by Deborah Franklin

It's August-eve and Friday -- a good time, in the heat of summer, to catch up on the health of U.S. beaches and world fisheries.

First, in regards to seafood: An authoritative new survey of the seas, published in Friday's Science, suggests it may not be too late to restore the bounty of world waters after all -- if fishermen act now. Recent strict curbs on fishing in some regions -- some quite painful to the industry -- are working, the survey shows. Some popular fish are coming back from the brink in New England, southern Australia and several other regions.

We're far from home free. As NPR's Richard Harris reports, the new census shows overfishing in some waters is still dangerously depleting some favorite seafood species, such as bluefin tuna in Europe. Harris notes,

The researchers find that 14 percent of the 170 species they studied are now at less than 10 percent of their original numbers. That's how they define a fishery 'collapse.'

(Read past the jump to find out if your favorite beach is clean)

Continue reading "Morning Rounds: Healthiest Fisheries and Beaches" >

by Deborah Franklin

As the new team at the FDA launches its mid-summer clean-up, where better to start than the kitchen?

At a press conference later today, the agency is expected to take aim at food poisoning -- salmonella and E.coli, in particular -- by tightening the rules that govern how manufacturers handle eggs and improving the food tracking system so that it's easier to quickly trace contaminated ingredients to their source.

We can also expect tighter rules on the handling of produce by the end of this month, and tighter poultry inspections and standards by the end of the year, according to FDA and industry sources quoted by AP and Reuters. Still no word on how E.coli got into Toll House cookie dough at that plant in Danville, Virginia.

Meanwhile, with yesterday's announcement that the Obama administration has rolled back some restrictions on the federal funding of stem cell research, several cash strapped states are hoping to lure some of that research money and new jobs.

Continue reading "FDA Tightens Food Rules As NIH Relaxes On Stem Cells" >

by Deborah Franklin

Bumblebees need love, too. /istockphoto.com

In celebration of National Pollinator Week, NPR's Melissa Block checked in this afternoon with Tucson entomologist Steve Buchmann about the status of America's imperiled honeybees, and what backyard gardeners can do to help save them.

The precise cause of "colony collapse" among honeybees is still a mystery, Buchmann says. But he cites a glimmer of good news for farmers and produce lovers:

Mother Nature has lots of other pollinators -- typically five to ten types -- that visit a single plant.

Still, bumblebees and bats could use tending, too, he says. To improve their lives, try to plant local wildflowers and heirloom fruits and veggies. Native plants suited to the local climate and soil are likelier to flourish and feed bees. Steer clear of the ornately ruffled sophisticates that have spent generations in a hothouse.

Continue reading "All Hail Honeybees (And Their Pollinating Pals)" >

by Alison Richards

Hey! I feel a theory coming on. /istockphoto.com

Scientists, apparently, are just as sentimental as the rest of us.

Tufts University announced this week that cosmologist Alex Vilenkin hopes to plant an apple tree this Fall whose lineage goes back to the English farm where Sir Isaac Newton lived in the 1600s -- Woolsthorpe Manor.

This isn't Vilenkin's first tribute to the fabled event that inspired Newton's theory of gravitation. According to Tufts, the professor drops an apple onto the heads of his graduating PhD students every year.

Not that the Tufts tree will provide fruit for that ceremony any time soon. The cuttings -- which came from a tree planted at MIT -- have only just been grafted onto a rootstock in a local orchard .

I must admit, though I wrote a book about apples a few years ago, I'd never heard of this scientific soft spot for Newton's apple tree. It turns out there are august research institutes all over the world boasting trees thought to be descended from Isaac's own.

Continue reading "A Scientific Soft Spot for Newton's Apple" >

By Clay Masters

Debate continues over how to refer to the new H1N1 flu outbreak. One Nebraska Senator has his own idea about how to name influenza viruses.

Nebraska Sen. Ben Nelson, a Democrat, expressed concerns over the financial hit the pork industry has taken because the H1N1 virus is referred to as swine flu. Nelson offered his own virus-naming system.

