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CORRUPTION UPDATES 159

Posted: february 25, 2008, Draft edition

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recent article links

U.S. Ends Protections for Wolves in 3 States, nyt, 2-22-08

global warming kills 54: Out of control tropical moisture sparks massive tornado storm, ap, 2-6-08

climate set for 'sudden shifts', bbc, 2-4-08

essay: growth assures climate meltdown, committee, 6-07

essay: seasons already shifted, committee, 5-07

China 'not ready' for snow crisis, bbc, 2-4-09

Indonesian Chickens, and People, Hard Hit by Bird Flu, nyt, 2-1-08

China's freak Snow: millions experience social collapse, au.news, 2-1-08

snow threatens winter crops, food shortages now, bbc, 1-31-08

china infrastructure shuts down, marketwatch, 1-29-08

 

New articles

1) The Articles linked below were Abstracted from the sources cited. After the abstract there's analysis and commentary, links to related articles, and a link to the database with suggested search terms.

 

Union of Concerned Scientists

Citizens and Scientists for Environmental Solutions

 

Protecting Government Science

Scientific Freedom and the Public Good

feb 14, ‘08

The pursuit of science in an open society has played a large role in the policies that keep us safe and healthy and protect our environment. In recent years, however, the manipulation, suppression, and distortion of federal government science has misinformed the public and led to poor policy decisions.

 

 

On February 14, 2008, a group of prominent scientists called on the U.S. government to establish conditions that would enable federal scientists to produce the scientific knowledge that is needed by a government dedicated to the public good.  In an accompanying report, UCS details specific steps that Congress and the administration can take to restore scientific integrity to federal policy making. The report also explores how science has been misused, with a special focus on systemic changes that hamper federal scientific capacity and make it more difficult for federal agencies like the EPA, FDA, and CDC to fulfill their missions.

 

The next president and Congress will face increasingly complex scientific and technical challenges. They have an historic opportunity codify the scientific freedoms needed for federal science to flourish. We are working to give them the tools to make this a reality.

 

Scientists and Engineers: Join 15,000 of your peers who have called for reform by (/forms/rsi-network-enrollment-form.html) .

 

Non-scientists: (http://ucsaction.org/ucsaction/join.html) to help us defend science from political interference.

 

Scientific Freedom and the Public Good

February 14, 2008

 

Scientific knowledge and its successful applications have played a large role in making the United States of America a powerful nation and its citizens increasingly prosperous and healthy. The challenges that face the United States in the twenty-first century can only be met if this tradition is honored and sustained.

 

To that end, the U.S. government must adhere to high standards of scientific integrity in forming and implementing its policies. Breaches of this principle have damaged the public good and the international leadership of the United States. To meet its obligation to serve the public interest, the government must have reliable scientific work and advice at its disposal, and provide the public with reliable scientific information. This requires the government to provide federal scientists with the resources and the professional environment necessary to carry out their missions effectively and honestly. The government should also draw on the knowledge of federal scientists and of the larger scientific community to formulate public policy in an objective and transparent manner.

 

Scientists employed by government institutions commit themselves to serve the public good free from undisclosed conflicts of interest and to carry out science that is reliable and useful, while respecting statutory limitations such as national security laws. Therefore, government scientists should, without fear of reprisal or retaliation, have the freedom:

to conduct their work without political or private-sector interference;

to candidly communicate their findings to Congress, the public, and their scientific peers;

to publish their work and to participate fully in the scientific community;

to disclose misrepresentation, censorship, and other abuses of science; and

to have their technical work evaluated by scientific peers.

 

We call on Congress and the executive branch to codify these freedoms, to establish stronger means for gathering scientific advice, and to take concrete steps to enhance transparency, so as to create conditions conducive to a thriving scientific enterprise that will serve our democracy with integrity and bring the full fruits of science to all Americans and to the world.

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What's Really Going on Here??

 

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

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Links: censoring science

 

Corruption Database

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environment

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2) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

US judge rejects Bush decision over Navy sonar use

 

 

by Staff Writers

Los Angeles (AFP) Feb 5, 2008

 

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/US_judge_rejects_

Bush_decision_over_Navy_sonar_use_999.html

 

A Los Angeles judge has rejected a decision by President George W. Bush allowing the Navy to use sonar equipment accused of endangering marine life, stating there was no emergency to justify over-riding existing environmental laws, court documents showed Tuesday.

