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Svjetska zdravstena organizacija je objavila stručan rad o mogućoj kancerogenosti glifoast herbicida već u ožuju 2015.
Život ovisi o čistom okolišu
Foto: Vivian Grisogono
Bez obzira na to, Europska Komisija hoće produžiti dozvolu za glifosat poslije isteka u lipnju 2016, i to na 15 godina, najdulji mogući termin.
Zastupnici Europskog parlamenta, uključujći neke iz Hrvatske, su glasili protiv odluke Komisije u travnju 2016. Slijedi glasanje u svibnju 2016., ali ako nema zaključka, konačna odluka će donjeti Komisija.
Na našoj internetskoj stranici objavljujemo tekstove i informacije na temu zdravlja, okoliša i zaštite životinja. Premda u prvom redu govorimo o otoku Hvaru u Dalmaciji, većina informacija vrijedi za cijelu Hrvatsku, a neke od njih odnose se na Europu, Sjedinjene američke države i ostale dijelove svijeta.
Većina tekstova je pisana na engleskom jeziku, ali s vremenom ćemo dodati i tekstove na hrvatskom jeziku.
Najsrdačnije zahvaljujemo Željki Horvat koja nam je stručno dizajnirala zaštitini znak naše udruge ECO HVAR.
Posebnu hvalu dugujemo Jeleni Bunčuga, Petri Mimica, Barulu Mimici, Ivani Župan, Dinki Barbić i Josipu Vlainiću za prijevode; i Mihaelu Magdiću iz ORION Informatike i Trgovine Varaždin, koji s mnogo strpljenja a s izvrsnim rezultatom dizajnirao našu internetsku stranicu.
Caring for God’s Acre mapped out 20,000 cemeteries and recorded 10,000 species
Churchyards are vital havens for rare wildlife including dormice, bats and beetles, according to an extensive audit of burial grounds around the UK.
The conservation charity Caring for God’s Acre mapped out 20,325 cemeteries, with 800,000 wildlife records submitted and more than 10,800 species recorded.
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Rising temperatures are pushing these Arctic mammals ever farther into Greenland’s north. But eventually there will be nowhere left for them to go
Built like a small bison, weighing as much as a grand piano and covered in thick, shaggy coat, the musk ox is one of the most distinctive species in the high Arctic. But from a hill on Greenland’s tundra, they seem impossible to find.
Each bush, rock and clump of grass resembles a mass of wool and horns in the blustery chill on the edge of the island’s enormous polar ice cap. Scanning the shimmering landscape with binoculars, Chris Sørensen looks for signs of movement.
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Campaigners say consumption such as travel, gifts and food are destroying planet and the meaning of Christmas
Whether out of poverty or virtue, many of us spend much of the year reining in our appetites to save our pennies and our health. But at Christmas many of us put our worries aside and go wild in an orgy of lavish gifting, extensive travel and a gluttonous feeding frenzy.
This carnival of consumption has a cost: not just to our wallets and our waistlines, but also to the climate.
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The Marches, Shropshire: After the wind shook everything up, the rains have returned and the crazy old oaks have withdrawn into themselves
Pigeons of the patient mind swirl over roofs of the post office and a Wetherspoon’s named after Wilfred Owen, the Oswestry-born poet. All the birds have been shaken by this recent brood of storms, which deepen the answering violence of the oceans. Through the physics of vulnerability, all the molecules of bird and wind rush in the same direction, casting hollow bones through the forward motion of primary feathers into the aerodynamics of trust.
The trees are shaken too. An old beech, with all its grand architecture and generations of carved graffiti like runic script, was downed in Cae Glas Park. Out in the fields up Penylan Lane, jackdaws settle in an oak. In its dark hollow is an imprisoned King Lear, who raged against the storm, daring it to “crack its cheeks” and send the “oak-cleaving thunderbolt”. It’s quiet now. Rain returns, clouds wrap the skyline, and the crazy old oaks, instead of raging in their own heads, have withdrawn into themselves. “No,” Lear says, “I will be the pattern of all patience. I will say nothing.”
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Scientists search for a variety to withstand the climate crisis as high temperatures and drought can stress trees
The climate crisis is increasingly affecting agriculture in the United States, including the production of Christmas trees.
Like all crops, Christmas trees are vulnerable to a changing climate, as the United States continues to experience warmer temperatures, more frequent and severe heat, increased rainfall, droughts, wildfires and hurricanes, as a result of global warming and the climate crisis – primarily driven by humans’ burning of fossil fuels.
