IGIHE

Author: Théophile Niyitegeka

  • Top 5 causes of death in children linked to environment

    {The World Health Organisation (WHO) report has revealed that more than one in four deaths of children under five-years are attributable to unhealthy environments.}

    According to the first WHO report dubbed,” Inheriting a Sustainable World Atlas on Children’s Health and the Environment” stated that a large portion of the most common causes of death among children aged one month to five- years are diarrhoea, malaria and pneumonia which are preventable by interventions known to reduce environmental risks, such as access to safe water and clean cooking fuels.

    Dr Margaret Chan, the WHO Director-General, said: “A polluted environment is a deadly one particularly for young children.” adding that this is because their developing organs and immune systems, and smaller bodies and airways, make them especially vulnerable to dirty air and water.

    She said harmful exposures can start in the mother’s womb and increase the risk of premature birth. Additionally, when infants and preschoolers are exposed to indoor and outdoor air pollution and second-hand smoke they have an increased risk of pneumonia in childhood, and a lifelong increased risk of chronic respiratory diseases, such as asthma. Exposure to air pollution may also increase their lifelong risk of heart disease, stroke and cancer.

    The WHO report findings correspond with those of researchers from Makerere University Medical School which confirmed that in Uganda, pneumonia which is attributed to the unhealthy environment is a leading cause of death among children under five-years of age.

    “Pneumonia deaths could be averted if caretakers recognised the danger signs and sought appropriate treatment promptly,” the finding from researchers at Makerere University Medical School read in part.

    The research finding are derived from interviewing 278 caretakers in Mukono District Uganda, whose under-five children had suffered from probable pneumonia two weeks prior to the evaluation. Through structured questionnaires they assessed caretaker’s knowledge about danger signs among under-five children with pneumonia and the actions taken to manage probable pneumonia using descriptive statistics. They also conducted in-depth interviews with caretakers and community health workers.

    {{Utility:}}

    Top 5 causes of death in children under five-years linked to the environment
    A companion report, Don’t pollute my future! The impact of the environment on children’s health, provides a comprehensive overview of the environment’s impact on children’s health, illustrating the scale of the challenge. Every year:
    570 000 children under 5 years die from respiratory infections, such as pneumonia, attributable to indoor and outdoor air pollution, and second-hand smoke.

    361 000 children under 5 years die due to diarrhoea, as a result of poor access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene.

    270 000 children die during their first month of life from conditions, including prematurity, which could be prevented through access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene in health facilities as well as reducing air pollution.

    200 000 deaths of children under 5 years from malaria could be prevented through environmental actions, such as reducing breeding sites of mosquitoes or covering drinking-water storage.

    200 000 children under 5 years die from unintentional injuries attributable to the environment, such as poisoning, falls, and drowning.

    361 000 children under 5 years die due to diarrhoea, as a result of poor access to clean water, sanitation, and hygiene

    Source:Daily Monitor

  • UN gives $5m in aid for crisis-hit region in DRC

    {The United Nations announced aid worth $5m on Saturday to help people affected by the humanitarian crisis in the violence-wracked Kasai region of the Democratic Republic of Congo.}

    The remote, central region has been plagued by violence since mid-August when government forces killed a tribal chief and militia leader, Kamwina Nsapu, who had rebelled against the central government of President Joseph Kabila.

    At least 400 people have been killed since September, according to the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (OCHA) in DR Congo.

    “Today, throughout the three (areas of) Kasai, we count 200 000 internally displaced people, 32,000 returned, and more than 400 dead, including 66 in the month of January alone,” OCHA said in a press release.

    The $5 million grant, released through its Central Emergency Response Fund, will be for a maximum period of six months to save the lives of about 108 000 people.

    “The majority of the affected population is still sheltering in places often located in the bush,” OCHA said. “These displaced people have no access to drinking water, nor to basic food or health services.”

    The UN organisation added that the insecurity that continues to plague the province has forced many schools to close, “depriving some 53,000 students of normal schooling” this year.

    Kasai is a particularly isolated and under-developed region in DRC.

    Clashes between government forces and Nsapu supporters, which began in the central Kasai. have steadily also engulfed the east and west areas of Kasai.

    In February, a seven-minute video posted to social media, which appeared to be taken by a cellphone, purported to show a massacre of unarmed men and women by Congolese soldiers apparently in the central Kasai area.

    The government first qualified the video as a “ridiculous montage,” rejecting international pressure to investigate. But two days later, it did an about-face, saying it was looking into the video “as a precautionary measure”.

    Source:AFP

  • Senators in push to elect East African Legislative Assembly members

    {Senators want the law changed to allow them to nominate and elect members of the East African Legislative Assembly (Eala).}

    Already, the two Houses have agreed to form a joint select committee of seven members each, to review the procedure of selection of the Eala members.

