Analysis of data gathered using cutting-edge methodology – including detailed satellite images and measurements from more than 1,400 ground monitoring stations – reveals a dire picture of dirty air, with 98% of people living in areas with highly damaging fine particulate pollution that exceed World Health Organization guidelines. Almost two-thirds live in areas where air quality is more than double the WHO’s guidelines.
The worst hit country in Europe is North Macedonia. Almost two-thirds of people across the country live in areas with more than four times the WHO guidelines for PM2.5, while four areas were found to have air pollution almost six times the figure, including in its capital, Skopje.
…
Traffic, industry, domestic heating and agriculture are the main sources of PM2.5 and the impact is often felt disproportionately by the poorest communities. »
Day: 20 September 2023
Anne Frank, a young Jewish German teenager, journaled her experiences as she and her family hid for two years in an attic during the Nazi occupation of the Netherlands during World War II.
Anne and her family were apprehended in 1944, and Anne Frank died of typhus in the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp in 1945.
Her diary, which was first published in 1947, has since been published in more than 70 languages, and used in schools around the world for decades to educate students on the the Holocaust.
History is repeating itself. This time the USA.
A Texas middle school teacher has been fired after assigning an unapproved illustrated version of Anne Frank’s Diary to her eighth grade reading class. Per a report from KFDM, a spokesperson for Hamshire-Fannett ISD, located south of Beaumont, released a statement confirming the teacher was sent home on Wednesday after reading a passage from Anne Frank’s Diary: The Graphic Adaptation in which Frank wrote about male and female genitalia. An investigation into the incident has since ensued.
Meanwhile
Ariana Grande, Guillermo del Toro, Mark Ruffalo and Amanda Gorman are among the over 175 actors, entertainers, authors, activists and others who have signed an open letter calling on Hollywood to use their influence to oppose book bans.
The letter, spearheaded by Reading Rainbow host LeVar Burton and published via the political advocacy organization MoveOn Political Action, calls out books bans in US schools as “restrictive behavior” that is “antithetical to free speech and expression”. It also emphasizes the “chilling effect” the bans, often implemented at the local level, can have “on the broader creative field”.
“We have to be truthful, not neutral,” she urged. “I would make sure that you don’t just give a platform … to those who want to crash down the constitution and democracy.”
It’s an important call to action. But so far, the American press is failing to meet its responsibility to adequately emphasize the stakes of the coming election.
Livestock farming takes a heavy toll on the environment and excessive meat consumption can carry health risks. The Financial Times asks if governments should introduce a meat tax.
Note: Clicking the above image will load and play the video from YouTube.
Finland is a world leader when it comes to early years education. Childcare is affordable and nursery places are universally available in a system that puts children’s rights at the centre of decision-making.
Now the country is applying the same child-first thinking to paternity-leave policies in an attempt to tackle gender inequality in parenting. The Guardian’s Alexandra Topping travels to Helsinki to find out why the UK pre-school system lags so far behind and whether it really is easier to be a parent in Finland.
Note: Clicking the above image will load and play the video from YouTube.