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From the Flask glacier to King George Island, intrepid researchers expect good cheer, snow and penguins
Many of us will not get a white Christmas this year, but a group of scientists are guaranteed one while carrying out research on the Antarctic peninsula.
While ice and good cheer are expected, their yuletide activities will be very different from those back home. Dr Kate Winter, of Northumbria University, and colleagues will be deploying instruments on Flask glacier to study the way that meltwater affects how quickly glaciers flow into the ocean.
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Subsidence affecting many new builds, raising questions about sustainability of skyscrapers in coastal areas
Miami’s oceanfront skyscrapers are sinking. In 2021 the devastating collapse of the Champlain Towers South condominium in Miami’s Surfside resulted in the loss of 98 lives, and prompted closer inspection of the city’s high-rise shoreline. Now a study has identified unexpected levels of subsidence among many of Miami’s high-rise buildings, including prominent luxury properties such as the Porsche Design Tower, Trump Tower III and Trump International Beach Resort.
Using satellite data gathered between 2016 and 2023, researchers observed between 2cm and 8cm of sinking of buildings along Miami’s beachfront area. One beachfront – Sunny Isles Beach – recorded continuous subsidence in more than 70% of its new builds. The findings, published in Earth and Space Science, show the majority of affected buildings were recently constructed high-rises. Which means it is possible the subsidence is a consequence of their own construction. The combination of hefty high-rise buildings, vibration from construction, groundwater movement and tidal flows are potentially triggering the subsidence, with the worst-affected areas being those with a sandy layered limestone underlying them.
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With restrictions due next month, food vendors are still using such plastics and some traders have not heard of ban
Labake Ajiboye-Richard, the founder of a Lagos-based sustainability consultancy, was driving in Nigeria’s most populous city earlier this month when she saw someone throwing rubbish out of their car window.
“I was so shocked to see that in 2024,” she said. “If you’re throwing something on the road, what are you doing in your home? What are you doing in your community?”
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While some residents take to building houses in trees, officials recognise need for national response to climate disasters
Every summer, Dongting Hu, China’s second-largest freshwater lake, swells in size as flood water from the Yangtze River flows into its borders. Dams and dikes are erected around the lake’s edges to protect against flooding. But this year, not for the first time, they were overwhelmed.
For three days in early July, more than 800 rescue workers in Hunan province scrambled to block the breaches. One rupture alone took 100,000 cubic metres of rock to seal, according to Zhang Yingchun, a Hunan official. At least 7,000 people had to be evacuated. It was one of a series of disasters to hit China as the country grappled with a summer of extreme weather. By August, there had been 25 large floods, the biggest number since records began in 1998, reported state media.
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The death of Tanaru, the last member of an uncontacted group in the Amazon, raises questions about ethnic cleansing of Indigenous people, justice and the future of ancestral lands
For at least 26 years a man known as Tanaru lived alone in a small forest in the south-western Brazilian Amazon, moving around his territory, building several houses, planting crops and hunting. He also dug large, mysterious holes inside his homes.
When a team from the National Indigenous Peoples Foundation (Funai) came across him in 1996, he resisted contact, aiming an arrow at them through a gap in his palm shelter, a scene captured in the 2009 documentary Corumbiara. In 2007, Funai officials made another attempt at contact. Again Tanaru repelled it, leaving one man with a bad arrow wound.
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Revolucionarno novo otkriće istaknulo je litij - lijek koji se dugo koristio za liječenje bipolarnog poremećaja i depresije - kao potencijalnu terapiju za poremećaje autističnog spektra (ASD). Naime, pokazalo se da litij može obnoviti funkciju mozga i ublažiti simptome ponašanja koji su uzrokovani mutacijama u Dyrk1a genu.
Standardni lijek za Parkinsonovu bolest, levodopa, u četrdesetak posto pacijenata nije učinkovit protiv tremora, osobito u stresnim situacijama. Propranolol, međutim, djeluje tijekom stresa, na način da izravno inhibira aktivnost u moždanom krugu koji kontrolira tremor.
Ispijanje kave i čaja može smanjiti rizik od raka glave i vrata, usne šupljine i grla, ukazuje analiza 14 studija. Valja spomenuti, da je čak i kava bez kofeina imala pozitivan učinak.
