BEIJING – The greatest risk China faces in its historic modernization is the massive imbalance between urban and rural areas, according to the country’s top agriculture official. “The most important and difficult task is to resolve issues concerning agriculture, countryside and farmers … to realize the agricultural modernization and the urbanization of most farmers,” said Minister of Agriculture Han Changfu […]
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What will it take for France to get serious about regulating prescription drugs? asked Sauveur Boukris. We French love to take pills; we are the biggest consumers of medicines in Europe. French doctors “tend to prescribe far more heavily” than their foreign colleagues, dispensing four or five drugs to treat any given malady, while German or Dutch doctors prescribe two […]
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A parasite lurking in your cat’s litter box could make you suicidal. A study of 46,000 Danish women found that those who were infected with Toxoplasma gondii, a common parasite that lives in the guts of cats and is transmitted through their feces, were 1.5 times more likely to kill themselves than those who weren’t infected and the more T. […]
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Poland is giving up the liberties it fought so hard to gain, said Jacek Zakowski. There was “no coup, no fanfare, no lofty ideas or slogans.” But slowly and incrementally, our own democratically elected government has been passing law after law restricting our freedoms. In the past six months, we’ve granted the government permission to track us through our cellphone […]
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A New Mexico teenager is expected to face murder charges after allegedly gunning down five family members with his parents’ rifles. Nehemiah Griego, 15, is accused of using a .22 caliber rifle to shoot his mother while she slept and then kill his siblings—ages 9, 5, and 2—when they awoke. He then allegedly grabbed an assault rifle and waited downstairs […]
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A new study has found the strongest link yet between air pollution and autism, which experts now say affects one in 50 U.S. schoolchildren. Pregnant women who lived in areas with high levels of diesel exhaust and airborne mercury were found to be twice as likely to have a child with autism as those living in places with the lowest […]
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If you want to go for a walk but don’t want to go alone, you can call Chuck McCarthy and he will come walk with you for $7 a mile. While you are walking you have someone to talk to that will listen and you don’t need a leash. Since he is an underemployed actor, he thought “what can I […]
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Beijing The cloud of pollution over Beijing grew so dense this week that much of the city was rendered invisible. Hundreds of flights were grounded, auto traffic was stalled for scores of miles, and residents rushed to buy masks and air filters. Chinese officials downplayed the air-quality crisis, as usual, saying their readings showed that air pollution was “moderate.” But […]
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More people are driving in traffic every day and breathing in toxins from all the automobiles traveling the same road at the same time. The air around this traffic is filled with millions of tiny particles of magnetite (iron oxide) which enters the body. When it enters the body, it can concentrate in the brain and has been linked to […]
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Johannesburg With cameras rolling, a South African journalist was robbed by two men just moments before he was to give a report. The video shows the two assailants scuffling with reporter Vuyo Mvoko, who shouts, “Hey we’re being mugged!” as he gives up his cellphone and a laptop. “Every South African lives with the reality of crime,” said the South […]
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