Watching the World
Harmful Computer Games
Brazil’s Ministry of Justice “has banned the sale of a controversial computer game in which players gain points by stealing cars and killing policemen,” states a Reuters report. The game is considered “dangerous because it trivializes robbery and murder and could incite younger players to violence.” In 1997 the ministry banned a computer game that “rewarded players for killing pedestrians, which included elderly women and pregnant women.” A spokeswoman for Procon, a consumer rights organization, said: “These kinds of games are dangerous and harmful because they give rise to violence. Children start considering this kind of activity as normal.”
Polluted Seas
“Ruthless overfishing, poisonous chemicals, and radioactive waste in the oceans endanger the basis for life on the whole earth,” reports the newspaper Nassauische Neue Presse. According to the newspaper Kieler Nachrichten, a foremost victim is the Black Sea. It is considered to be one of the most endangered ecosystems in the world, with 90 percent of it totally lifeless. Unprocessed sewage has turned the waves lapping on the shores of Ukraine into a greenish-brown slop, and the beaches around Odessa were opened for only one week last summer. “The Black Sea is fatally wounded,” said Romania’s president Emil Constantinescu. “If we let it die, we are in for consequences worse than we can imagine.” The United Nations has declared 1998 to be the “International Year of the Ocean.”
Fake Medicine
“About 8 percent of the medicines sold on the planet are fake,” states Le Figaro Magazine. According to the World Health Organization, the percentage of fake drugs in Brazil is estimated to be 30 percent, and in Nigeria it is thought to be a staggering 60 percent. Trade in counterfeit medicines is reportedly a 300-billion-dollar business, with organized crime taking a leading part. Despite the efforts of pharmaceutical companies to put an end to this trade, police and international organizations have not found a solution to the problem. At best, fake medicine can serve as a placebo; at worst, it can be deadly. “Fake medicine plays Russian roulette with the health of the sick,” observes Le Figaro Magazine.
Love for Guns in the United States
“The differences between America [the United States] and other countries are stark,” notes The Economist. “In 1996 handguns were used to murder two people in New Zealand, 15 in Japan, 30 in Britain, 106 in Canada, 211 in Germany and 9,390 in the United States.” Each year in the United States, firearms are involved in about half a million criminal incidents and some 35,000 deaths, including suicides and accidents. Yet, people in the United States who own firearms “want to keep their guns, no matter how high the price,” states the magazine. “Far from choosing tighter controls, as so many other countries have done, they are rushing in the opposite direction.” Now, 31 states issue permits allowing people to carry concealed handguns.
World’s Longest Suspension Bridge
The Akashi Kaikyo Bridge in Japan, connecting Awaji Island with the city of Kobe, opened in April and immediately entered the record books as the world’s longest suspension bridge. “In the works for a decade, the $7.7 billion project boasts a 6,532-ft. (1.2 mile) [1,991 m] center span—measured as the distance between the two towers,” states Time magazine. “Each of the towers, taller than a 90-story building, is equipped with 20 vibration-control devices; if winds make the structure sway, pendulums tug the towers back.” The bridge has also been designed to withstand earthquakes as high as 8.0 on the Richter scale. If strung out, its steel cable could encircle the earth seven times.
Imperiled Plants
After 20 years of work, botanists and conservationists around the world have concluded that 12.5 percent of the 270,000 known species of plants in the world—1 out of every 8—are under threat of extinction. “Nine of every 10 plants on the list are native to only one country, making them especially vulnerable to national or local economic and social conditions,” says The New York Times. Scientists give two major reasons why plants become endangered: (1) large-scale destruction of wild countryside by development, logging, and agriculture and (2) invasions by nonnative plants that run amok and crowd out native species. The article states that plants “are more fundamental to nature’s functioning” than mammals and birds. It further says regarding plants: “They undergird most of the rest of life, including human life, by converting sunlight into food. They provide the raw material for many medicines and the genetic stock from which agricultural strains of plants are developed. And they constitute the very warp and woof of the natural landscape, the framework within which everything else happens.”
Hospital Infections
“Infections acquired in the hospital following a medical or surgical procedure represent a real public health problem,” declares the French newspaper Le Figaro. In France alone, 800,000 people are infected each year, and the number of deaths is estimated at 10,000. Various steps can reduce the risk of contamination: disinfecting rooms before each new patient arrives, checking sterilization procedures, and thoroughly washing hands before treating a patient. Apparently, many of these practices are often neglected. A study carried out in a hospital in Paris revealed that only 72 percent of hospital ancillary workers said they systematically washed their hands after contact with each patient. Of these, 60 percent washed their hands for less than the optimum time. The newspaper concludes that with grim statistics like these, “a lot of work, it seems, remains to be done.”
Seat Belts Save Lives in the Air
As every seasoned air traveler knows, planes may suddenly and unexpectedly encounter severe air turbulence that can injure or even kill passengers. The only effective precaution you can take, experts say, is to wear your seat belt at all times when seated in the aircraft. “Clear-air turbulence is extremely hard to predict, detect, and avoid,” states U.S.News & World Report. While scientists are looking into developing sensors to detect such turbulence, most planes now depend on reports from planes that are flying ahead on the same route. Nearly all the people injured during turbulence were not wearing seat belts. “But,” the article concedes, “the airlines have not figured out how to force passengers to buckle up.”
Save Electricity
“Eleven percent of the electricity used in German homes and offices is consumed by appliances that are not in use but are on standby,” reports the newsletter Apotheken Umschau. According to estimates for Germany, TV sets, stereos, computers, and other electronic appliances in standby mode use about 20.5 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity each year. This is more than the yearly electricity consumption of Berlin, the country’s largest city. It may be possible to save electricity and spare your purse by switching some appliances off completely rather than leaving them in standby mode.
Dead Sea Disappearing
The Dead Sea, the lowest and saltiest spot on the earth, is fast disappearing. In 1965 the surface of the Dead Sea was 1,295 feet [395 m] below sea level. It is now 1,355 feet [413 m] below sea level, and a thin spit of dry land has appeared that divides it in two. Hotels that were built on the water’s edge are now substantially inland. “Its water level is dropping a noticeable 2.5 feet [80 cm] a year, the sea denied replenishment by the demands of people and politics,” states The Dallas Morning News. “The Dead Sea’s potential demise signals the severity of the regional water shortage, while the obstacles to a solution indicate how much water and peace mix in the parched Middle East. . . . Today, the main source for the Dead Sea, the Jordan River, is almost completely diverted . . . by Israel, Syria and Jordan.” Concerning the Dead Sea’s history, the article says: “By far the most vivid story is the Biblical account of how the Cities of the Plain settled in a fertile region until God, despairing at their moral breaches, ‘rained upon Sodom and upon Gomorrah brimstone and fire’ to turn it to a wasteland.”