Večernji obroci mogu utjecati na metaboličko zdravlje, upozorava nedavno objavljena studija. Naime, konzumirati više od 45% dnevnog unosa kalorija nakon 17 sati, može pridonijeti višim razinama glukoze u krvi kod starijih osoba s predijabetesom ili ranim dijabetesom tipa 2, a loše regulirana razina glukoze u krvi može tijekom vremena pridonijeti razvoju dijabetesa tipa 2, većem kardiovaskularnom riziku i kroničnoj upali.
U novoj velikoj studiji otkriveno je da su genetske varijante koje povećavaju mogućnost disleksije povezane s razlikama u područjima mozga koja su uključena u motoričku koordinaciju, vid i jezik.
Ispijanje više šalica kave tijekom dana može pomoći u sprječavanju kognitivnog pada kod osoba s fibrilacijom atrija, ukazuju rezultati novog istraživanja. Inače, fibrilacija atrija je najčešći poremećaj srčanog ritma u odraslih osoba koji povećava rizik od demencije.
Nova studija pokazala je da se plazmatske razine proteina znanog kao placentni faktor rasta (PlGF), potencijalno mogu koristiti kao biomarker za probir i praćenje kognitivnih oštećenja i demencije.
Prema rezultatima nove studije dodatak stereotaktičke radioterapije tijela (SBRT) sistemskoj terapiji sorafenibom značajno poboljšava preživljenje bez progresije bolesti (PFS) i vrijeme do progresije u bolesnika s lokalno uznapredovalim hepatocelularnim karcinomom.
Rezultati nove studije pokazali su da većina hranjivih tvari dobivenih iz jaja (lecitini, apolipoproteini i nezasićene masne kiseline) nije povezana s povećanim rizikom od pretilosti. Iznenađujuće, većina istraživanja sugerira da te hranjive tvari smanjuju vjerojatnost pretilosti putem regulacije metabolizma lipida.
Poznato je da sleep apneja pridonosi srčanim problemima, dijabetesu i bolestima jetre. No, čini se da ona također ima izravne učinke na zdravlje mozga, pokazuje nova studija. Naime, pokazalo se da osobe sa sleep apnejom doživljavaju ubrzano starenje bijele tvari mozga, koja služi za povezivanje različitih regija mozga.
Doba u kojem živimo obilježeno je sve bržim promjenama koje se name?‡u morskom okolišu, a gotovo za sve odgovorni su ljudi. Obalna zona Sredozemlja, pa tako i našeg Jadranskoga mora, mjesto je na kojemu obitava više od polovice ukupnog stanovništva Mediterana te zbog toga ovo usko područje predstavlja i jedan od najugroženijih morskih okoliša.
U našem dijelu svijeta, koji zovemo zapadnim i smatramo razvijenim, prije samo 50 godina nisu sve žene imale pravo glasa na izborima, nisu imale jednak pristup obrazovanju, nisu mogle voditi države i nisu imale pristup visokim pozicijama u poslovnom svijetu.
Gotovo svi su upoznati s činjenicom kako oceani i mora prekrivaju više od 70 % površine Zemlje. Me?‘utim, nedovoljno je prepoznato kako su oceani, mora i obalna područja esencijalni dio Zemljinih ekosustava te kako o njima ovisi cijelo čovječanstvo, bilo na obali ili u dubokoj unutrašnjosti kontinenata! Zašto?
Ovaj cilj održivog razvoja odnosi se na ostvarivanje održive proizvodnje i potrošnje u čemu trenutačno ne uspijevamo jer je ekološki otisak koji ostavljamo i dalje ve?‡i od resursa koje imamo na raspolaganju. Dakle, potrebno je promijeniti načine na koji proizvodimo hranu, smanjiti bacanje hrane, pove?‡ati udjele obnovljive izvore energije u ukupnoj proizvodnji energije, pravilno gospodariti otpadom tijekom čitavog njegovog životnog ciklusa kako bi, me?‘u ostalim što manje utjecali na zaga?‘enje zraka, vode i tla.
Razvoj industrije i infrastrukture kao temelja za pove?‡anje životnog standarda za sve ljude, uz okolišno prihvatljiva rješenja te uključivanje novih tehnologija tema je cilja održivog razvoja koji se odnosi na okolišno prihvatljivu industrijalizaciju, kvalitetnu, pouzdanu, održivu i prilagodljivu infrastrukturu, a sve uz primjenu novih tehnologija, istraživanja i inovacija.
