Following a red carpet arrival Saturday at the New Orleans Museum of Art, King Felipe VI and Queen Letizia of Spain enjoyed music by a jazz group and a cultural performance by Mardi Gras Indians as they ended a visit to the city celebrating its tricentennial.

After a private lunch with New Orleans Mayor Latoya Cantrell, Louisiana Lieutenant Governor Billy Nungesser and other dignitaries and officials, the royals departed New Orleans for San Antonio, Texas, which is also celebrating 300 years of existence.

“It was a great and amazing weekend for the city, our residents and the king and queen for them to come back to a former Spanish colony,” said Trey Caruso, a spokesman for Cantrell’s office.

Musical connections

Clarinetist, music historian and Xavier University Spanish professor Michael White said he and his Original Liberty Brass Band played two pieces with a connection to Europe and New Orleans at the New Orleans Museum of Art.

The first piece was Panama, a march in the traditional European style.

“It was published in 1911, and all over the country it was played by and read by brass bands,” White said prior to the performance. “But in New Orleans they kind of threw away the sheet music and improvised, and therefore made it personal. I think it’s a good way to show the interaction between European culture and New Orleans culture.”

The second piece, Andalusian Strut, was one of White’s compositions. It combines a common flamenco structure and flamenco-type rhythms and melodies with classic New Orleans jazz style and improvisation, he said.

“That one went over really, really well,” White said after the event. “The king and all of the people there really loved it.”

White said their third song was When the Saints Go Marching In, which White described as “probably the most famous song in New Orleans history.”

“We surprised them by singing the chorus in Spanish,” he said.

The Mardi Gras Indians, groups of African-Americans who create elaborate feathered and beaded costumes in which they strut and dance through the streets on Mardi Gras, performed as well.

“Though the program was relatively short, I think overall it gave a good idea of New Orleans’ culture,” White said.

Arrived Thursday

Felipe and Letizia flew in Thursday evening to Louisiana, which was a Spanish colony from 1763 to 1802. They arrived at New Orleans’ airport at sunset and were greeted by several officials, including Louisiana Governor John Bel Edwards and Cantrell.

They saluted New Orleans’ centuries-old Spanish heritage at an event Friday at Gallier Hall, a former City Hall opened in 1853 and renovated for the city’s 300th anniversary. That evening, they visited two buildings erected under Spanish rule: St. Louis Cathedral and the Cabildo, the Spanish government seat in Louisiana.

On Monday they’ll go to Washington for a White House visit Tuesday with President Donald Trump and first lady Melania Trump.
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From: MeNeedIt

A major fire has torn through one of Scotland’s architectural gems, the Mackintosh building at the Glasgow School of Art, for the second time in four years.

More than 120 firefighters fought the blaze during the night as it gutted the 1909 building and spread to a theater and a nearby nightclub. No casualties were reported.

“The extent of the damage is very severe,” Peter Heath, deputy assistant chief officer of the Scottish Fire and Rescue Service, told reporters at the scene in Glasgow city center Saturday morning.

The fire “has reached from the ground floor right through to the roof,” he said.

By morning the fire was under control, but smoke was still rising from the building as firefighters sprayed it from tall ladders. Heath said the theater was still on fire and its roof had partly collapsed, but the blaze was no longer spreading.

The Mackintosh building had been scheduled to reopen next year after millions of pounds in restoration works following a fire in May 2014.

“My first thoughts tonight are for the safety of people, but my heart also breaks for Glasgow’s beloved School of Art,” Scottish First Minister Nicola Sturgeon said on Twitter.

The Mackintosh building is named after its architect, Charles Rennie Mackintosh, Scotland’s most influential designer.

The School of Art’s website says the building “heralded the birth of a new style in 20th century European architecture.”

Heath said fire crews were called about 20 minutes before midnight Friday, and by the time they arrived fire had spread to the whole building.

The area was quickly evacuated and cordoned off. It remained inaccessible to the public Saturday morning.

“This is a devastating loss for Glasgow, absolutely devastating,” Heath said.
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From: MeNeedIt

California officials, having concluded coffee drinking is not a risky pastime, are proposing a regulation that will essentially tell consumers of America’s favorite beverage they can drink up without fear.

The unprecedented action Friday by the Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment to propose a regulation to clear coffee of the stigma that it could pose a toxic risk followed a review of more than 1,000 studies published this week by the World Health Organization that found inadequate evidence that coffee causes cancer.

The state agency implements a law passed by voters in 1986 that requires warnings of chemicals known to cause cancer and birth defects. One of those chemicals is acrylamide, which is found in many things and is a byproduct of coffee roasting and brewing present in every cup of joe.

Win for coffee industry 

If the regulation is adopted, it would be a huge win for the coffee industry, which faces potentially massive civil penalties after recently losing an 8-year-old lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court that could require scary warnings on all coffee packaging sold in California.

