South Korea reported 15 new cases of the coronavirus Wednesday, intensifying concerns of an outbreak following a lull in reported South Korean infections.A total of 46 people in South Korea have been infected with the highly contagious virus, which causes a pneumonia-like illness recently named COVID-19. South Korean health officials this week warned of a possible “new phase” of the outbreak, following five days in which no new infections were reported.Thirteen of the latest cases are in the area around Daegu, South Korea’s fourth largest city, according to the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC).More than 1,000 people are being checked for the virus or are under quarantine, the Yonhap news agency reported Wednesday, citing figures from the KCDC. The virus has killed more than 2,000 people and infected more than 75,000 worldwide. Almost all of the infections have been in China.No South Koreans are reported to have …

Many wealthy nations are letting the world’s younger generations down by failing to curb planet-warming emissions, a U.N.-backed report said Wednesday, warning climate change posed an urgent threat to the health and future of every child and adolescent.A new global index showed children in Norway, South Korea and the Netherlands had the best chance at survival and well-being thanks to good health care, education and nutrition.   But a ranking of countries by per-capita carbon emissions put those and other rich nations, including the United States and Australia, close to the bottom on that measure, as major contributors to global health threats driven by climate change.”Countries need to overhaul their approach to child and adolescent health, to ensure that we not only look after our children today but protect the world they will inherit in the future,” said former New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark, co-chair of the international commission …

A roadside bombing targeted a police vehicle in northwestern Pakistan on Tuesday, killing a policeman and wounding three others, officials said. The police were assigned to escort health workers during an anti-polio vaccination campaign in the region.      No one immediately claimed responsibility for the bombing in Kolachi, a town in the Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province which borders Afghanistan. Pakistan regularly carries out anti-polio drives, despite attacks and threats by the Taliban who claim the campaign is a Western conspiracy to sterilize children.      Pakistani security forces were searching the area for the attackers, said police official Wahid Khan. No polio workers were travelling with the police at the time of the bombing, he added.      Attacks on anti-polio campaigns increased in the years following revelations that a fake hepatitis vaccination campaign was used as a ruse by the CIA in the hunt for al-Qaida leader Osama bin …

The U.N. secretary-general said Tuesday that the virus outbreak that began in China poses a very dangerous situation” for the world, but “is not out of control.”      Speaking in an interview with The Associated Press, Antonio Guterres said that” the risks are enormous and we need to be prepared worldwide for that.”      Guterres said his greatest worry was a spread of the virus to areas withless capacity in their health service,” particularly some African countries. The World Health Organization is looking into how to help handle such a development, he added.      Egypt recently reported its first case of the virus, raising fears of its spread to the African continent.      The outbreak has infected more than 73,000 people globally. The World Health Organization has named the illness COVID-19, referring to its origin late last year and the coronavirus that causes it.      …

Chinese health officials reported Tuesday the number of confirmed cases from a coronavirus outbreak has surpassed 72,000, with the death toll rising to nearly 1,900.The latest update included 98 more deaths and 1,886 new cases of the virus that has strained China’s healthcare system and caused authorities to put areas on lockdown to try to stop it from spreading.The country’s state television reported that one person who died from the virus Tuesday was Liu Zhiming, the director of Wuchang Hospital in Wuhan, the capital of Hubei province that is the epicenter of the outbreak.The head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, said Monday that Chinese data from recent days appeared to indicate a decline in new cases. However, he said the trend “must be interpreted very cautiously.””Trends can change as new populations are affected. It is too early to tell if this reported decline will continue. Every scenario …

Australia is preparing to evacuate more than 200 of its citizens from the coronavirus-hit cruise ship, the Diamond Princess, in Yokohama, Japan.  They will face two weeks in isolation on their return home.   Also, the first group of Australian coronavirus evacuees from the Chinese city, Wuhan, has been released from quarantine. The Diamond Princess has been in quarantine since February 3. Onboard the cruise liner have been about 3,700 passengers and crew, including dozens of Australian tourists.The ship has more than 450 confirmed cases of the COVID-19 coronavirus, including several Australians. It is the largest cluster of infections outside China, where the virus was first reported.Australian passengers must decide Tuesday if they will take up their government’s offer of an evacuation flight out of Japan.  Authorities in Canberra are planning to fly them home on Wednesday.  They will all go into isolation for 14 days, in addition to the time …

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos says he will give $10 billion of his own money to fight climate change.The world’s wealthiest person made the pledge Monday in an Instagram post.“Climate change is the biggest threat to our planet,” Bezos wrote. “I want to work alongside others both to amplify known ways and to explore new ways of fighting the devastating impact of climate change.”He said the initiative, called the Bezos Earth Fund, would begin issuing grants this summer.With the announcement, Bezos joins the ranks of several other U.S. billionaires who have pledged large sums of money to fight the effects of climate change, including Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates, former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg and hedge fund manager Tom Steyer.Amazon has faced criticism from its own employees for not doing enough to combat climate change. The company, which delivers billions of parcels each year, has a high carbon footprint based …

Extreme hot spells made increasingly likely by climate change could overload urban power grids and cause roving blackouts as an ever-greater share of humanity opt to live in cities, scientists said Monday.In a series of studies and comment pieces in a special edition of the journal Nature Energy, researchers examined how cities can better use renewable power sources and plan for more frequent and potent temperature swings.With more than half of mankind expected to live in cities by 2050, existing infrastructure relying on power from fossil fuels is likely to prove insufficient to meet growing demand, as well as the exploding use of air conditioning as urban heat skyrockets in summer.While climate change is a long-term phenomenon, an international team of researchers wanted to see what effect short-term weather extremes would have on urban power grids.They used a host of climate models to simulate how electricity demand was likely to …