 

In a 36-page opinion, US District Judge Florence Marie Cooper said the Navy must now abide by a previous order which outlawed the use of submarine-hunting sonar in areas off the coast of California known to be populated by whales.

Last month Bush granted an exemption to the Navy over use of sonar, arguing it was vital for military preparedness exercises which were in the "paramount interest of the United States."

 

The decision allowed the Navy to ignore a January 3 injunction requiring it to "monitor for and avoid marine mammals while operating high-intensity, mid-frequency sonar during ... naval exercises."

 

In her ruling, Cooper suggested Bush's attempt to skirt the earlier court order was "constitutionally suspect."

 

She also dismissed the argument put forward by the Navy that the lives of its sailors depended on being properly skilled in hunting submarines from hostile nations.

 

"The Navy's current 'emergency' is simply a creature of its own making, i.e., its failure to prepare adequate environmental documentation in a timely fashion," Cooper wrote.

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What's Really Going on Here??

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

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Also See:

bush corrupts law to kill whales, Los Angeles Times, January 17, 2008

 

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3) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Antarctic glaciers surge to ocean

By Martin Redfern

Rothera Research Station, Antarctica

bbc, 24 February 2008, 00:24 GMT

 

 

UK scientists working in Antarctica have found some of the clearest evidence yet of instabilities in the ice of part of West Antarctica.

 

If the trend continues, they say, it could lead to a significant rise in global sea level.

 

The new evidence comes from a group of glaciers covering an area the size of Texas, in a remote and seldom visited part of West Antarctica.

 

The "rivers of ice" have surged sharply in speed towards the ocean.

 

David Vaughan, of the British Antarctic Survey, explained: "It has been called the weak underbelly of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, and the reason for that is that this is the area where the bed beneath the ice sheet dips down steepest towards the interior.

 

Satellite measurements have shown that three huge glaciers here have been speeding up for more than a decade.

 

The biggest of the glaciers, the Pine Island Glacier, is causing the most concern.

 

"It's a couple of kilometres thick, its 30km wide and it's moving at 3.5km per year, so it's putting a lot of ice into the ocean."

 

Throughout the 1990s, according to satellite measurements, the glacier was accelerating by around 1% a year. Julian Scott's sensational finding this season is that it now seems to have accelerated by 7% in a single season, sending more and more ice into the ocean.

 

"The measurements from last season seem to show an incredible acceleration, a rate of up to 7%. That is far greater than the accelerations they were getting excited about in the 1990s."

The big question now is whether what has been recorded is an exceptional surge or whether it heralds a major collapse of the ice. Julian Scott hopes to find out.

 

"It is extraordinary and we've left a GPS there over winter to see if it is going to continue this trend."

 

If the glacier does continue to surge and discharge most of it ice into the sea, say the researchers, the Pine Island Glacier alone could raise global sea level by 25cm.

 

That might take decades or a century, but neighbouring glaciers are accelerating too and if the entire region were to lose its ice, the sea would rise by 1.5m worldwide.

 

A doubling in snow accumulation in the western Antarctic Peninsula since 1850

american geophysical union, jan 08

 

The Antarctic Peninsula has experienced a dramatic change in climate over the past 50 years (the period of observational record), with annual temperatures increasing and many ice shelves on the fringes of the peninsula disintegrating. Despite this, some records from the peninsula show that the number of days with snowfall has increased by at least 62 days since 1950. To extend knowledge of climate dynamics beyond the 50-year observation record, Thomas et al. (2008) analyzed data from a new ice core drilled at Gomez, a site of high snow accumulation on the Antarctic Peninsula. On the basis of these data, the authors found that snow accumulation has doubled since the 1850s, representing the largest increase observed across the region. Through comparing Gomez records with the behavior of the Southern Annular Mode (SAM), a dominant cycle of atmospheric variability in the Southern Hemisphere, the authors suggest that SAM circulation patterns have shifted to bring warm moist air to the region, causing an increase in snow accumulation as this air cools.

 

Published: 12 January 2008

 

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What's Really Going on Here??

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

The massive deposition of snow at the center of the antiartic while the sea ice melts and the glaciers accelerate into the ocean is interesting.