Judge Elihu Berle found that Starbucks and other coffee roasters and retailers had failed to show that benefits from drinking coffee outweighed any cancer risks. He had previously ruled the companies hadn’t shown the threat from the chemical was insignificant.

The state’s action rejects that ruling.

“The proposed regulation would state that drinking coffee does not pose a significant cancer risk, despite the presence of chemicals created during the roasting and brewing process that are listed under Proposition 65 as known carcinogens,” the agency said in a statement. “The proposed regulation is based on extensive scientific evidence that drinking coffee has not been shown to increase the risk of cancer and may reduce the risk of some types of cancer.”

​Unprecedented move

Attorney Raphael Metzger, who won the court case on behalf of The Council for Education and Research on Toxics, said he was shocked the agency would move to nullify the court decision and undermine its own report more than a decade ago that drinking even small amounts of coffee resulted in a significant cancer risk.

“The takeaway is that the state is proposing a rule contrary to its own scientific conclusion. That’s unprecedented and bad,” Metzger said. “The whole thing stinks to high hell.”

The National Coffee Association had no comment on the proposed change. In the past, the organization has said coffee has health benefits and that the lawsuit made a mockery of the state law intended to protect people from toxics.

Scientific evidence on coffee has gone back and forth over many years, but concerns have eased recently about possible dangers, with some studies finding health benefits.

Big Coffee didn’t deny that acrylamide was found in the coffee, but argued it was only found at low levels and was outweighed by other benefits such as antioxidants that reduce cancer risk.

Congress

The state agency’s action comes about a week after bipartisan bills were introduced in both houses of Congress to require science-based criteria for labels on food and other products. One of the sponsors, Rep. Kurt Schrader, D-Oregon, alluded to the California coffee lawsuit as an example of misleading warnings.

“When we have mandatory cancer warnings on a cup of coffee, something has gone seriously wrong with the process,” Schrader said in a news release. “We now have so many warnings unrelated to the actual health risk posed to consumers, that most people just ignore them.”

The lawsuit against Starbucks and 90 companies was brought by the tiny nonprofit under a law that allows private citizens, advocacy groups and attorneys to sue on behalf of the state and collect a portion of civil penalties for failure to provide warnings.

The Safe Drinking Water and Toxic Enforcement Act, better known as Proposition 65, requires warning labels for about 900 chemicals known to cause cancer or birth defects.

The law has been credited with reducing cancer-causing chemicals, but it has been criticized for leading to quick settlement shakedowns and vague warnings that are often ignored.
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From: MeNeedIt

Among the millions of fans watching the World Cup are amateur football players who have dreams of being as good as their heroes, Now, they have a new way to compare their performance to the best professionals in the game, so they can build their skills. The help comes from a new wearable device that uses GPS and other sensors to track their movements. Faiza Elmasry has the story. Faith Lapidus narrates.
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From: MeNeedIt

By now, you have probably heard that suicide rates in the United States have increased sharply over the past two decades.

There was a lot of media coverage after fashion designer Kate Spade and celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain took their own lives. Their suicides happened around the same time that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention issued a report showing a 25 percent increase in suicide in the U.S. since 1999. Suicide is now the 10th leading cause of death in the U.S.

Deborah Stone, a behavioral scientist at the CDC, said the increase wasn’t surprising, as researchers have been seeing these rates going up for a long time.

“The data really speak volumes that the problem is getting worse, and what is really needed is suicide prevention,” Stone told VOA.

Risk factors

She said the risk factors are similar to the risk factors for homicides or mass killings. A person has relationship problems, including conflicts with a spouse or partner, is a victim of bullying, breaks up with or loses a loved one.

Substance abuse can also be involved. In 2016, there were 64,000 overdose deaths in the U.S. Some of the deaths were not intentional, but some were.

Homelessness, loss of a job, and financial problems are also risk factors, as are health problems.

Stone said both physical and mental health problems make people more vulnerable to committing suicide. The report said almost half of those who committed suicide had a known mental health condition, but more than half — 54 percent — did not.

Jennifer Payne, a psychiatrist at Johns Hopkins Medicine, said just because the CDC reported a majority of those who committed suicide did not have a known mental illness, does not mean they didn’t have one.

“I think it’s likely that a majority of cases of suicide are related to a mental health diagnosis,” she said.

The illness could have been undiagnosed, or because of the stigma associated with mental illness, people may have not sought treatment.

Psychiatrist Bashkin Kadriu at the National Institute of Mental Health said, “When you do that psychological autopsy, or the examination of people who have committed suicide, over 90 percent of them have an undiagnosed mental illness.”

In the U.S., mental health treatment is often expensive. Not all psychiatrists accept insurance, which puts treatment out of reach for many. Payne attributes this to a shortage of psychiatrists. 

