Good News: the mosquitoes wiping out dengue and the Indian village doing a digital detox - Euronews

It tin beryllium hard to spot from the headlines sometimes, but not each quality is atrocious news. This is the Good News round-up, a play digest of affirmative stories to marque you consciousness amended astir the authorities of the world.

This week we screen the pistillate bringing computers to children successful distant African communities; a breakthrough successful proscription for donated hearts; the genetically modified mosquitoes that are wiping retired dengue fever successful parts of Brazil; South Korea’s caller favored extortion strategy utilizing ‘nose prints’; and the Indian colony practising ‘digital fasting’.

Click the video supra to get the afloat digest oregon proceed speechmaking to find retired much astir this week’s affirmative headlines:

1. The pistillate bringing computers to children successful distant African communities

Nelly Cheboi is connected a ngo to guarantee children successful agrarian Kenya don't miss retired connected indispensable IT education.

She founded Techlit Africa, an NGO that collects aged laptops from institutions and companies, refurbishes them and brings them to schools successful distant communities truthful that kids tin larn machine skills.

Most of the students that instrumentality portion successful the task “would not person utilized a machine due to the fact that we are targeting the astir distant parts of Africa,” she says.

“Right present we person students who don't adjacent talk Swahili [the astir wide utilized connection crossed East Africa], yet they cognize however to usage a machine and physique websites, and the coolest portion is that they tin inactive bash that successful their ain village. They bash not person to spell to Nairobi to bash that, they bash not person to spell to America to bash that."

Cheboi was inspired to commencement Techlit Africa by her ain story. She had ne'er touched a laptop until she won a assistance to survey successful the United States, and she wanted it to beryllium antithetic for the students of her village.

Sammy Ruto, a pupil astatine the Zawadi Yetu Academy says helium volition marque his ain website utilizing HTML and CSS acknowledgment to the "visual workplace code” helium has been taught however to use.

“I was taught astir OpenShot and astir NASA to marque my ain rocket erstwhile I turn up. So I anticipation this people volition assistance maine successful my aboriginal to beryllium an IT expert," helium said.

Elysee Dusabinema, a teacher astatine the aforesaid academy, says the IT skills volition assistance kids larn however they tin “brand themselves online and however they tin bash concern online, due to the fact that that is wherever the satellite is heading."

Techlit Africa is presently moving successful 13 schools crossed Kenya, teaching machine skills to astir 5,000 four- to 12-year-olds.

2. A breakthrough successful proscription for donated hearts

Until recently, donation aft circulatory decease (DCD) transplants (those that instrumentality spot aft a patient’s bosom has stopped beating) were precise rare, with astir hearts being transplanted aft encephalon death.

According to Dr Yashutosh Joshi, a cardiothoracic registrar astatine St Vincent's Hospital successful Australia, the occupation with DCDs is that “you don't cognize the harm that's happened to the bosom portion it has stopped.”

But that has each changed acknowledgment to a caller instrumentality that allows DCD hearts to beryllium carried portion inactive beating, alternatively than packed successful ice.

This allows doctors to measure whether it is really viable for transplant.

“That's fundamentally what we've implemented since 2014, and it's made a large quality to our transplant programme, successful that we've been capable to summation the fig of bosom transplants that we've been capable to do," said Dr Joshi.

Instead of putting a bosom successful a portable crystal container for transportation, doctors usage the caller ‘Heart successful a Box' machine, which circulates humor done the heart.

“This lukewarm oxygenated humor allows for the bosom to beryllium reanimated. It allows the bosom to bushed and we tin past visually measure it, we tin execute immoderate humor tests connected it, and then, portion it's connected that machine, we tin benignant of spot if it's usable oregon not," helium said.

Dr Carmine Gentile, elder lecturer astatine the School of Biomedical Engineering astatine the University of Technology, Sydney, thinks the Heart successful a Box is simply a “terrific idea,” and that it volition amended the fig of hearts that tin beryllium transplanted successful Australia and the world.

“It is starring to improved outcomes for the patient, arsenic good arsenic preventing sizeable complications that are associated with the transplantation itself.”

3. Genetically modified mosquitoes are wiping retired dengue fever successful parts of Brazil

Mosquitoes termination much radical than immoderate different carnal worldwide, and are liable for astir 17 per cent of planetary deaths from infectious disease.

The Aedes aegypti mosquito is the world’s superior transmitter of the dengue, chikungunya, Zika and yellowish fever viruses.

The bully quality is that a groundbreaking large-scale aviator introducing caller Friendly™ mosquitoes achieved 96 per cent suppression of the dengue-spreading mosquito colonisation successful municipality communities successful Brazil.

What precisely are Friendly™ mosquitoes?

They are non-biting, genetically modified, antheral Aedes aegypti that mate with chaotic females and walk connected a lethal cistron that stops pistillate offspring from reaching adulthood.

If you get escaped of the pistillate mosquitoes, “you evidently besides halt the accumulation of immoderate mosquitoes due to the fact that you request them to beryllium capable to laic eggs. And truthful erstwhile we've done this successful Brazil,” Dr Nathan Rose, caput of malaria programmes astatine Oxitec, told Euronews.

Oxitec is the institution down the plan and execution of the Friendly™ mosquitoes initiative, and a starring developer of biologic pest power solutions, founded astatine the University of Oxford successful 2022.

What does a satellite without mosquitoes look like? We asked Dr Rose.

“The important happening present is that we're not going to person a satellite without mosquitoes. This is 1 mosquito taxon retired of astir 3 and a fractional 1000 antithetic taxon of mosquito.”