    The Senate is pushing to be part of the process following concerns that the election rules adopted in April 2012, do not take into consideration the bicameral Parliament.

    The senators also want to pass amendments to the Ratification of Treaties Act to allow the senate to participate in the ratification of internationals laws and instruments that affect Kenya.

    Senate Minority Leader Moses Wetang’ula (Bungoma) said the current situation where treaties signed by the country can only be ratified by the National Assembly is based on a wrong assumption that Kenya has no bicameral House.

    {{TREATY RATIFICATION}}

    He faulted the National Assembly for amending the law to lock out the Senate from ratifying international treaties, which is against global standards.

    “The National Assembly unilaterally amended the law on treaty ratification to give itself powers to ratify treaties when the Constitution says they should be signed by Parliament, as a whole,” Mr Wetang’ula (above) said.

    He cited countries such as Burundi and Rwanda which have a bicameral parliament, saying their electoral college is vested in both Houses.

    “We want to move in tandem with our East African countries to have both Houses participate in nomination and election of Eala members,” said the senator.

    He proposed that Eala members whose terms expire on June 4, be elected by citizens of the East African region, through special constituencies, as opposed to through the member countries’ parliaments.

    {{CAN’T AMEND TREATIES}}

    “We need to make Eala a full parliament where every political party provides a list of those to serve there, if elected. We need a strong Eala with a wider mandate. Currently, they can’t amend a single treaty,” Mr Kipchumba Murkomen (Elgeyo-Marakwet) said.

    Mr Wetang’ula observed that most of the those who end up in Eala are political rejects being rewarded for being loyal to some parties, and this has affected the assembly’s effectiveness.

    The team consists of senators Mutula Kilonzo Jr (Makueni), Elizabeth Ongoro (nominated) Kimani Wamatangi (Kiambu), Peter Mositet (Kajiado), Kipchumba Murkomen (Elgeyo Markwet), Mshenga Mvita (nominated), and Henry ole Ndiema (Trans Nzoia).

    Members from the National Assembly are Katoo ole Metito (Kajiado South), Ali Wario (Bura), Florence Mutua (Busia woman rep), Wafula Wamunyinyi (Kanduyi), Samuel Chepkong’a (Ainabkoi), Wanjiku Muhia (Nyandarua woman rep) and Daniel Maanzo (Makueni).

    The committee has 14 days to present a report to the two Houses for consideration.

    Senate Minority Leader Moses Wetang'ula. Senators want the law changed to allow them to nominate and elect members of the East African Legislative Assembly.

    Source:Daily Nation

  • African Parks gets $65M for conservation in Rwanda and Malawi

    {African Parks will receive $65 million from the Wyss Foundation to bolster conservation efforts in Rwanda, Malawi, and beyond.

    The funds will go toward African Parks’ management of Liwonde National Park, Majete Wildlife Reserve and Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserve in Malawi; Akagera National Park in Rwanda; and five still-to-be-identified protected areas in other countries.

    African Parks privately manages protected areas, effectively taking over operations traditionally managed by governments.}

    African Parks, a South Africa-based organization that manages six million hectares across ten protected areas in seven African nations, will receive $65 million from the Wyss Foundation to bolster conservation efforts in Rwanda, Malawi, and beyond.

    Antelopes in Akagera National Park in July 2015:Photo Théophile Niyitegeka

    According to statement released by Wyss, the funds will go toward African Parks’ management of Liwonde National Park, Majete Wildlife Reserve and Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserve in Malawi; Akagera National Park in Rwanda; and five still-to-be-identified protected areas in other countries.

    “The Wyss Foundation is partnering with African Parks to safeguard more large wild landscapes in Africa from poaching and destruction,” said Hansjörg Wyss, Founder and Chairman of The Wyss Foundation, said in a press release. “African Parks has demonstrated success in cooperating with local leaders, communities and African nations in preserving ecosystems benefiting wildlife, while supporting local communities and populations. We are proud of our partnership with African Parks.”

    The donation builds on a 2015 grant from Wyss that enabled African Parks to reintroduce lions to Rwanda after they had been driven to extinction during the genocide of the mid-1990s. That lion population has since doubled.

    African Parks and Wyss are also collaborating on a massive translocation of animals to Malawi’s Nkhotakota Wildlife Reserve.

    “Up to 500 elephants are currently being moved from two parks with a surplus (Liwonde and Majete) to a third park (Nkhotakota) that until recently had been heavily poached but has since been secured and is poised to be restocked and revived as Malawi’s premier elephant sanctuary,” the statement said. “In addition to these elephants, more than 1,000 head of other animals, including sable antelope, buffalo, waterbuck and impala have also been reintroduced to Nkhotakota, re-establishing viable founder populations, and helping to restore the health of the park.”

    A zebra in Akagera National Park, Rwanda, which is managed by African Parks. Photo by John Dickens/African Parks.