Payne treats depression, which often leads to suicide, and depression is not always a life-long affliction. It can intensify for a while, and it can also go away. It can also be treated with medication.

No surprise

Paul Gionfriddo, head of Mental Health America, an advocacy group, said it’s no surprise suicide rates have risen.

“The time frame of the CDC report is troubling in that by using 1999 as a reference point, it captures what has happened in post-9/11 America. During that time, we have been subjected to major traumatic events, and our young people have fought in two very long and seemingly endless wars,” he said.

Gionfriddo said trauma and exposure to violence cause mental health conditions which, in turn, can lead to suicide.

The CDC report found that most suicides were committed in rural areas where people lack access to immediate care and where they often live in isolation — yet another risk factor.

Most U.S. suicides are also committed with guns.

Dr. Georges Benjamin, head of the American Public Health Association, told VOA that people who buy guns, even for self- protection, are at more risk of being hurt by their own gun than to be shot by a stranger.

He said the gun lobby has prevented research on how to make guns safer.

“For political reasons, people are not doing the kinds of things you would normally do if we had airplanes crashing every day,” Benjamin said.

Stone said the main thing is that suicide is preventable.

“It’s a public health problem that requires a public health approach. It’s not just due to one thing. And so, our strategies need to be multifaceted to address all of the range of suicides,” she added.

Suicide is a global problem, as well. The World Health Organization reports that suicide is the second-leading cause of death among 15- to 29-year-olds, and that 75 percent of all suicides occur in low- and middle-income countries. 

Close to 800,000 people die by suicide every year. Nearly 45,000 people took their lives in the U.S. in 2016.
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From: MeNeedIt

World Cup fever hit the United Nations Thursday as ambassadors and staffers gathered to watch the opening match and celebrate the link between peace and sport. Our U.N. Correspondent Margaret Besheer was there.
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From: MeNeedIt

Once again, hard facts support the claim that the planet is getting warmer. According to a new report, published in the scientific journal Nature, Antarctica is losing ice so fast that by the end of this century, the sea level could rise as much as 16 centimeters. This may not sound like much, but scientists say the trend is alarming. VOA’s George Putic has more.
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From: MeNeedIt

Republican and Democratic lawmakers took to the field Thursday night for the annual congressional charity baseball game. It fell on the first anniversary of a shooting spree at a practice last year that almost killed U.S. House Majority Whip Steve Scalise. Jill Craig was in the stands for the first pitch.
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From: MeNeedIt

As soccer’s top stars arrive in Russia to chase World Cup glory, their fans from around the world have also made their way there to participate in the fun and hopefully see their team win. VOA’s Mariama Diallo reports.
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From: MeNeedIt

The beautiful, all-you-can-eat sushi platter you shared with friends last week might have included a special ingredient: plastic.

Microplastics — the remnants of plastic bags, takeout containers and straws that almost-but-not-quite disintegrate in the oceans — are found in 3 out of 4 fish, such as squid, cuttlefish and swordfish in markets around the world, say the authors of a February study.

“These fish inhabit a remote area, so theoretically they should be pretty isolated from human influences, such as microplastics,” said Alina Wieczorek, lead author of the Frontiers study.

“However, as they regularly migrate to the surface, we thought that they may ingest microplastics there,” she said.

Food chain pollutants

Consumers are waking up to pollutants in their food chain, and scientists are joining them to raise awareness and combat other issues like overfishing. Last week, thousands marched in the United States and 25 other countries for World Oceans Day.

Under the hood of a shark costume was Brian Yurasits, director of development at the nonprofit TerraMar Project, which educates and promotes ocean issues. Yurasits circulated with about 3,000 others at the march in the shadow of the Washington Monument and a life-size, inflatable blue whale.

Holding a sign that read, “Sharks are friends, not food,” Yurasits emphasized that issues about ocean health “is more than just plastic.”

[See our video interview with Yurasits here.]

“It’s overfishing, climate change, invasive species and habitat loss,” he said.

The youth-led Sea Youth Rise Up advocates for ocean conservation, including reduced single-use plastics such as plastic straws, water bottles and shopping bags, which the ocean breaks down into microplastics. Much of the plastic that ends up in the oceans was blown into rivers first from uncontained trash on land.

Microplastics are microscopic and smaller than plankton, a popular food choice of larger marine life. They are made of hydrocarbons, a compound found in petroleum and natural gas, and attract other pollutants, according to the National Association of Geoscience Teachers.

Because microplastics can’t be digested, they build up in the fish that consume them.

“The biggest impacts aren’t the ones we can see very easily,” said Katie Farnsworth, a professor and marine geologist who studies coastal sediments at the Indiana University of Pennsylvania. “The biggest danger is those microplastics, because they are being eaten by things in the bottom of the food web, and then move their way up through the chain.”

