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Monday, December 31, 2007

What would you tell your grandchildren about 2007 if they asked you about it in, let’s say, 20 year’s time? If the answer to a quiz question was 2007, what would the question be? The year that you first signed on to Facebook? The year Britney Spears and Amy Winehouse fell apart? The year author Kurt Vonnegut or mime Marcel Marceau died, both at 84?

Let’s take a look at some of the international stories of 2007. Links to the original Wikinews articles are in bold.

Tuesday, February 16, 2016

Yesterday, UK singer Ed Sheeran won the Grammy Award for Song of the Year for his song Thinking Out Loud from his album × ahead of Kendrick Lamar’s Alright; Wiz Khalifa’s, featuring Charlie Puth, See You Again; Little Big Town’s Girl Crush; and Taylor Swift’s Blank Space. Girl Crush won the Grammy Award for Best Country Song.

Welsh singer Amy Wadge co-wrote the song. Sheeran during the ceremony said they wrote the song on a couch in his house. In remarks to the Western Mail, Wadge said the album was already complete when they wrote the song.

Thinking out Loud remained #2 on Billboard Hot 100 for almost two months, and topped the UK rankings last year. Its video song has 969 Million YouTube views and has more than four million likes. The song also won the Grammy Award for Best Pop Solo Performance.

US singer Stevie Wonder announced the winner for the Song of the Year, and the envelope was written in Braille script. He joked about it saying “You can’t read it, you can’t read Braille!”

Along with Ed Sheeran’s first Grammy, Canadians The Weeknd and Justin Bieber won Grammy awards for the first time.

Wednesday, December 7, 2016

Chemotherapy is usually associated with a collection of side effects ranging from digestive problems to hair loss, but a study published this week in Human Reproduction demonstrated that female cancer patients may find they have something in common with much younger women in one specific area — their ovaries.

Scientists from the University of Edinburgh examined donated ovarian tissue from fourteen female cancer patients, most of whom had Hodgkin lymphoma, and compared it to tissue from healthy women. They found the samples from women who had been treated with a specific chemotherapeutic regimen known as ABVD not only contained greater numbers of dormant ova — egg cells — than those from women treated with harsher regimens but also more than samples from healthy women. ABVD is named for combining several drugs known as adriamycin, bleomycin, vinblastine, and dacarbazine.

These reproductive cells were not merely more plentiful in ABVD patients. They also appeared immature, “new” in the words of lead researcher Evelyn Telfer. This challenges the conventional belief that girls are born with all the ova they will ever have and the numbers can only go down as the cells are either used up by the reproductive cycle or succumb to damage or natural aging. However, further research is needed to confirm this. The study covered relatively few patients by scientific standards, and David Albertini of the Center for Human Reproduction in New York has suggested the cells may not actually be freshly grown. Instead, they may have always been there and were merely rendered more detectable by ABVD treatment.

The ability to grow new egg cells may have significant implications for women in Western societies, many of whom postpone childbearing to establish careers, sometimes into their late thirties or forties. However, Telfer warns against making use of these findings too soon: “There’s so much we don’t know about the ovary. We have to be very cautious about jumping to clinical applications.”

The experiments had been discussed earlier this year at the annual conference of the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology.

Friday, March 5, 2010

Jacob Zuma, President of South Africa, claimed Britain believed Africa is “barbaric”, hours before a state visit to Queen Elizabeth II. These claims were made after the Daily Mail described him as a “sex-obsessed bigot and vile buffoon.”

Zuma accused Britons of considering themselves to be culturally superior owing to their past colonial activities. “When the British came to our country they said everything we did was barbaric, was wrong, inferior in whatever way. Bear in mind that I’m a freedom fighter and I fought to free myself, also for my culture to be respected. And I don’t know why they are continuing thinking that their culture is more superior than others, those who might have said so,” stated Zuma in an African newspaper.

According to him, he had never “looked down upon any culture of anyone” and that no one has the authority of judging other cultures. Zuma added, “The British have done that before, as they colonised us, and they continue to do this, and it’s an unfortunate thing. If people want an engagement, I’m sure we will engage on that issue.”

The President’s comments were published in a local private newspaper. Zuma, who has three current wives, made these comments after arriving in Britain with Thobeka Madiba, 38, his third wife.

The Queen will welcome them at the Horse Guards Parade and take them to Buckingham Palace thereafter. A state banquet will also be held in his honor at the palace, where he is set to spend two nights.

Zuma, a member of the Zulu tribe, was compelled to make a public apology following a love child with the daughter of a friend. This incident triggered the articles in Daily Mail and Daily Mirror which attacked Zuma.

Zuma, whose state trip includes meetings with Gordon Brown, David Cameron and Nick Clegg, as well as a speech to members of parliament, plans to continue with the visit. This was confirmed by officials today.

Vincent Magwenya, Zuma’s spokesman said the incident would have no impact in Zuma’s trip.

Magwenya stated: “Mr Zuma is in the UK for wide-ranging programme of substantial and serious issues. The comments he made were not aimed at the British public in general but at certain sections of the media which have lambasted him for what he considers to be his culture. Mr Zuma had a meeting with British journalists yesterday and was asked not one question about his private life”.

He also added that Zuma did not “appreciate reading things which he considers are patronising to his culture” and claimed that it was obvious that “his comments will have no bearing on the state visit.” The President, according to Magwneya, looks forward to the visit and will continue with the full schedule.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Alliance, South Africa’s principal opposition party, stated that the reports in the British newspapers did not warrant Zuma’s lashing out at Britain.

Kenneth Mubu, of the opposing political party said, said: “Instead of rising above predictable criticism from a particular quarter of the British press, he has allowed himself to be dragged down to the level of the tabloids. By accusing the British people of believing that Africans are barbaric and inferior, he has insulted his hosts, and no doubt undermined the entire purpose of the state visit – which is to strengthen relations between South Africa and the United Kingdom.”

The youth sector of the African National Congress supported the President. It expressed its disgust at the British reports.

“British media seem to have developed a habit of rubbishing our president and constantly portray him as barbaric and of inferior belonging,” the youth league said. “It is quite apparent that the British media is the one that is characterised and defined by the worst form of barbarism, backwardness and racism. These British racists continue to live in a dreamland and sadly believe that Africans are still their colonial subjects, with no values and principles. They believe that the only acceptable values and principles in the world are British values of whiteness and subjugation of Africans,” stated the party.

Sunday, January 15, 2006

Ariel Sharon, 77, is scheduled to undergo a tracheotomy today, which is expected to help wean him off a respirator, which is helping him to breathe, a hospital statement said.

A tracheotomy is a procedure where an incision in the windpipe is made to create a temporary or permanent opening. It will allow for the removal of the breathing tube now inserted in Sharon’s throat. Sharon suffered a major stroke on January 4, 2006. Last week, doctors said the plastic tube connecting his windpipe with the respirator would start to cause him damage if left in for too long.

Tracheotomies are routinely performed on stroke victims to reduce the risk of infection posed by intubation.

“The prime minister’s condition continues to remain critical but stable,” said a statement issued by Jerusalem’s Hadassah hospital where doctors have been trying, unsuccessfully, to wake Sharon from a medically induced coma. “This evening the prime minister will undergo a CT test after which he will undergo a tracheotomy. The surgery is aimed at helping to wean him off a respirator machine. It will be conducted in the operating room under general anaesthesia.”