As I can plainly observe here, at Lattitude 38, the equatorial regions are pumping out a great deal more heat and moisture than I have seen in my lifetime. The heat of the equator has marched northward and is now the dominate force in determining the weather patterns.

Prior to this radical shift, the dominant force during the winter was the northwestern storms out of the bering straight region. Now equator is the dominate force determing the the seasonal weather patterns.

It is apparant that a radical increase in the heat and evaporative power in the equatorial zone is pushing the seasons out of their traditional patterns around the world.

In the antartic it appears that the reving-up of the equatorial engine of heat transfer is likely responsible for both the acceleration of snowfall in the heart of the contienent, the acceleration of the glaciers towards the ocean, and the loss of sea ice.

The increase in air and ocean heating at the equator is putting more moisture into the atmosphere. This heavily moisture-laden air is being sucked into the katabatic, which is depositing extreme amounts snow into the heart of the antartic. This extra snow represents a tremendous increase in the weight of snow at the south pole, which sits at 10,000 feet, increasing the force pushing all the glaciers down to the sea.

At the same time the weight and pressure are increasing the pressure on the glaciers from the south pole, the warming of the antaritic oceans have been melting the ice shelf "plugs," which had obstructed the ends of the glaciers and kept them bottled up.

The rise in antartic ocean tempetures appears to be increasing coastal tempetures inland enough to melt the glaciers enough to provide a water lubrication that is accelerating their un-pluged rush to the sea.

One thing is becoming clear: these changes are severe, and possibly catastrophic on land and sea. The disruptions to the beginning and end of winter are significantly damaging crop yields. The changes in wind direction are altering ocean currents around the world, causing the already precipitious decline in ocean productivity to accelerate.

Judging by the radical speed of the significant changes in the seasons that are being experienced around the world, I expect that the fertility of the planet is about to significantly plunge.

Two things are clear. How we got to this position, and what we need to do to get out of it, and salvage some small piece of our natural world. As americans, we are the main source of the radical increases in co2 during the last 70 years.

The US has doubled its popultation during the last 35 years, and consumption has increased by an incredible 15 times. The fact is that americans are the source of the pollution that has changed the seasons.

The tool we have used to destroy our environment has been, and still is, the irresponsible massive expansion of our population and our consumption that we have allowed to occure.

To sustain our irresponsible growth rate we have used two tools: allowing millions of illegals to enter the country and drive prices up while driving wages down. The second tool is much like the first, but rather than bringing poverty to our country, we go and seek out poverty around the world to bring down wages.

We have allowed our corporations to use china's poverty to drive american worker's wages down to poverty levels, while at the same time making as much money as possible by exploiting the lack of health, safety or environmental law in china.

Our leaders, and the leaders of china and mexico appear to agree that their transformation into consumer nations will be funded by brutal industrialization. Americans have participated in, and funded China's labor and environmental abuses by offshoring as much of our manufacturing as we possibly can.

Domestically, by opening china to a brutal industrialization, and our labor markets to the peasants of mexico, we have sacrificed both our industrial base, our middle class, our economic security, and our environment in one fell swoop.

Because of us confluence of corruption, greed and ignorance, the chinese caught up with our co2 production at the end of last year.

The course we need to steer is clear: we must stop all growth in population. We must completely close the borders. We must return we return the majority of our manufacturing to our country, and no imports should be allowed into our contry unless they were produced in compliance with our labor and environmental laws.

Domestically, we have already exceeded our water and fuel supplies. We have destroyed our schools and hospitals. Our ignorant policy of pursuing profits based on a never-ever expansion of consumption and production by never-ending increasing population has hit the wall.

This irresponsible practice has drained our country of its environmental and social infrastructures. Our irresponsibe growth has changed the seasons and seriously damaged our environment.

The only way to achive policy change of this magnitude is to take control of our government out of the paws of the greedy, and put it back into the hands of the people.

Unless we really change the political system, and break the chains of bribery that the corporations and special interests have used to steal our elections, and bribe all of the candidates and officeholders, we will not be able to stop the irresponsible growth that has destroyed our climate.

Our generation has stamped its mark on this chapter of american history. Our generation has proven that it considers greed more powerful than our rights, our environment, or wisdom.

Our blind greed is the reason why we are continuing to celebrate the expansion of our already bloated population as we watch our environment, our crops, and our water and energy dissappear. Blind greed is why we continue to grow as our schools and social services collaspe around us.