    African Parks is developing proposals for the other five new protected areas in Chad, Kenya, Mozambique and Benin that could receive support in the form of “challenge grants” if matching funds are raised. The group, which privately manages protected areas from top to bottom, says it is also in discussions with the Governments of Zimbabwe and Zambia as part of its goal to manage 20 parks by 2020.

    “Our vision is to protect 20 parks by 2020, bringing up to 10 million hectares of wilderness under our management,” said Peter Fearnhead, CEO of African Parks. “This historic gift, and the partnership forged with the Wyss Foundation, enables us to have a conservation impact at a scale which is globally significant.”

    Source:Mongabay

  • Umugoroba w’Ababyeyi reuniting broken families in Kamonyi

    {It is 4.16PM as i arrive in a remote village of Muganza in Karama Sector of Kamonyi District, about 30 minutes drive off Kigali-Muhanga highway.}

    Under a tree, a gathering of about 200 people -men and women – are seated in semi-cyclical form.

    A dark skinned slander middle–aged woman holding a microphone is standing in the middle boldly speaking to the attentive gathering.

    She’s talking about a very essential topic – care for pregnant women from conception to birth.

    In a close observation, there are no children around save for a few toddlers with some being breastfed.

    The gathering is a customary social coercion traditionally known as Umugoroba w’Ababyeyi, loosely translated as “evening of parents” that happens every Thursday in all villages across the country where men and women come together to deliberate on various community issues related to security and socio-economic and cultural issues.

    The Rwandan historical tradition was initaily an all-women meeting where sat after the day’s home chores and deliberated on social and family issues, before it was adopted as a national policy due to it’s impact as a home-grown solution in addressing a range of community issues.

    The vice mayor of Kamonyi in charge of social affairs, Prisca Uwamahoro addressing residents of Muganza during Umugoroba w'ababyeyi.

    The forum is structured at a village level where a team comprising of seven opinion leaders and elders is selected to steer discussions.

    About fifteen minutes into her presentation, a man sends the whole gathering into laughter with a question; how do you know your wife is pregnant?

    From health issues, discussions shifted to security related matters.

    A balded man raises his hand seemingly to make a strong point judging from his impatience to speak or give the most accurate response. He is flagged to move in front.

    “Today, I want to thank you all my neighbors for not forsaking me during my dark periods,” says Denis Kalimbanya.

    He goes on to narrate how NUANCE he was and an embarrassment to both his family and community.

    He thanks his village-mates for bringing him to Umugoroba w’Ababyeyi last year, which he calls a ‘turning point.’

    {{Kalimbanya’s story}}

    The father of six was a drunkard with irrational behavior, and could not provide anything to support the family save for always assaulting his wife and children and even taking the little money earned by his spouse who was forced by the situation to do casual work for a the children’s survivor.

    This also led their children to drop out of school, at some point being yet another problem to the community as in some cases they would be tempted to steal to survive.

    “I was a problem to myself, my family and my community,” narrates Kalimbanya.

    Last year, Kalimbanya was summoned by community members to Umugoroba w’Ababyeyi, after the wife boldly decided to break silence over her long suffering.

    It was during this forum that Kalimbanyi together with others were counselled and advised on proper conduct and reconciled and reunited with their families.

    It was a moment of tears of joy back then as Kalimbanyi called out his wife and children, asked for forgiveness, and hugged as a symbol of forgiveness normally used in this community forum.

    Today, Kalimbanyi is a complete opposite of his previous self and has since lost his alcohol obsessions, lives happily with his wife, engaged in family development activities and the children are back in school.

    A resident of Muganza cheering during Umugoroba w'ababyeyi.

    It is these testimonies from past experiences that continues to be used in Kamonyi every Thursday evening, like in other parts of the country, to transform lives of people in the district,

    Marie Murerwa, who is in charge of gender and family promotion in Kamonyi says those handling evening of parents are given periodic training on how to handle societal issue.

    “We bring together modal and problematic families to share experiences” she says.

    “Normally, those found with deep rooted conflicts are taken through six weeks counseling session,” adds Murerwa.

    “We address issues related to domestic and gender based violence, child abuse, family planning, positive living; we discuss on how to improve security in our communities like strengthening Irondo, information sharing with security organs on criminals like drug dealers; ensure that all children go to school and hold parents and guardians accountable, ” she explains.

    According to the Vice mayor of Kamonyi in charge of Social Affairs, Prisca Uwamahoro, since the launch of Umugoroba w’ababyeyi to be an all-adult national programme, the number of men participating has increased, so is the impact.

    “I must say that before, majority of the families were experiencing internal conflicts, to some extent resulting into a bloody where a woman or man would be tempted to kill the other over either property or especially women who felt they were pushed to the extreme by their errant husbands, who beat them up every time,” says the first mayor.

