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Increase in child melanoma, with global warming, more UV radiation

Pediatric melanoma a growing occurrence Pediatric melanoma, rare but becoming more common, is a serious but treatable disease Chron, By Todd Ackerman | April 23, 2014  M.D. Anderson sees more child patients than anywhere else in the nation, partly because it gets so many referrals from nonspecialists who don’t know what to make of adolescents getting a disease that scientists say usually takes a decade or more to develop, most of the time because of too much exposure to the sun. Even now, only a few doctors specialize in the disease in children, said Dr. Dennis Hughes, an M.D. Anderson pediatric oncologist who treats most of the center’s youngest patients.

Melanoma develops when skin cells called melancytes become abnormal and multiply in an uncontrolled way. The cells, which normally give skin its color and protect the deeper levels from sun damage, form a mass of tissue, or a tumor, when they’re multiplying uncontrollably that can spread and damage healthy tissue.

The reasons for the jump in pediatric cases are unclear. Some suspect – though there’s no supporting data – it may involve the depletion of the ozone layer, which absorbs most of the sun’s ultraviolet radiation. Hughes notes that more skin gets exposed now but also thinks it’s because of improved awareness. More doctors now know that melanoma is not just an adult disease.

It is not, however, an easy diagnosis. Frequently mistaken for warts or mosquito bites, pediatric melanoma can look quite different from the adult disease, often light-colored and well-defined instead of irregularly pigmented. A 2011 study found that 60 percent of melanoma-afflicted young children didn’t meet the common melanoma-detection criteria (the ABCD warning signs of asymmetry, border irregularity, color variation and diameter over 6 millimeters).

In children younger than 10, it also usually doesn’t show up in sun-exposed areas.

For such reasons, pediatric melanoma is often diagnosed late, not a good thing in a cancer a recent study found spreads more quickly in children than in adults. Hughes estimates that a third to a half of such child patients arrive at M.D. Anderson with a delayed diagnosis, something Hughes has no difficulty understanding.

“Warts are common,” he said. “Pediatric melanoma isn’t.”

Hughes doesn’t want parents to overreact, given pediatric melanoma’s rarity. . But he also wants them to know it’s possible that what they think is a wart that isn’t getting better could be melanoma…….http://www.chron.com/news/health/article/Pediatric-melanoma-a-growing-occurrence-5424359.php

April 25, 2014 Posted by | 2 WORLD, children | Leave a comment

Promising investement future for solar energy in Sub Saharan Africas

piggy-ban-renewablesInvestors in solar energy eye sub-Saharan Africa  Ghana is currently hosting a two-day Sub-Saharan Africa Solar Conference organized by independent business media company Magenta Global. World Bulletin / News Desk 24 April 14

Investors in energy from Germany, Canada, China and South Africa have descended on Ghanaian capital Accra to explore ways of providing solar energy to sub-Saharan Africa.

“The growth in the power sector in sub-Saharan Africa is likely to be somewhere between 60 and 80 gigawatts over the next ten years, and solar is going to form 10 to 15 percent of the overall increase in energy mix across sub-Saharan Africa,” Douglas Coleman, project director for Mere Power Nzema Limited, told Anadolu Agency. The company is developing a 155MWP grid connected solar photovoltaic (PV) power plant in Ghana. The solar PV plant will consist of over 630,000 solar modules situated on 452 acres of land.

The plant, according to the company, will be the largest in Africa. It will cost approximately $350 million and is expected to begin electricity production in 2015.

“If the legal, regulatory and political frameworks are in place, there is certainly sufficient global capital with an appetite for investment in this sector in sub-Saharan Africa,” said Coleman……http://www.worldbulletin.net/todays-news/134626/investors-in-solar-energy-eye-sub-saharan-africa

April 25, 2014 Posted by | general | Leave a comment

Maksim Viniarski goes on hunger strike-Chernobyl remembrance march – Because of World Hockey match PR

http://freeales.fidh.net/2014/04/two-more-opposition-activists-arrested-ahead-of-chernobyl-way-march/

April 24, 2014

Two activists of the Alternatyva opposition movement, Aliaksandr Stsepanenka and Uladzimir Siarheyeu, were detained last evening in Minsk. They were charged with disorderly conduct and sentenced to five days of arrest by the Minsk Tsentralny District Court.