"Maybe we ought not to name them such as avian or bird flu or swine flu and just name them like names like we do hurricanes -- it could be for example flu Jake or something like that," Nelson said.

Dr. Steve Hinrichs, chair of the department of pathology and microbiology at the University of Nebraska Medical Center, explains that viruses get named based on their origin. In this case a certain amount of genetic material has been traced back to a pig.

Continue reading "Hate Swine Flu's Name? How About Calling it Jake?" >

Egyptian pigs with their backs against the wall. KHALED DESOUKI/AFP/Getty Images

 

By Frank James

Why hasn't Egypt slaughtered its entire poultry population?

That question arises because of reports that avian flu has been a bigger problem in Egypt than swine flu. Avian flu is linked to the deaths of at least three people in the last month according to at least one report while not a single case of swine flu has been reported in Egypt.

Yet the Egyptian government ordered the slaughter of the nation's entire 300,000 pig population. And while the keeping of birds in populated areas has been officially banned, according to a piece on the Radio Netherlands Worldwide website:

... People are still keeping chickens, ducks, geese and pigeons in populated areas, in both rural and urban areas. It is mostly young women who feed the fowl, that contract the disease.

Continue reading "Why No Avian Flu-Related Poultry Slaughter In Egypt?" >

by April Fulton

Egypt is about to get a whole lot more garbage piling up in the streets.

NPR's Peter Kenyon will report later today on the Egyptian government's order to slaughter the country's entire pig population, despite the fact that the country has no known swine flu (H1N1) cases.

This means 300,000 - 400,000 pigs will be killed -- pigs that provide a valuable public service by recycling the public's food scrap waste.

Continue reading "Note from Cairo: Pig Slaughter and Garbage" >

By Frank James

The Obama Administration would greatly appreciate it if we all stopped calling the influenza virus currently the subject of so many recent screaming headlines the "swine flu."

Obama Administration officials would far prefer that we call the virus by the much less catchy scientific designation "H1N1." Indeed, the administration's new task force formed to coordinate the federal response will be called the "H1N1 Task Force."

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, said at a press conference this afternoon, that "We have asked and there has been a response to change the name of this."

We here NPR's Flu Shots blog aren't sure who was asked and agreed to rebrand the virus but we'll try to find out and get back to you our readers on that.

Vilsack, a former governor of Iowa, the nation's hog capital, said:

"This really isn't swine flu. It's H1N1 virus. That's very, very important. And it is significant. Because there are a lot of hard working families whose livelihood depends on us conveying this message sense of safety. And it's not just simply pork production. It's also grain farmers because markets are very sensitive. They react to positive news and they also react to negative news. The livelihoods of a lot of people are at stake here. We want to reinforce the fact that we're doing everything we possibly can to make sure that our hog industry is sound and safe and to make sure consumers in this country and around the world know that American products are safe."

Continue reading "Call 'Swine Flu' H1N1 Instead: Ag Sec'y " >

By Frank James

An infection named swine flu clearly puts hogs on the spot, making them look like the primary cause of the infection in humans that's now emerging around the world.

But Sen. Tom Harkin, an Iowa Democrat from the nation's largest hog-producing state, wants it known that as far as he's concerned, pigs are getting a bum rap.

Towards the end of this afternoon's Senate Appropriations subcommittee hearing Harkin, the subcommittee's chair, asked John Clifford, an U.S. Agriculture Department official a few leading questions: No signs of the virus have been found in any U.S. pig, is that right? Harkin asked. Nor in any pig in Mexico, right? asked Harkin.

That's right, said Clifford. Here's their exchange:

HARKIN: "That's why I'm really sorry that this seemed to take on the connotation of swine flu. I don't know how that happened. It's just somebody started talking about it. I open up the newspaper this morning and there's a picture of pigs and hogs as though all of them are infected with this.

Continue reading "Swine Flu Gives Pigs Bum Rap: Sen. Harkin" >