Wednesday, July 11, 2007

Today, at 12:00 p.m. EDT (UTC-4) the Animal rights group People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) staged a “naked” protest in White Plains, New York. The target of the protest was British fashion house, Burberry, and their fur practices.

Two “naked” female PETA members, wearing nothing but bikini bottoms and body paint held billboards with the slogan, “When plaid goes bad.” The body paint was done in the trademarked Burberry Check plaid design.

Two other PETA members were there handing out leaflets and showing a video presentation. The painted protesters were spattered with far less fake blood than other documented PETA protests in this campaign.

PETA is protesting Burberry for the company’s use of fur in its products and how it is obtained. The group has staged similar protests around the world in its ongoing “BloodyBurberry”-campaign.

The protest took place at the intersection of Westchester Avenue and Bloomingdale Road in front of the The Westchester, an upscale shopping mall owned by Simon Property Group. Burberry has a retail store in the mall.

This corner is far from the mall’s entrances and sees little pedestrian traffic. However, it does see heavy traffic by motorists, before whom the protestors were in plain sight. While Wikinews was on the scene, police and news media were the only other pedestrians.

The police presence was significant, numbering at least two vehicles and two mounted police officers. But since there was no crowd to control, they just hung back. Media was also there in numbers. At least two television crews could be observed.

As far as Wikinews can tell, Burberry has yet to make any public comment about any of the “BloodyBurberry” protests.

Saturday, September 16, 2006

A report released on September 13 called “Progress in Preventing Childhood Obesity: How Do We Measure Up?” states that if strict measures are not implemented, in just four years, over 20 percent of American children will be obese. The report called current measures aimed at tackling childhood obesity “fragmented and small-scale”.

The report was released by the Institute of Medicine, but including an explicit disclaimer that ‘Any opinions, findings, conclusions, are those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect the views of the organization [Institute of Medicine, Robert Wood Johnson Foundation] that provided support for the project.’

Dr. Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, president of Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, the organization that funded the report, said “if we do not reverse the epidemic of childhood obesity, millions of kids and our society will be robbed of a healthy and hopeful future”. The percentage of children who are overweight or obese has been increasing worldwide in recent years. Food Consumer reports that according to the World Health Organization (WHO), childhood overweight and obesity is a “global pandemic”.

According to an estimate based on the National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey (NHANES), 34 percent of American children were overweight in 2003-2004, compared to 28 percent in 1999-2000. In 2002, 16 percent of American children and teens were obese. In 2004, the rate was 17 percent. The rate is expected to rise to 20 percent, according to the report.

Childhood obesity increases risk of several chronic diseases, including diabetes mellitus type 2, hypertension, obstructive sleep apnea, non-alcoholic steatohepatitis, heart disease, poor self-esteem, and a lower health-related quality of life. Type 2 diabetes is at an all-time high in American children. According to WHO, obesity also increases the risk of stroke and certain forms of cancer.

While there is no single cause of childhood obesity, experts cite sedentary lifestyle, labor-saving technology, not eating enough fruits and vegetables, calorie-dense fast foods, and deceptive advertising as some of the main causes. A recent report by International Obesity Task Force has said that junk food manufacturers target children, for example, through Internet advertising, chat rooms, text messages, and “advergames” on websites.

The article also mentions the greater prevalence of obesity among two minority populations, African-Americans and Hispanic/Latino, but does not consider in its analysis of the increase in obesity the increase of these populations as a proportion of the United States population.

African-Americans and Hispanic/Latinos have a higher rates of obesity than White Americans, while Asian-Americans have a relatively low rate of obesity. Despite only representing one third of the U.S. population, African-Americans and Hispanic/Latinos represent about one half of the population growth.

Wednesday, July 21, 2021

Yesterday, with 85 active cases of COVID-19 in the Australian state of Victoria, Premier Daniel Andrews has extended the state’s current lockdown by a week until July 27 at 11:59 p.m. (0159 UTC).

Since a five-day lockdown was first announced last Thursday, cases have been recorded in areas across Victoria, including Phillip Island, Mildura and Barwon Heads. Notably, Mildura’s COVID-19 case, which was recorded on Sunday, is their first in 15 months. Thirteen new cases of coronavirus were recorded in Victoria yesterday.

Red zone travel permits, required for residents of New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory for entry into Victoria, are temporarily paused. Andrews said that while this decision would “cause a real challenge for many people”, he justified this decision by saying that “things are too unstable—too uncertain and frankly out of control from a virus point of view in Sydney”.

State health minister Martin Foley stated, “We’ve had thousands of Victorians return from New South Wales in recent weeks, but with the situation escalating, the recent incursions and the increased infectiousness of the Delta variant, we must act to protect Victoria and temporarily pause Red Zone Permits.”

Restrictions remain the same from the initial Thursday announcement. Under the regulations, there are only five reasons to leave home: for food and supplies; exercise; care or caregiving; work or education, if not possible from home; and to be vaccinated against COVID-19. In exercising, people cannot go more than 5 kilometers (3 mi) away from their home, and for no more than two hours. The vaccination should be administered at the nearest possible location. Face masks remain mandatory both outdoors and indoors, except at home.

A press release from the premier’s office said the COVID-19 Delta variant is moving “faster than anything Victoria’s public health experts have seen before”, adding as a result “we need to limit movement for a longer period of time”. The press release also noted over 15 thousand close contacts of cases in quarantine, over 250 exposure sites across the state, and the COVID-19 daily case numbers remaining in double digits.