According to Alternatyva leader Aleh Korban, the detentions are primarily related to the forthcoming Chernobyl Way demonstration.

Opposition activist Maksim Viniarski goes on hunger strike to protest sentencing

http://freeales.fidh.net/2014/04/activist-viniarski-goes-on-hunger-strike-protest-sentencing/

viniarski

The King
: . . . He has chosen death:
Refusing to eat or drink, that he may bring
Disgrace upon me; for there is a custom,
An old and foolish custom, that if a man
Be wronged, or think that he is wronged, and starve
Upon another’s threshold till he die,
The Common People, for all time to come,
Will raise a heavy cry against that threshold,
Even though it be the King’s.
— W.B. Yeats, The King’s Threshold

April 23, 2014

Maksim Viniarski, activist of the European Belarus opposition movement, was sentenced last evening to 12 days of arrest by the Court of Minsk’s Frunzenski district.

During the trial, an ambulance was called, who said Maksim had to go to hospital because of tonsillitis. However, the police opposed and said he would go to the detention center in Akrestsin Street. In response, Maksim Viniarski declared a dry hunger strike.

Maksim Viniarski was detained by police when leaving the Korona shopping mall in Minsk. The police officers said the activist looked like a criminal.

At the police station he was charged with disobeying police officers.

Coordinator of the European Belarus movement, Maksim Viniarski, who was recently released after a 15-day arrest, said that before the release a police officer offered him to leave the city during the forthcoming Ice Hockey World Championship.

In response to this warning, Viniarski told human rights defenders that he might be detained to be preventively isolated because of his socio-political beliefs.

Chernobyl pickets banned in Vitsebsk, Navapolatsk and Hrodna

http://freeales.fidh.net/2014/04/chernobyl-pickets-banned-in-vitsebsk-navapolatsk-and-hrodna/

April 22, 2014

Local authorities in Vitsebsk, Navapolatsk and Hrodan have banned a number of awareness-raising pickets, scheduled for April 26 to mark the anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster. According to the officials, the organizers failed to submit an appropriate application.

Four representatives of the political party Belarusian Popular Front in Vitsebsk sent a request to the administration of the Chyhunachny district to hold a picket in the local park. However, the bid was rejected, as the applicants failed to attach copies of the contracts as required by the City Executive Committee’s decision. It says that the organizers must sign contracts with the police, public utilities and health care departments. But these services refuse to enter into contracts with the activists. So the activists requested that the authorities did not pay attention to the decision of the Vitsebsk City Executive Committee, but were directly guided by the Law “On Mass Events” and the Constitution. They say that the decision actually makes it impossible to exercise people’s rights to freedom of expression and peaceful assembly. Over the past five years, not a single opposition activist has managed to sign agreements required by the Vitsebsk executive officials.

In Hrodna, members of the local Belarusian Popular Front’s office have also received from the executive committee official bans on conducting awareness-raising pickets, scheduled for April 26 to mark the anniversary of the Chernobyl disaster.

Activists threatened with preventive detention ahead of Hockey World Championship

http://freeales.fidh.net/2014/04/activists-threatened-arrests-ahead-hockey-world-champ/

April 16, 2014

Human rights defenders have received information about possible provocations against opposition activists and their preventive detention ahead of the forthcoming Ice Hockey World Championship, due to open on 9 May. This was confirmed by the coordinator of the European Belarus movement Maksim Viniarski, who was recently released after a 15-day arrest.

According to HRC “Viasna” website, he said that before his release he was offered to temporarily leave the capital. A police officer told him that if he considered himself a reasonable person, he should realize that he had but two options: either to leave Belarus or to go to the country for some time (referring to the time of the Ice Hockey World Championship). Because “the issue with everyone” will be resolved anyway, the detention center employee warned the activist.

In response to this warning, Viniarski said that he did not use drugs, used foul language, was not prone to misbehavior, and so his possible arrest should be regarded as preventive isolation because of his political beliefs.

Maksim Viniarski also says that many administrative detainees held under Articles 17.1 (hooliganism) and 17.3 (appearing drunk in a public place) of the Administrative Code will be sent to active therapy centers.

Thus, the authorities of Minsk are preparing a total cleansing of unwanted persons who may in any way mar the image of Belarus among numerous foreign guests expected during the event.

April 25, 2014 Posted by | Uncategorized | 2 Comments

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