The plastics can give off toxins, she said, because plastic is made from hydrocarbons. And hydrocarbons, she explained, attract and bind with other pollutants that are in the ocean.

Carbon dioxide

But microplastics aren’t the only threat to marine life. Ocean acidification and overfishing also imperil the health of oceans.

Ocean acidification occurs when seawater absorbs carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide is released into the air by burning fossil fuels, like oil and coal. That makes the ocean more acidic, which harms shellfish, other marine life and plants.

Ocean acidity has increased about 25 percent since the Industrial Revolution starting in 1760, the EPA reports, commonly depicted by billowing smokestacks at coal-burning factories.

Julia Dohner is a second-year Ph.D. student studying marine chemistry and geochemistry at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in San Diego. She is also a surfer who spends lots of time in the Pacific Ocean.

“Everything I think about is through the context of carbon dioxide,” Dohner said. “For me, reducing one’s carbon footprint is really important. It’s kind of a straightforward task, if you want to do something about the environment.”

Dohner said she believes awareness of ocean acidification has increased in the past few years.

“There’s been a lot of effort going into understanding how quickly our oceans are acidifying and understanding how those conditions will affect various forms in the ocean,” Dohner said.

Overfishing

Overfishing also threatens ocean health. It occurs when more fish are caught than the population can replace through natural reproduction. According to the World Wildlife Federation, several important commercial fish populations, such as Atlantic bluefin tuna, have declined to the point where their survival as a species is threatened.

Regulating overfishing is nearly impossible because “fish could care less about political boundaries,” said Farnsworth, meaning fishing boats follow the fish, often disregarding lines drawn around territorial boundaries. 

“Regulations in one country don’t help very much because you have to get treaties to get everybody in agreement,” she said.

Dohner said she believes that the biggest threat the ocean faces is a lack of awareness of these issues.

“There’s all this research going on about how our planet is changing and what it’s going to look like in the future,” Dohner said. “But at the end of the day, if we can’t convince people such that there is tangible policy changes enacted, then what have we really accomplished?”

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From: MeNeedIt

Millions of high school students are done. So done.

In flowing gowns and square caps, more than 3 million will walk across a stage this month and be handed a diploma, what they’ve been working toward for 12 years.

Latavea Cole, a graduating senior at Paul Laurence Dunbar High School in Baltimore, Maryland, wore a black cap decorated with yellow feathers and words that glittered.

“Mine says ‘Black girl magic,’” Cole told VOA. “It’s an inspirational thing, and graduating is really just … magic.”

Personalized caps

Many students personalize their caps with inspirational quotes, feathers and glitter to stand out in a sea of other graduates for family and friends in the grandstands. Some just want to celebrate their hard-won achievement that culminates in filing into a gymnasium and walking across a stage to receive their diplomas.

At Dunbar, the high school attended by the late rap artist Tupac Shakur, nearly 200 graduates filed in one by one as the school band played “Pomp and Circumstance,” the traditional music of graduations throughout America.

Over half of the caps were vividly decorated, with rhinestones that reflected the gymnasium’s light, and fake flowers mirroring real ones gifted to the graduates by their families.

On to college

Cole said she will pursue a degree in special education at a nearby community college after leaving Dunbar, which specializes in preparing students for careers in health care.

“Dunbar high school is a high school for professional health careers, and it gets you ready for college and the next level,” Kelvin Williams, a fellow graduating senior, told VOA.

Williams will move to North Carolina in the fall to major in sports medicine with plans to become a doctor to “help athletes.”

“The entire group is just dynamic, boisterous. They’re looking at wonderful things in their future,” said Tameka Taylor, an English teacher at Dunbar.

“They’re going to colleges in Arizona, Kansas, all over the state of Maryland, with over $500,000 to $1 million in scholarships. So, we are just excited, and we can’t wait to usher them out into the world,” Taylor said.

Before and after the ceremony, many students pondered their four-year journey through high school.

“I had a great experience. It was fun. There were some serious times, but mostly fun. I wouldn’t pick a different school,” Cole said.

“It’s been hard, but it’s been great,” her classmate Carl Kuniken added.

“Mine says I’m a draguate’,” said Jahi Chatman, turning around to show the camera his decorated cap. He will be headed to military basic training in the fall.

“I dragged my way through high school, so I’m a draguate!”
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From: MeNeedIt

Much like the rest of the world, Muslims in America are in the midst of the holy month of Ramadan — praying, fasting, giving to charity and breaking their monthlong fast every day at sunset. But as VOA’s Urdu, Kurdish and Turkish services reports, Muslims get together to enjoy the holy month in different ways. Serhan Akyildiz, Aziz Ahmed, Raveen Dosky contributed to this report. Bezhan Hamdard narrates.
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From: MeNeedIt