 

Our social, political and economic practices can not even remotely be considered democratic, responsible, or enduring.

The corporate parties and their special interest masters each fund up a couple of "viable" candidates to make the "consumers" believe they have a choice.

We do: we cand choose between the lies of corporate candidate "D," or corporate candidate "R."

Not once in my life have I seen a candidate from outside the corporate parties win a major election.

Until we change that sad fact, our environment is fucked.

 

Climatologists No Better than Reporters: climate change has already happened, committee, may 1, 2007

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Also See:

Arctic sea ice set to hit new low, bbc, 8-13-07

Researchers say summer sea ice could soon vanish, ap, 12-12-07

 

'Unexpected growth' in CO2 found, bbc, 10-23-07

Co2 sets record in 2006, ap, November 23, 2007

Equatorial heat dominating N. Lat weather, BBC NEWS: 12-04-07

 

global warming: ice, fire, and flood

 

Corruption Database

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water

global warming

sea ice

 

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4) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

Salmon arriving in record low numbers

 

SF Chronicle, January 30, 2008

   

 

The Central Valley fall run of chinook salmon apparently has collapsed, portending sharp fishing restrictions and rising prices for consumers while providing further evidence that the state's water demands are causing widespread ecological damage.

 

The bad news for commercial and sport fishermen and the salmon-consuming public surfaced Tuesday when a fisheries-management group warned that the numbers of the bay's biggest wild salmon run had plummeted to near record lows.

In April, the Pacific Fishery Management Council will set restrictions on the salmon season, which typically starts in May. A shortage could drive up the price of West Coast wild salmon.

 

"The low returns are particularly distressing since this stock has consistently been the healthy 'workhorse' for salmon fisheries off California and most of Oregon," the council's executive director, Donald McIsaac, said in a statement Tuesday.

 

At its peak, the fall run has numbered hundreds of thousands of fish, exceeding 800,000 in some years. But this year the preliminary count has put the number at 90,000 adults returning to spawn in the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers and their tributaries. During the past decade, the number of returning fish has never fallen below 250,000.

 

Through the years, the chinook, or king, salmon that pass through San Francisco Bay have suffered from diversions of freshwater to cities and farms, the operation of the water-export pumps that send delta water to other regions, exposure to pollutants and warming ocean conditions.

 

...most sport and environmental groups, attribute the salmon decline primarily to Central Valley dams that flood or block spawning grounds and the delta water pumps that move water around the state.

 

"Twenty years ago, we identified the amount of additional freshwater we needed for healthy fish," he said. A federal law was passed in 1988 to reserve water to help fish, but the water only makes it as far as the delta - not out to the bay, where it would help migrating fish like salmon, he said.

 

Heidi Rooks, an environmental program manager in the Department of Water Resources, said the salmon's woes probably are linked to the Pacific Ocean.

 

"...I'm concerned that ocean conditions, including currents and food sources, are influencing our salmon populations as well," she said. "We're working on habitat restoration, but it's not going to address ocean conditions."

 

"The last two years have been the worst salmon fishing years in all of California history," said Dick Pool, president and owner of Pro-Troll Fishing Products in Concord, a company that makes salmon-fishing equipment.

 

"The main reason has been the collapse of the delta. The tiny little smolts aren't making it the 100 miles from the rivers to the bay. As the water exports have increased over the last five years, the food chain has been significantly affected," he said.

 

Delta smelt, threadfin shad, longfin smelt and striped bass have declined in numbers starting in the early 2000s, she said. "That's the same time that the salmon that returned this year to spawn were going through the delta," she said.

 

The five highest water-export years have all occurred since 2000, she said.

 

Today's adult fish were migrating out to the ocean in 2005, the year the delta exports hit a record high, Swanson said.

 

"Dams along the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers are holding back water, and the flows are usually less than what the salmon need," Swanson said. The low flows of freshwater to the bay can also raise overall water temperatures beyond what is healthy for juvenile salmon, she said. In the delta, the water pumps suck up salmon and other fish. The pumping system moves the juvenile salmon into large, open areas of the delta, where they are prey for bigger fish.

 

Scientists studying the decline in fish populations also consider the effect of the ocean environment, although they agree that it is still too early to measure the effects of global warming. They look at the timing of migrations and food availability, said William Sydeman, a biologist with the Farallon Institutes for Advanced Ecosystem Research.

