The journal Science announced the breakthrough of the year 2011 today: a study reported in the paper “Prevention of HIV-1 Infection with Early Antiretroviral Therapy“.

The study involved more than 1700 heterosexual couples, of whom one partner was infected with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) and the other was not at the start of the trial. All those infected still had relatively intact immune systems. The study gave antiretroviral drugs to half of the infected people and delayed giving treatment to the other half until their immune systems declined to a dangerous degree. The results of this early treatment with a cocktail of antiviral drugs were dramatic, lowering the rate at which the HIV-free partner became infected 20-fold, while also improving outcomes for the infected partner. In combination with other promising clinical trials, the results have galvanized efforts to end the world’s AIDS epidemic in a way that would have been inconceivable even a year ago. “The goal of an AIDS-free generation is ambitious, but it is possible,” U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton told scientists last month.

Bruce Alberts ends his summary about the year 2011 with very critical words:

Not all of the news for science has been good this year. Regrettably, we live in an age where “science denial” has become fashionable. For instance, in the United States, the pressure to conform has become so great that even many politicians who know better have become unwilling to speak out to support what science knows about climate change. Part of the reason is that politicians need to raise funds to compete effectively in elections, and the large amount of money spent by special interest groups distorts the public debate. To counter such science denial, I have repeatedly argued on this page that scientists need to pay much more attention to science education. Teaching is not the same as simply telling students what one knows—a common approach pursued through lecturing. Instead, the scientific community needs to strongly support evidence-based methods for improving how students learn science both in college and at lower levels, focusing on empowering all students with the reasoning and problem-solving skills of scientists [...]

– Source: Science Magazine

This quote is quite remarkable:

Though not a party to the case, the US Department of Transportation said it “strongly objects, on both legal and policy grounds, to the EU’s plan to impose its own policies on other countries”.

– Source: eubusiness.com

What happened?

The US says EU plans for an emissions tax on airlines must be dealt with by the international aviation body. It had tried to block European Union plans to levy the emissions tax, saying they were invalid, but the European Court of Justice (ECJ) ruled on Wednesday that they were legal.
[...]
“Application of the emissions trading scheme to aviation infringes neither the principles of customary international law at issue nor the Open Skies Agreement” across the Atlantic, the ECJ decided.
“It is only if the operators of such aircraft choose to operate a commercial air route arriving at or departing from an airport situated in the EU that they are subject to the emissions trading scheme,” it added.
As a result of this choice, the EU system “infringes neither the principle of territoriality nor the sovereignty of third states, since the scheme is applicable to the operators only when their aircraft are physically in the territory of one of the member states of the EU”.
The EU has made it clear that it will not bow to US pressure following Wednesday’s decision.
“We will neither abandon nor delay [the Emissions Trading System]. The measure will fully enter force on 1 January 2012,” said the spokesman for EU climate change commissioner, Connie Hedegaard.

– Source: a wonderful article on BBC.CO.UK

March 2003 BEGINNING
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January 2011
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March 2011
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July 2011
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September 2011
October 2011
November 2011
December 2011 END

Was it worth it?

What did you achieve?

68% of Iraqis have no access to safe drinking water today, after 8 years of war. You granted less than 800 Iraqi refugees asylum. You killed many innocent people, among them children.

How many hundreds of thousands of lives could be better today if you had used the $1.9 trillion for education and healthcare?

Was it worth it?

What did you achieve?

Open your eyes and see.

It is hard to believe that the so far best assessment of the state of the Republican candidates running for presidency I have read within the last months was published by a mediocre German newspaper.

Highly recommended reading:
“The Republicans’ Farcical Candidates: A Club of Liars, Demagogues and Ignoramuses (A Commentary by Marc Pitzke)”

Elections in Berlin in ten days – poll results:

(Apologies, dear international readers – German politics. Just skip this one if you don’t know what is going on.)

UPDATE 29.08.2011: Yesterday, Oscar Pistorius qualified for the 400 semi finals at the athletics world championships in Daegu. A sport-court had decided that his artificial carbon legs do not give him an unfair advantage compared to other runners.

UPDATE 17.05.2008: A few hours ago the CAS (basically a court for sports) decided that the prosthetic-limbed runner Oscar Pitorious will to be allowed to start at the “normal” Olympics in Peking this year (and not the Paralympics), if he is able to qualify by beating the time of 45.95 seconds for 400 metres (his record is 46.56 seconds so far). As you can read below, the IAAF decided in January 2008 that he had unfair advantages over other athletes and therefor denied him access to the Olympics; Pistorius appealed the decision and won.

–

Due to the massive number of doping reports in the last year, I had several discussions with friends about doping, drug-abuse and cyber-limbs in sports.

I think everyone would agree that tournaments (e.g. the Tour de France) should be as fair as possible in order to keep them interesting – which is one of the reasons why female do not compete versus male athletes (at least in disciplines where the body plays a key role), and which is one of the reasons why doping is not allowed in sports; you are not allowed to have an advantage over other athletes, because it makes the whole thing boring.

(Now, of course one could argue that sports per se isn’t fair, because Michael Jordan was born a better sportsman than me, but that’s just life I guess – on a statistical average, talking about sports worldwide here, we will find a bunch of athletes with the same physical conditions.)

A few days back Oscar Pistorius, a double-amputee sprinter, has been denied a shot at the Olympics … for being too fast. The runner — who uses carbon-fiber, prosthetic feet — was reviewed by the International Association of Athletics Federations (or IAAF), a review which found the combination of man and machine to be too much for its purely human competitors. According to the IAAF report, the “mechanical advantage of the blade in relation to the healthy ankle joint of an able bodied athlete is higher than 30-percent.” Additionally, Pistorius uses 25-percent less energy than average runners due to the artificial limbs, therefore giving him an unfair advantage on the track… or so they say. Oscar is expected to appeal the decision, saying a lack of variables explored by the single scientific study calls for deeper investigation into the matter.

