July 8, 2021: 185,236,000 confirmed infections; 4,005,000 deaths
July 30, 2020: 17,096,000 confirmed infections; 668,590 deaths
US (Map)
July 8, 2021: 33,772,700 confirmed infections; 606,230 deaths
July 30, 2020: 4,451,000 confirmed infections; 151,270 deaths
SA (Coronavirus portal)
July 8, 2021: 2,112,340 confirmed infections; 63,100 deaths
July 30, 2020: 471,125 confirmed infections; 7,498 deaths
Spotlight on India – fast approaching US Covid statistics:
July 8, 2021: 30,709,600 confirmed infections; 405,100 deaths
News blues
Fifteen months later…and the pandemic is still raging. Few experts guessed that by this point, the world would have not one vaccine but many, with 3 billion doses already delivered. At the same time, the coronavirus has evolved into super-transmissible variants that spread more easily. The clash between these variables will define the coming months and seasons. Here, then, are three simple principles to understand how they interact.1. The vaccines are still beating the variants.Read “The 3 Simple Rules That Underscore the Danger of Delta” >>
2. The variants are pummeling unvaccinated people.
3. The longer Principle No. 2 continues, the less likely No. 1 will hold.
***Coronavirus Pandemic Hits New Milestone: 4 Million DeadAnd that is widely believed to be an undercount because of overlooked cases or deliberate concealment.***Scandal-Plagued Brazil Could Soon Become The Global Leader In COVID-19 Deaths. Far-right President Jair Bolsonaro is facing allegations of corruption, official investigations and mass protests as Brazil’s death toll continues to climb.***Hardcopy reading: Reading on my cell phone these days, I seldom read hardcopy books, journals, and magazines anymore. Moreover, I’ve barely time to keep abreast with online current thinking, news, and writing, never mind find then read what’s published in what I now consider “heavy to hold” print matter. But… I thoroughly enjoy my visits with a friend - a pacifist researcher, writer, and speaker focused on nuclear weaponry – whose home is chock-a-block with print matter. Most recently, I read the current issue of Foreign Affairs. I recommend the following essays and reviews from the July/August 2021 issue:
Essay: The Forever Virus: A Strategy for the Long Fight Against COVID-19
Essay: The Threat Reflex: Why Some Societies Respond to Danger Better than Others
And, a thought-provoking review: “Spies Like Us: The Promise and Peril of Crowdsourced Intelligence”***The Lincoln Project:
Remember (3:12 mins)
Toyota (0:56 mins)
Healthy planet, anyone?
There is now so much ocean plastic that it has become a route for invasive species, threatening native animals with extinction.Japan’s 2011 tsunami was catastrophic, killing nearly 16,000 people, destroying homes and infrastructure, and sweeping an estimated 5m tons of debris out to sea.Read “Plastic rafting: the invasive species hitching a ride on ocean litter” >>
That debris did not disappear, however. Some of it drifted all the way across the Pacific, reaching the shores of Hawaii, Alaska and California – and with it came hitchhikers.
Nearly 300 different non-native species caught a lift across the ocean in what can be thought of as a “mass rafting” event. The Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in 2017 counted 289 Japanese marine species that were carried to distant shores after the tsunami, including sea snails, sea anemones and isopods, a type of crustacean.
Plastic is, indeed, a major environmental contaminant – so is invasive rafting… but… gulp, are you ready for vanillin made from plastic? Logically, not voluntarily eating substances made from plastic may, perhaps, be a little precious? After all, reliable research now shows that tiny bits of plastic already are in our food, drinking water, the air we breathe, and, yes, inside our bodies. ... Research calculates that the average American eats, drinks, and breathes in more than 74,000 microplastic particles every year. Now, however…
…Plastic bottles have been converted into vanilla flavouring using genetically engineered bacteria, the first time a valuable chemical has been brewed from waste plastic. …Hmmm. “Green chemistry.” Now we gotta be even more careful of what we’re eating… I hope “green chemistry” is so labeled.
Stephen Wallace, also of the University of Edinburgh, said: “Our work challenges the perception of plastic being a problematic waste and instead demonstrates its use as a new carbon resource from which high value products can be made.”
About 1m plastic bottles are sold every minute around the world and just 14% are recycled. Currently even those bottles that are recycled can only be turned into opaque fibres for clothing or carpets.
The research, published in the journal Green Chemistry , used engineered E coli bacteria to transform TA into vanillin. The scientists warmed a microbial broth to 37C for a day, the same conditions as for brewing beer, Wallace said. This converted 79% of the TA into vanillin.
Next the scientists will further tweak the bacteria to increase the conversion rate further, he said: “We think we can do that pretty quickly. We have an amazing roboticised DNA assembly facility here.” They will also work on scaling up the process to convert larger amounts of plastic. Other valuable molecules could also be brewed from TA, such as some used in perfumes.
Ellis Crawford, of the Royal Society of Chemistry, said: “This is a really interesting use of microbial science to improve sustainability. Using microbes to turn waste plastics, which are harmful to the environment, into an important commodity is a beautiful demonstration of green chemistry.”
***
More than 8 billion people could be at risk of malaria and dengue fever by 2080 if greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise unabated, a new study says. Malaria and dengue fever will spread to reach billions of people…[with] researchers predicting up to 4.7 billion more people could be threatened by the world’s two most prominent mosquito-borne diseases, compared with 1970-99 figures.Read “Climate crisis ‘may put 8bn at risk of malaria and dengue’ “ >>
The figures are based on projections of a population growth of about 4.5 billion over the same period, and a temperature rise of about 3.7C by 2100.
The study, led by the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) and published in the Lancet Planetary Health journal, found that if emission levels continue to rise at current rates, the effect on global temperatures could lengthen transmission seasons by more than a month for malaria and four months for dengue over the next 50 years.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch…
Feeding off rafts of invasives?Canada geese do it, too.
Living in the “inner bay” – directly on shores of San Francisco Bay – brings one into close contact with Canada geese. Until recently, my impression of Canada geese tended to the unfavorable: noisy, poopy, poopy, and noisy…
Then, small flocks on Canada geese arrived on Old River – in front of my houseboat. They’ve settled in … and I’ve fallen in love with them. Old River brings out the best in Canada geese. Unlike their habits along the bay, where they’re noisy and intrusive, on the river they’re quiet, and communal. Here, a small flock cruises down the marina’s slow channel with dignity and aplomb.
Living in the “inner bay” – directly on shores of San Francisco Bay – brings one into close contact with Canada geese. Until recently, my impression of Canada geese tended to the unfavorable: noisy, poopy, poopy, and noisy…
Then, small flocks on Canada geese arrived on Old River – in front of my houseboat. They’ve settled in … and I’ve fallen in love with them. Old River brings out the best in Canada geese. Unlike their habits along the bay, where they’re noisy and intrusive, on the river they’re quiet, and communal. Here, a small flock cruises down the marina’s slow channel with dignity and aplomb.
Recently, visiting Canada geese demonstrate keen gustatory pleasure with water hyacinth – an invasive’s invasive.
Further posts on invasive plants - in the Delta , and in South Africa)
The upside? I’m privileged enough to have a place of refuge….
Further posts on invasive plants - in the Delta , and in South Africa)
***
Climate refugee? I’ve departed my houseboat twice in the five weeks since I returned to California – due to excessive heat. Over the next few days, temperatures are predicted to reach 103F, 104F, 109F, and 111F, before dropping into the “cooler” upper 90s. The upside? I’m privileged enough to have a place of refuge….