 

He found that in 2005, 2006 and, to a lesser extent, in 2007, the breeding failures of the Cassin's auklet on the Farallones could be linked to the demise of krill in the marine environment at the time when the birds needed it. Salmon, too, feed on krill, anchovies and other small aquatic creatures, which are affected in abundance by ocean conditions

 

"The ocean environment has a strong influence on how many survive the initial period at sea and how many come back to spawn three to four years later in the Sacramento River," Sydeman said.

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What's Really Going on Here??

unbridled, irrresponsible growth killing california

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

The web of life is breaking apart around us. What are you going to do?

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Also See:

Ocean dead zones expanding, ScienceNOW Daily News, 25 January 2008

Yangtze almost dead, The Guardian, Thursday January 17 2008

Water shortage limiting growth, lat, 1-14-07

Energy Bill: Dems Serve Big Oil, NYT, December 14, 2007

Corruption Updates 71, 9th article on the page, "Only 50 years left' for sea fish"

Corruption Updates 93, 3rd article on the page, "Record Gulf of Mexico ‘Dead Zone’ Is Predicted"

Corruption Updates 94, 8th article on the page, "Climate Change Debate Hinges On Economics"

 

Corruption Updates 106, 3rd article on the page, Tiny Delta fish at center of huge water war

Fish farms threaten salmon with extinction, NYT, December 13, 2007

World fish stocks collaspe: africa feeling it first, nyt, January 14, 2008

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Warming risks Antarctic sea life

By Helen Briggs

BBC News, 2-16-08

 

Unique marine life in Antarctica will be at risk from an invasion of sharks, crabs and other predators if global warming continues, scientists warn.

 

Crabs are poised to return to the Antarctic shallows, threatening creatures such as giant sea spiders and floppy ribbon worms, says a UK-US team.

 

Some have evolved without predators for tens of millions of years.

 

Bony fish and sharks would move in if waters warm further, threatening species with extinction, they say.

 

In the last 50 years, sea surface temperatures around Antarctica have risen by 1 to 2C, which is more than twice the global average.

 

Loss of species

 

Speaking in Boston at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS), the researchers said global warming could fundamentally change the ecosystem, leading to the loss of some species.

Professor Wilga said the arrival of sharks and shell-crushing bony fishes would lead to dramatic changes in the number and proportions of species found there.

 

Shrimp, ribbon worms and brittle stars are likely to be the most vulnerable to population declines.

 

Dr Sven Thatje of the National Oceanography Centre at the University of Southampton, UK, said animals living in shallow water in Antarctica were unique on Earth today because they evolved in a very cold environment over tens of millions of years.

 

Extreme conditions

 

"In the course of a process we call Antarctic cooling that started about 40 million years ago, all major seafloor predators such as sharks and crabs went extinct in Antarctica because they were not able to cope with these extreme conditions," he told BBC News.

 

The researchers say urgent local and global actions are needed to protect this last pristine environment.

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What's Really Going on Here??

Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

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Hammerhead in need of protection

By Helen Briggs

BBC News, 1-18-08

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/go/pr/fr/-/2/hi/science/nature/7251651.stm

 

 

Over-fishing and demand for shark fins, an expensive delicacy, have pushed one of the world's iconic animals towards the brink of extinction, say experts.

 

The scalloped hammerhead shark is to be added to the official endangered species list this year, under the heading "globally endangered".

 

Their plight has been discussed at the American Association for the Advancement of Science annual meeting.

 

It was told that enforcement of marine reserves would aid shark protection.

 

The observation takes account of new research that shows hammerhead and great white sharks patrol fixed routes in the ocean, gathering at hotspots to mate or feed.

 

Dr Julia Baum, a marine ecologist at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, US, and a member of the World Conservation Union (IUCN), said excessive fishing was putting many of the ocean's "most majestic predators" at risk of extinction.

 

Speaking at the Boston meeting, she said: "Sharks evolved 400 million years ago, and we could now lose some species in the next few decades - so that would be just a blink of an eye in evolutionary time."

 

Fishing for sharks in international waters is unrestricted, but conservation groups are calling for urgent measures to set limits on shark catch and fishing quotas.

 

They say demand for shark fins as an expensive delicacy is greatly increasing the pressure on shark populations.