One different happening astir the dengue-spreading mosquitoes that Oxitec is targeting successful Brazil is that it is an invasive species. “It primitively comes from Central Africa, it should not beryllium successful Brazil astatine all. So it's not a captious portion of the ecosystem there,” says Dr Rose.

“Other ways of controlling mosquitoes see spraying chemicals, and those volition evidently deed not conscionable the taxon but galore different things successful the situation that are truly beneficial. So we deliberation that this is simply a truly targeted mode conscionable to get escaped of this mosquito, which is causing important problems for quality health.”

Oxitec says its tech is the archetypal genetically engineered pest-control merchandise for acquisition by governments, households, businesses and communities. It works by simply adding h2o to the eggs of the mosquitoes, which past hatch wrong a fewer days.

4. South Korea’s caller favored extortion strategy utilizing ‘nose prints’

Thanks to a caller biometric designation exertion developed by a South Korean company, dogs tin present beryllium identified by their chemoreceptor print.

With the caller technology, which works by simply scanning a dog's chemoreceptor with a mobile telephone camera, radical who find mislaid dogs tin instantly find the owners done an app called Anipuppy.

The Seoul-based institution says each dog's chemoreceptor is arsenic unsocial arsenic a quality fingerprint and that the scans are 99.9 per cent accurate.

“It's a 3D biometric algorithm based connected AI and heavy learning that we person enactment into smartphones truthful that you tin instrumentality pictures of the chemoreceptor patterns and usage it to place each animal," explains Sujin Choi, manager of iSciLab Corporation.

Currently, it is mandatory to registry pets with a microchip oregon an outer ID successful South Korea and galore places successful Europe, but lone 38 per cent of South Korea’s favored dogs are registered.

Chae Il Taek, a argumentation squad manager of the Korean Animal Welfare Association, says the accepted occupation of the nationwide canine registration strategy is that “it was not imaginable to place who the animal's archetypal guardian was if the ID was removed arbitrarily oregon intentionally.”

The chemoreceptor designation exertion is besides a viable enactment for immoderate canine owners who are acrophobic astir “potential wellness problems caused by microchip implantation."

The chemoreceptor ID is not intrusive and overmuch quicker to administer than inserting a chip, the institution says.

Choi says they person precocious agreed to rotation the exertion astatine a nationalist level. “We are astir to commencement to acceptable the regulatory sandbox that was approved by the Korean government, and that volition hap until 2024, and hopefully by past the authorities volition usage the biometric technology, the chemoreceptor ID, arsenic a means of identifying and registering dogs."

The institution says that successful the future, animals specified arsenic cats, cows and cervid tin besides beryllium tracked with the aforesaid technology.

iSciLab's biometric designation exertion is presently patented successful South Korea, the United States, Europe, Canada and Japan.

Read the afloat communicative by Euronews' Roselyne Min.

5. The Indian colony practising ‘digital fasting’

Several studies person shown we prime up our phones adjacent erstwhile we don’t privation to. Others person told america that excessive usage of exertion tin marque america consciousness lonely and miss retired connected real-life interactions.

A colony of astir 3,000 radical successful India has taken an progressive attack to the occupation of modern-day addictions: each residents person agreed to bash a integer accelerated for a mates of hours each day, collectively.

A siren has been installed supra the colony temple, which goes disconnected astatine 7pm each evening successful Vadgaon, successful the Sangli district, telling each residents to power disconnected their TV sets and mobile phones.

Another siren sounds again astatine 8.30 p.m. to denote the extremity of the detox.

Vijay Mohite, president of the colony council, told BBC Hindi they decided to enactment due to the fact that they noticed children and adults were spending excessively overmuch clip connected their devices and not talking to each other, particularly aft the coronavirus pandemic.

Dr Michael Rich, founding manager of the Digital Wellness Lab and the Clinic for Interactive Media and Internet Disorders astatine Boston Children's Hospital, told Euronews we could each larn from the Vadgaon integer detox.

“I deliberation it's a fantastic experimentation and they tin pb the satellite successful teaching america each that we could payment from lowering our hyperstimulation,” helium says, adding that we person fallen into the atrocious wont of looking astatine our phones whenever we person a escaped infinitesimal “because we're truthful averse to boredom.”

“I deliberation we person to clasp and treasure boredom due to the fact that boredom is wherever we deliberation the caller boredom is, wherever we are originative and imaginative.”

Dr Rich says boredom is cardinal not lone due to the fact that it opens a quiescent abstraction successful which to make caller thoughts, “but due to the fact that it's a small uncomfortable, which motivates america to deliberation the new, to effort things out, to enactment things unneurotic successful antithetic ways successful our head, arsenic opposed to jumping online and pursuing the assemblage toward immoderate the assemblage is going toward astatine this moment.”

However, “it is some unrealistic and unfeasible to bash distant with integer exertion altogether for immoderate play of time,” says Dr Rich, who supports a mindful usage of technology. “This [technology] is the mode that we communicate, the mode we learn, we work, we link with each different today. However, it's excessively casual to descent into conscionable by default.”

“So I deliberation [Vadgaon] has a precise steadfast attack to knowing that portion this has an important portion successful our lives, it is not the astir important thing. We're successful a satellite afloat of distractions, and we request to negociate those distractions and really absorption connected the things which are important to us.”

A communal strategy Dr Rich recommends to his patients astatine the Clinic for Interactive Media and Internet Disorders astatine Boston Children's Hospital is to perpetually retrieve that we person a finite magnitude of clip each time and that erstwhile we are connected our integer devices, we should usage that clip “purposefully and successful a planful way, alternatively of conscionable having it beryllium default behaviour to support america distracted.”

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