and GE seeds grown in Hawai’i test fields have local, national and global impact. Wherever they’re grown, the seeds can cross-pollinate with traditional or non-GE varieties — threatening indigenous seed saving practices, organic certification or even exposing farmers to patent infringement lawsuits from the Big 6. And the pesticides that often accompany GE crops can damage neighboring crops and contaminate air, soil and water, often having a serious impact on the health of local communities.

From test fields in Kaua’i to farmland in Iowa to seed and pesticide packages pushed on farmers in India, frontline communities around the world are experiencing the impact — and damage — of this approach to agriculture.

From corn to kalo

From Hawai’i to Mexico, a movement for food justice is growing, rooted in rich cultural food traditions. People are standing up for the thousands of varieties of corn still planted in Mexico that are used in over 600 Mexican dishes. The varieties — or landraces — have grown up to fill very specific agroecological niches, and address very specific farming challenges from wind to salinated soils to unrelenting pests.

An impressive three million rural Mexican farmers grow crops, including corn, to help feed over 15 million in their country. And the introduction of a handful of patented GE corn varieties threatens the diversity of the existing varieties, limits choices for farmers and endangers this critical food source. Local communities are successfully pushing back.

While GE corn seed from Monsanto and DuPont is grown and tested in Hawai’i, and shipped to places like Mexico for planting, the connections don’t stop there. Hawai’i also shares deep connections to indigenous foods, including kalo (taro), a central element of the Hawaiian creation story. Some 100 of 300 varieties of kalo remain, echoing the role and importance of corn varieties in Mexico and beyond. For years, Hawaiians, especially kalo farmers, successfully fought off the introduction of genetically engineered taro after the University of Hawai’i began patenting some varieties and quietly engineering others.

While that effort has been largely successful, it hasn’t stopped pesticide corporations and the University from pushing for more GE food crops on the islands.

A movement has grown up in Hawai’i and is actively promoting malama ‘aina, emphasizing the importance of taking care of the land that feeds people. The phrase could easily apply to communities in Mexico as well. Just take this passage from a speech by San Vicente Tello:

 The defense of corn is not just to preserve our sacred plant. It is also fundamental to sustaining Mexico as a living genetic reserve of important varieties of fruits and vegetables that feed humanity. This great agro-biodiversity would never exist without the campesinos/as [peasant farmers] who, over centuries, have fed and nurtured a proud culture which is an example for many countries.”

For years, Mexicans have fought Monsanto and DuPont to stop the companies from planting seeds, and challenged international trade policies that enable these activities. And like their Hawaiian counterparts, Mexican farmers seem victorious for the moment. The country’s courts have been playing ping-pong in their decisions. Most recently the higher courts ruled for protections of seed diversity, a direct challenge to Monsanto and DuPont, corporations with a big stake in the GE market. Let’s hope the decisions in support of local communities and farmers stand.

Determined to reconnect to ‘aina

San Vicente Tello is one woman among four traveling across Hawai’i next week. What do these four women, from four different cultures and countries, have in common? ‘Onipa’a, or steadfast determination. It was the phrase frequently used by the fierce Hawaiian leader, Queen Lili’uokalani. And more recently it’s become a mantra of the Hawaiian sovereignty movement, so it’s fitting that these women are pushing for food sovereignty. Along with Adelita San Vicente Tello, the women joining the speaking tour are:

  • Mariann Bassey Orovwuje, coordinator of Friends of the Earth Africa’s Food Sovereignty Campaign in Nigeria,
  • Sarojeni V. Rengam, executive director of Pesticide Action Network Asia & the Pacific (PAN AP) in Malaysia, and
  • Eva Schürmann, a community leader with Multiwatch in Switzerland.

In pursuit of a resilient and equitable food system, they have all faced tremendous odds against powerful corporations and governments.

For her part, San Vicente Tello continues to remain hopeful. Like the other women, she reminds us that the food system doesn’t have to be this way, that seeds should be free of patents and corporate ownership, freely passed on to us by family farmers in the age-old tradition of saving and exchanging seed. “When all is said and done,” says San Vincente Tello, “we are children of corn. It’s our life, and we need to protect it.”
 

Photo: International Maize and Wheat Improvement Center | Flickr

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