 

They want a meaningful ban on the practice of shark finning, which involves a shark's fins being removed before the rest of the animal is thrown back into the ocean to die.

 

Hammerheads are among the most commonly caught sharks for finning. A large shark fin can fetch over £50 a kilo.

 

Previous research by Dr Baum's team has found that sharks are declining rapidly in parts of the Atlantic Ocean.

 

All species they looked at had declined by over 50% since the early 1970s.

 

For many large coastal shark species, the drop in numbers was much greater: tiger, scalloped hammerhead and dusky shark populations have fallen by more than 95%.

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Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

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Map shows toll on world's oceans

By Helen Briggs, Science reporter,

2-14-08, BBC News, Boston

 

'Fly-over' of impacted oceans

 

 

Only about 4% of the world's oceans remain undamaged by human activity, according to the first detailed global map of human impacts on the seas.

 

A study in Science journal says climate change, fishing, pollution and other human factors have exacted a heavy toll on almost half of the marine waters.

 

Only remote icy areas near the poles are relatively pristine, but they face threats as ice sheets melt, it warns.

 

The authors say the data is a "wake-up call" to policymakers.

 

Lead scientist, Dr Benjamin Halpern, of the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis in Santa Barbara, US, said humans were having a major impact on the oceans and the marine ecosystems within them.

 

"In the past, many studies have shown the impact of individual activities," he said. "But here for the first time we have produced a global map of all of these different activities layered on top of each other so that we can get this big picture of the overall impact that humans are having rather than just single impacts."

 

Co-author Dr Mark Spalding told BBC News that the map was the first attempt to describe and quantify the combined threats facing the world's oceans from human factors, ranging from commercial shipping to over-fishing.

 

"There's an element of wake-up call when you get maps like this," he said. "Human threats are all pervasive across the world's oceans.

 

"The map is an impetus for action, I think that it is a real signal to roll up our sleeves and start managing our coast and oceans."

 

Complex model

 

The international team of 20 scientists in the US, Canada and UK built a complex model to handle large amounts of information on 17 different human threats.

 

The researchers divided the world's oceans into 1km-square sections and examined all real data available on how humankind is influencing the marine environment.

 

They then calculated "human impact scores" for each location, presenting this as a global map of the toll people have exacted on the seas.

 

 

The scientists say they were shocked by the findings.

 

"I think the big surprise from all of this was seeing what the complete coverage of human impacts was," said Dr Spalding, senior marine scientist at The Nature Conservancy, a conservation group in Newmarket, UK. "There's nowhere really that escaped. It's quite a shocking map to see."

 

He said the two biggest drivers in destroying marine habitats were climate change and over-fishing.

 

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Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

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U.S. Ends Protections for Wolves in 3 States

By KIRK JOHNSON

nyt, 2-22-08

 

DENVER — The Bush administration on Thursday announced an end to federal protection for gray wolves in Montana, Wyoming and Idaho, concluding that the wolves were reproductively robust enough to survive.

 

“Wolves are back,” said Lynn Scarlett, the deputy secretary of the Department of the Interior, in a telephone conference call with reporters. “Gray wolves in the northern Rocky Mountains are thriving and no longer need protection.”

 

A coalition of wildlife and environmental groups dismissed the government’s claims and announced plans for a lawsuit to reverse the decision, which is to take effect next month.

 

Advocates for the animals said there were too few wolves to make a genetically sound population, and that state plans to manage wolf populations were underfinanced and fueled by a long-simmering animosity against wolves that could drive them back to threatened status.

 

“The numbers are inadequate and the state programs are, too,” said Louisa Willcox, a senior wildlife advocate at the Natural Resources Defense Council, a conservation group that is participating in the planned lawsuit.

 

From a base population of 66 wolves introduced into Yellowstone National Park and central Idaho in the mid-1990s, there are now nearly 1,300, with an additional 230 or so in Montana that have drifted down from Canada. State management plans allow for wolf hunting, or outright eradication in some places — including most of Wyoming — with a target population of 150 in each of the three states.

 

Biologists cited by the environmental and wildlife groups say that target population is too small, and suggest instead that 2,000 to 3,000 animals are the minimum needed.