Italy’s opposition leader Matteo Salvini provoked a vehement backlash on Monday after insinuating that migrant women who went to emergency rooms to seek an abortion led an “uncivilized” life.The comments from the ex-interior minister and head of the far-right League that some women having abortions were using emergency rooms “like health ATMs” came during a political rally in Rome on Sunday.Anti-migrant diatribes regularly launched by Salvini, a staunch Catholic, have made him hugely popular among supporters, who see in his nationalist “Italians first” messages a way to restore Italian pride.”Emergency room nurses in Milan let me know there are women who have shown up for the seventh time for an abortion,” Salvini told supporters.”It’s not for me to judge, it’s right for a woman to choose, but the emergency room can’t be the solution for uncivilized lifestyles in 2020.”Just before his comment, Salvini had railed against the problem of “non-Italians” …

Japanese officials have confirmed 99 more people infected by the new virus aboard the quarantined cruise ship Diamond Princess, bringing the total to 454, the Health Ministry said Monday.      The ministry has been carrying out tests on passengers and crew on the ship, docked in Yokohama, a port city near Tokyo.      The 14-day quarantine for those on the ship was due to end Wednesday.      Outside China, the ship has had the largest number of cases of the COVID-19 illness caused by the virus that emerged in China late last year.      The ministry said it now has tested 1,723 people on the Diamond Princess. The ship had about 3,700 passengers and crew.      Two chartered planes flew 340 Americans who were aboard the vessel out of Japan late Sunday. About 380 Americans had been on the ship. The State Department announced later …

A lot of people are surviving cancer because new treatments are so effective. But there’s one thing that stands in the way for many people, and that’s having the money to pay for the drugs to fight their cancer. This includes people in the U.S. VOA’s Carol Pearson reports that at least one hospital is working to make cancer treatment more affordable. …

Record high temperatures reportedly measured in Antarctica will take months to verify, the U.N. weather agency said Sunday.A spokesman for the World Meteorological Organization said the measurements made by researchers from Argentina and Brazil earlier this month have to undergo a formal process to ensure that they meet international standards.”A formal decision on whether or not this is a record is likely to be several months away,” said Jonathan Fowler, the WMO spokesman.Scientists at an Argentine research base measured a temperature of 18.3° C (nearly 65° F) Feb. 6 on a peninsula that juts out from Antarctica toward the southern tip of South America. Last week, researchers from Brazil claimed to have measured temperatures above 20° C on an island off the peninsula.Fowler said both measurements would need to be transmitted to Prof. Randall Cerveny, a researcher at Arizona State University who examines reported temperature records for WMO.Cerveny then shares …

U.S. health officials are preparing for a second wave of the winter flu season, complicated this year by similarities between flu symptoms and those of the coronavirus that has killed more than 1,500 in China and spread fear around the world. A first round of seasonal flu, caused by a strain of influenza B, named B-Victoria for the city in which it was discovered, peaked in the United States in late December and then dropped off, according to the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention.  However, the CDC says a second round of flu began in late January, caused by a strain of influenza A that is related to the swine flu that first appeared in 2009, and cases continue to increase. While there have only been 15 confirmed coronavirus cases in the United States as of Friday, health officials have expressed concern that if the virus were to spread in …

Staff and patients celebrated at Beatrice Government Hospital this week after a U.S. charity known as We Care Solar installed solar power in the medical center’s labor and maternity wards.The hospital is one of more than 200 institutions that have benefited from the $3 million project by the California-based NGO.Eighteen-year-old Bridget Dube delivered her son Rodney under the solar-powered lights Tuesday night. Two of her sisters delivered their babies when the hospital had no solar energy.”We are really happy. This is a real relief,” Dube said. “We now have solar lights which are handy when there is no electricity. Our children and those in the labor ward will no longer be in darkness.”It was difficult without solar energy because doctors struggled to help expectant mothers, she said, adding that changing diapers in the dark was difficult.Because of recurring droughts and dilapidated power-generating equipment, Zimbabwe faces massive power outages that can …

A U.S.-funded charity has started installing solar panels to provide electricity to the maternity wards of rural hospitals in Zimbabwe. The move should come as a relief to new and expecting mothers, as power cuts have left many Zimbabwean hospitals without working lights. Columbus Mavhunga reports from Beatrice Government Hospital, about an hour’s drive south of Zimbabwe’s capital, Harare.   …

(Warning: This story includes content of a sexual nature and descriptions that some may find disturbing.) Cynthia, who for privacy does not wish to use her real name, was 12 years old when a senior female teacher announced that girls at her school — more than 100 — would undergo genital stretching. Under pressure from the girls’ parents, the school arranged for older women to instruct the girls on how to stretch their labia and to use traditional herbs to make it permanent. “It was painful,” Cynthia said. “It wasn’t really something pleasant for me as a person. Because at that time, you’re something like 12 years, 11 years — you’re not sexually active. So why are you doing this thing? Honestly, why are you doing this so-called ‘pulling,’ whatever people call it?  I didn’t know why, but because we were many, some days they would say, ‘Get a partner. Get a partner, you do it to each …