The IAAF rule 144.2 prohibits:

(e) Use of any technical device that incorporates springs, wheels or any other element that provides the user with an advantage over another athlete not using such a device.

Read the rest of this entry »

• The American tabacco company Philip Morris decided to sue Uruguay for $2.000.000.000 (damage compensation). Because Uruguay is a nation strongly opposed to smoking, and was among the first to ban public smoking entirely (2006). President Tabaré Vázquez is an oncologist and probably knows quite well what he’s doing.
  In Germany, the amounts of cigarettes smoked per year has been reduced by 40% within the last 10 years. It looks like they are becoming desperate.
• There is a group called “Homeopaths without Borders” – and they are giving away placebos in Africa: against Malaria.
• A package of 500 Aspirin pills costs $3 in the States. In Germany, we pay €3 for 10 pills. That’s over 5000% more expensive. I’m getting tired of this system. (via Fefe)
• In German pharmacies, they sell beer now. Of course, it is not properly marked to be beer, but a relaxing well-being and balance drink.
• Some years ago, the German government (consisting of the green party and the social democrats) initiated that all nuclear energy was to be stopped 2020. Our current government removed this law again, against the will of a major part of the people in Germany. After Fukushima, they lost plenty of votes in regional elections, and now celebrate the “energy turn” because they want to end nuclear energy 2022 in Germany. How can they possibly do that without losing 100% of their voters? How can you say A against massive protests and then a couple of months later decide to go for B and celebrate it as your own idea? Bah, that makes me a sad panda.
• More and more esoteric stuff is offered at German Universities. Can we please keep this out of the sciences? Read the article, it’s a good one.

Pope “Condoms-make-AIDS-worse” Ratzinger is in the news again, this time with a couple of sentences he said in his opening address to the Queen at Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh.

“Even in our own lifetimes we can recall how Britain and her leaders stood against a Nazi tyranny that wished to eradicate God from society and denied our common humanity to many, especially the Jews, who were thought unfit to live. As we reflect on the sobering lessons of atheist extremism of the 20th century, let us never forget how the exclusion of God, religion and virtue from public life leads ultimately to a truncated vision of man and of society and thus a reductive vision of a person and his destiny.”

Right.

And that from the leader of the Catholic Church, who’s words are truth by default, and to whom hundreds of millions of people look up to?

The British Humanist Association issued a statement in response:

“The notion that it is non-religious people in the UK today who want to force their views on others, coming from a man whose organisation exerts itself internationally to impose its narrow and exclusive form of morality and undermine the human rights of women, children, gay people and many others, is surreal.”

(Source: BBC)

Many citizens interested in in a transparent state and worried about power abuse have heard about the discussion regarding general video surveillance. In Berlin, for example, cameras are omnipresent, especially in Mitte.

To give you an example, last year’s demonstration “Freiheit statt Angst” passed over 150 cameras. None of these – nor any of the many police cameras – filmed the unchecked police aggression towards an innocent man peacefully protesting; fortunately, demonstrators switched their cameras on as soon as they saw a crime being committed. This actually led to a reform of the Berlin police force: they have to wear an identification number on their uniform now.

Sometimes, the cameras in Berlin have a little sign next to them: “For your own safety, this place is under video surveillance.”

But that is simply not true: a camera does not increase your safety. It is just a piece of metal. If people rob you or assault you a camera will not help you. It will be there, filming, and show people robbing and assaulting. In nearly all cases, these people cannot be identified – that is very well known from cities like London where there is extensive research regarding the usefulness of video footage. We also know that cameras do not reduce crime rates, which was to be expected, because it is common knowledge in psychology that draconic measures of punishment like the death penalty do likewise not reduce crime rates.

Something has happened in London now that really upset me.
In January 2009, there were demonstrations against the Israeli offensive on Gaza. People were throwing bottles at police officers, which is not okay – and so the London police spent months watching CCTV footage in order to identify protestors and charge them. I understand that. But as the Guardian puts it: “It is only right that similar efforts are made to uncover police wrongdoing.” And there have been many documented assaults of policemen towards innocent and peaceful protesters, so that there is a lot of reason to investigate.

One case is a special, however:

“More worrying is the way in which CCTV is being used by the police. Demonstrator Jake Smith was charged with two counts of violent disorder. These charges were later dropped when Smith’s solicitor, Matt Foot, viewed the original CCTV footage and discovered that the police video had been edited to show events out of sequence, at one point implying another man was Smith while omitting footage showing Smith being assaulted by a police officer without provocation.”

Matt Foot, Jake’s solicitor, has published a short and very insighful written statement of the events.

To sum it up: the London police tampered with video footage in order to prosecute an innocent citizen, and they were caught by a very insistent lawyer.
I find that really hard to digest.

However, there was also one good consequence of the demonstrations. Russell and Ashley Inglis were assaulted by the police, but the police officers responsible could not be identified (youtube video).
They wrote a complaint which was turned down, appealed the decision with the same outcome, then decided to take their case to a solicitor for a civil claim. Russell and Ashley have been awarded £25,000 compensation, although the police officers responsible still remain unidentified! That is the first time this has happened, and although it might not be the best solution to let tax-payers cover for police crimes, at least there seems to be the possibility for compensation when the perpetrators cannot be identified.

Posts on this blog with related content:

• Police aggression in Berlin at “Freiheit statt Angst” demonstration, September 2009
• STOP IT: violence towards policemen at Berlin demonstrations

(Sources: Netzpolitik.org, The Guardian)