 

“We’re not at recovery yet,” said Doug Honnold, the managing attorney at the Northern Rockies office of Earthjustice, a nonprofit legal group based in Oakland, Calif. “We’re in the neighborhood, we’re close, but we’re not there.”

 

Removing federal protections now, Mr. Honnold said, would violate the language of the Endangered Species Act that requires decision makers to use the best possible science in determining a viable target population.

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Alex Wierbinski, Berkeley, Ca., February, 2008

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9) The Article linked below was Abstracted from the source cited.

India tiger population declines

India's tiger population has fallen drastically during the past five years, according to a new government census.

bbc, 2-13-08

 

The increasingly endangered animals' numbers have fallen to 1,411, down from 3,642 in the last major survey in 2002.

 

Wildlife activists blame poaching and urbanisation for the decline and say the authorities must do more.

 

Last year, federal authorities announced the creation of a special force to protect tigers. But it is unclear whether it has worked.

 

The latest census, released on Tuesday, said that there had been a decline in tiger population all over India.

 

The only exception was the southern state of Tamil Nadu where the animals' numbers had gone up to 76 from 60 five years ago.

 

Wildlife experts say urgent efforts should be made to save the animals.

 

"It is now time to act and save tigers from human beings. We have to create inviolate areas for tigers and provide modern weapons to forest guards," conservationist Valmik Thapar told Hindustan Times newspaper.

 

Experts blame the government for failing to crack down on poachers and the illegal trade in tiger skins.

 

Tigers are poached for their body parts - skins are prized for fashion and tiger bones are used for oriental medicines.

 

Tiger pelts can fetch up to $12,500 in China.

 

According to reports, there were 40,000 tigers in India a century ago.

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Insect explosion 'a threat to food crops'

 

By Steve Connor, Science Editor

Independent, Tuesday, 12 February 2008

 

Researchers found that the numbers of leaf-eating insects are likely to surge as a result of rising levels of CO2, at a time when crop production will have to be boosted to feed an extra three billion people living at the end of 21st century.

 

Scientists found that, during one of the last great episodes of global warming 55.8 million years ago, there was a significant increase in both the amount of damage caused by leaf-eating insects and the variety of injuries they inflicted on plants.

 

They believe that the 5C rise in global temperatures caused by a tripling of CO2 levels during the palaeocene-eocene thermal maximum (PETM) period sent insect numbers soaring and left an indelible impression on the fossilised leaves preserved since that time.

 

The percentage of leaves that suffered extensive insect damage rose dramatically during the PETM as foraging became more intensive. The researchers warned that the same effect might be seen during the present period of global warming caused by man-made emissions of CO2, which could double the pre-industrial concentration of the gas by the end of the century.

 

Ellen Currano of Pennsylvania State University, the lead author of the study, said that although the global warming experienced during the PETM occurred tens of millions of years ago, it is still the best analogy we have for what may happen in the future.

The study found that the leaf damage recorded in about 5,000 different fossils jumped from between 15 and 38 per cent prior to the PETM to 57 per cent during the period of global warming. Leaf damage then returned to about 33 per cent after temperatures fell.

 

"We think that the warming allowed insect species from the tropics ... to migrate north," Ms Currano said.

 

In addition to migration from tropical regions, the scientists believe that insects had to eat more because the rising concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere made leaves less nutritious because they contained relatively smaller concentrations of nitrogen. "With more CO2 available to plants, photosynthesis is easier and plants can make the same amount of food for themselves without having to put so much protein in their leaves," Ms Currano said.

 

Consequently, when CO2 increases, leaves have less protein and insects need to eat more to acquire the nutrients they need. Plants can grow faster when CO2 levels rise, but they suffer from a disproportionate increase in damage, she said.

 

There is still debate over what caused the global warming during the PETM. One theory is that it resulted from a massive release of methane from frozen deposits under the seabed. Another is that it was caused by huge volumes of CO2 pumped out from volcanoes.

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Python 'Invaders' Spreading Beyond the Everglades

redorbit, 2-22-08

 

The Everglades apparently isn't big enough for the giant invaders, who have grown fat, happy and increasingly numerous on a diet of unsuspecting natives. Over the last year, pythons have been found in the wild from Key Largo to Glades County -- and a new study suggests the exotic predators could spread beyond South Florida.

 

Far beyond.

