livus

livus, 10 months ago

From the article:

One of the world's most common artificial sweeteners is set to be declared a possible carcinogen next month by a leading global health body, according to two sources with knowledge of the process, pitting it against the food industry and regulators.

Aspartame, used in products from Coca-Cola diet sodas to Mars' Extra chewing gum and some Snapple drinks, will be listed in July as "possibly carcinogenic to humans" for the first time by the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC), the World Health Organisation's (WHO) cancer research arm, the sources said.

The IARC ruling, finalised earlier this month after a meeting of the group's external experts, is intended to assess whether something is a potential hazard or not, based on all the published evidence.

It does not take into account how much of a product a person can safely consume. This advice for individuals comes from a separate WHO expert committee on food additives, known as JECFA (the Joint WHO and Food and Agriculture Organization's Expert Committee on Food Additives), alongside determinations from national regulators.

However, similar IARC rulings in the past for different substances have raised concerns among consumers about their use, led to lawsuits, and pressured manufacturers to recreate recipes and swap to alternatives. That has led to criticism that the IARC's assessments can be confusing to the public.

JECFA, the WHO committee on additives, is also reviewing aspartame use this year. Its meeting began at the end of June and it is due to announce its findings on the same day that the IARC makes its decision public - on 14 July.

livus, 10 months ago

From the article:

The German government wants to limit the influence of China's Confucius Institute in the country, Education Minister Bettina Stark-Watzinger told German newspaper Handelsblatt in an interview published on Thursday.

There are currently 19 Confucius Institutes in Germany, according to government data, most of which are attached to universities where they offer language courses as well as talks on Chinese culture and history.

The minister from the neoliberal Free Democratic Party (FDP) called for "clear limits" on China's "direct influence" on science and teaching.

Germany's Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) categorized the Chinese institute as a tool for political influence in its annual report this year.

"China's activities and forms of cooperation threaten to undermine academic freedom in the field of education and research," the BfV said.

livus, 10 months ago

From the article:

The UN has warned of an increasingly dire humanitarian situation in north-eastern Nigeria, warning that approximately 6 million people there are in need of assistance.

Matthias Schmale, the UN humanitarian coordinator said that severe hunger is affecting 4.3 million people in Nigeria's Borno, Adamawa, and Yobe states. The number of children under five at risk of life-threatening severe acute malnutrition has doubled in one year to reach 700,000. "We must act fast to prevent the situation in the northeast of Nigeria from becoming even more catastrophic," he said.

The crisis is primarily caused by over a decade of insecurity linked to non-state armed groups, which hampers farming and income generation for the local population.

Climate change and extreme weather events, such as last year's severe floods affecting over 4.4 million people across Nigeria, including the north-east, have also played a detrimental role. More than 40,000 people have been killed and two million more displaced in fighting between the army and militants groups, including Boko Haram, over the last 14 years.

livus, 10 months ago

Thanks so much. I have a Mastodon account on principle, but never used it because I have always hated Twitter.

Your post makes me feel like checking it out.

livus, 10 months ago

I buy 14 apples at a time. I can't wrangle all of them individually, especially if I also bought 20 potatoes and a large broccoli.

It's also impossible to weigh them at checkout unless I have some way of grouping them. I wonder if we are going to reintroduce grocer-style fruit scales now that we are banning thin bags.

livus, 10 months ago

I agree. I'm actually kind of looking forward to more vege specific reusable bags on the market.

livus, 10 months ago

They are underpaid and the trolley queues are often long, so anything that wildly slows them down (like apples rolling off the counter) would not be appreciated.

Self checkout machines don't really have enough space, and again there's a line of people so slowly transferring a week's worth of apples, potatoes with dirt on them, carrots etc a few at a time would be a jerk move.

I'm very happy the plastic is about to be fully phased out.

livus, 10 months ago

Interesting times.

livus, 10 months ago

Skyrim! It's fun, it's immersive, and you can have as much or as little combat and quests as you like.

livus, 10 months ago

Hi!

livus, 10 months ago

Well, for a start, I'm on kbin.social so when I click your profile you have 0 everything. So whatever we have on our instance probably doesn't come with us into the fediverse.

And here at kbin our upvotes are not karma. I can see them on my comments but they don't accumulate anywhere. So it means nothing. (There is some kind of system here where downvotes matter locally and not upvotes but apparently its broken and Ernest will probably fix it one day).

livus, 10 months ago

Nothing weak about it. Cats are the preferred currency of the internet.

livus, 10 months ago

You have an awesome profile pic, by the way!

livus, 10 months ago

No, we're in the middle of Oops.

The next step is the part where we are burning and drowning and dying in vast numbers.

livus, 10 months ago

Perhaps. Resource scarcity leads to wars as well.

livus, 10 months ago

Congratulations!

As someone who joined yesterday, I'm part of your momentum!

livus, 10 months ago

Ha ha ha you got me! I am so heavily triggered right now!

One may only take my indeterminate second person pronouns from my cold dead hands.

livus, 10 months ago

One of the frequently wrong ones used to give snarky replies if you opted out, too. Whoever wrote it must be insufferable.

livus, 10 months ago

Sorry for the misundertanding. Now that I read it again I can see what you were saying.

I'm fediversing with my morning coffee, and should probably drink more of it before hitting the reply button!

livus, 10 months ago

I get what you mean. There is no editorial support and too much outsourcing of quality control.

I haven't actually seen a National Geographic for years, but I think that's a distribution issue.

livus, 10 months ago

Commenting late but I just tracked down your cat photo. Gorgeous!!!