 

The Burmese, or Indian, python -- at least theoretically -- would feel right at home from California to Delaware in an array of habitats from scrub deserts to mountain forests, according to a study by federal scientists. In 100 years, global warming might even extend the range for the big snakes as far north as the Big Apple.

 

The results, said lead author Gordon Rodda, a zoologist with the United States Geological Survey, will probably even surprise many biologists.

 

The suitable habitat, which stretches from coast to coast, underlines an all-terrain capability that scientists say has allowed one of the world's largest snakes to thrive in the Everglades.

 

The scientists found that the snakes could adapt to climates in 11 states across the southern border as well as Mexico. Under a global warming model, it could make a go of it as far north as New York and New Jersey.

 

For scientists and state wildlife managers, the continuing spread of the snake on its own is a real concern.

 

"The evidence from Florida is that they are spreading northward at a rapid rate," Rodda said.

 

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Drug-Resistant Bacteria Found in Wild Arctic Birds

Ker Than

for National Geographic News

January 24, 2008

 

 http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/pf/35851454.html

 

Microbes that are immune to commonly used drugs have been found inside birds living in some of Earth's most remote regions, scientists say.

 

The research suggests that antibiotic resistance has spread deep into nature—and humans are likely to blame.

 

"This is an indication how far we have pushed antibiotic resistance," said study leader Björn Olsen, a professor in the department of infectious diseases at Uppsala University Hospital in Sweden.

 

The researchers sampled waste from 97 birds belonging to a dozen different species from the Arctic tundra of northeastern Siberia, northern Alaska, and northern Greenland.

 

Eight birds—including sandpipers, geese, and gulls—carried Escherichia coli bacteria that was resistant to one or more commonly prescribed antibiotics.

 

"Many of these antibiotics are used at hospitals against severe infections such as pneumonia, urinary tract infections, or septicemia [blood poisoning]," Olsen said.

 

He and his team report their findings in the January issue of the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases.

 

"This is not a natural resistance," Olsen said. "I believe what we found on the tundra is a reflection of pickup from human activity."

 

The researchers speculate that the birds contracted drug-resistant E. coli from contact with human sewage or waste in lower latitudes before migrating north.

 

Infected birds could spread resistant bacteria to other animals or—in rare cases—even back to humans as the birds migrate around the world, Olsen said.

 

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Deadly new form of MRSA emerges

A deadly strain of the superbug MRSA which can lead to a flesh-eating form of pneumonia has emerged.

bbc15 January 2008, 08:50 GMT

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/low/health/7188741.stm

 

 

Research suggests it may be more prevalent among the gay community - the gay San Francisco district of Castro appears to have been hardest hit.

 

So far only two cases of the new form of the USA300 strain of the bug have been recorded in the UK.

 

It is not usually contracted in hospitals, but in the community - often by casual contact.

 

The new strain is resistant to treatment by many front-line antibiotics.

 

It causes large boils on the skin, and in severe cases can lead to fatal blood poisoning or necrotising pneumonia, which eats away at the lungs.

 

Researchers say the bug has so far been 13 times more prevalent in gay men in San Francisco than in other people.

 

In the Castro district - where more gay people live than anywhere else in the US - about one in 588 people are carrying the bug.

 

In the general San Francisco community the figure was around one in 3,800.

 

MRSA EVOLUTION

The first MRSA strain, resistant to the penicillin substitute methicillin, was discovered in 1961

The USA300 strain was first isolated from a patient in 2001 - it is now the dominant form of Staphylococcus infection in the US

The latest variant of USA300 - FPR3757- is resistant to six major kinds of antibiotics

Even the new variant is treatable with some antibiotics, most importantly vancomycin

However, doctors fear it is close to acquiring resistance to that drug as well

 

 

"But because the bacteria can be spread by more casual contact, we are also very concerned about a potential spread of this strain into the general population."

 

The study, reported in Annals of Internal Medicine, was based on a review of medical records from outpatient clinics and medical centres in San Francisco and Boston.

 

Professor Mark Enright, from Imperial College and St Mary's Hospital, London, Britain's leading authority on MRSA, said: "It's quite surprising that the figures are so high.

 

"We do know that the USA300 strain is extremely good at spreading between people through skin-to-skin contact.

 

"In the US it is already moving into the wider community."

 

"It is worrying that one in ten of the American cases are resistant to antibiotics, but most cases are treatable."

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