    “Today, Umugoroba w’ababyeyi has created impact in unity, harmony, partnership and active participation in government development programmes like Umuganda, universal education, subscribing to to the community health insurance scheme (mituelle se sante) and working with security organs to address threats to the social wellbeing of the people,” says Uwamahoro.

    She adds that the forum has helped hundreds of families which experienced internal conflicts to reconcile using the same methodology of peer to peer discussions guided by trained social workers.

    “The number of school dropouts and street kids has also drastically reduced, for example,” she prides.

    Denis Kalimbanyi speaking during Umugoroba w'ababyeyi.

    This, according to her, is attributed to parents understanding their role during such forum.

    It is said that most street children in the City of Kigali are from the neighbouring districts including Kamonyi.

    According to Chief Inspector of Police (CIP) Gisanga Ndahimana, the District Police Commander of Kamonyi, cases related to gender and domestic violence have reduced significantly.

    “Umugoroba w’Ababyeyi has instilled the spirit of togetherness, a sense of belonging and responsiveness and as a result, residents call us with information on conflicting families, drug dealers and abusers, families that employ minors as domestic workers, and even criminals that are wanted for a particular committed crime, and all this fulfills the concept of community policing,” says CIP Ndahimana.

    He says that where conflicts have not been prevented “culprits have been arrested since information smoothly sails through these forums.”

    The police also uses the forum to sensitize the public against crime.

    “We are often invited to talk to the masses and enlighten them about the dangers of illegal conduct and actually how abuse of illicit drugs and excessive drinking are the major causes of family conflicts,” he adds.

    Gender based violence and child abuse crimes, he says, reduced by 30 percent last year in Kamonyi, which he attributes to Umugoroba w’Ababyeyi.

    Statistics by Rwanda National Police indicate that crimes generally reduced by 12 per cent last year.

    Source:Police

  • Twice weekly yoga classes plus home practice effective in reducing symptoms of depression

    {People who suffer from depression should participate in yoga and deep (coherent) breathing classes at least twice weekly plus practice at home to receive a significant reduction in their symptoms.}

    The findings, which appear in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, provide preliminary support for the use of yoga-based interventions as an alternative or supplement to pharmacologic treatments for depression.

    Major depressive disorder (MDD) is common, recurrent, chronic and disabling. Due in part to its prevalence, depression is globally responsible for more years lost to disability than any other disease. Up to 40 percent of individuals treated with antidepressant medications for MDD do not achieve full remission. This study used lyengar yoga that has an emphasis on detail, precision and alignment in the performance of posture and breath control.

    Individuals with MDD were randomized to the high dose group, three 90-minute classes a week along with home practice, or the low dose group, two 90-minute classes a week, plus home practice. Both groups had significant decreases in their depressive symptoms and no significant differences in compliance. Although a greater number of subjects in the high dose group had less depressive symptoms, the researchers believe attending twice weekly classes (plus home practice) may constitute a less burdensome but still effective way to gain the mood benefits from the intervention.

    “This study supports the use of a yoga and coherent breathing intervention in major depressive disorder in people who are not on antidepressants and in those who have been on a stable dose of antidepressants and have not achieved a resolution of their symptoms,” explained corresponding author Chris Streeter, MD, associate professor of psychiatry and neurology at Boston University School of Medicine and a psychiatrist at Boston Medical Center.

    According to Streeter compared with mood altering medications, this intervention has the advantages of avoiding additional drug side effects and drug interactions. “While most pharmacologic treatment for depression target monoamine systems, such as serotonin, dopamine and norepinephrine, this intervention targets the parasympathetic and gamma aminobutyric acid system and provides a new avenue for treatment.”

    The findings, which appear in the Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine, provide preliminary support for the use of yoga-based interventions as an alternative or supplement to pharmacologic treatments for depression.

    Source:Science Daily

  • Ruhango: Police intensifies campaign against GBV, drug abuse

    {As part of the ongoing campaign against gender based violence and drug abuse in Ruhango District, the awareness continued on Friday during a radio live talkshow.}

    The District Police Commander, Chief Inspector of Police (CIP) Jean Bosco Ndayisabye, flanked by the District Community Liaison Officer (DCLO), Inspector of Police (IP) Angelique Abijuru, during the talk-show on radio Huguka, noted that although cases related to gender based violence continue to drop, it is still an issue that requires everyone’s attention in breaking silence to report anything they witness.

    “Domestic and gender based violence is in most cases done internally in families, and there’s a likelihood that most of these cases remain unreported. We need people to understand their rights, either as a man or woman, and claim these rights by reporting any human rights violations they face in their homes,” CIP Ndayisabye said.

    “As the DPU and Rwanda National Police in general, we are into mass campaign down in communities and in schools. We need people to own the fight against any sort of crime…anything that affects their social wellbeing.”

    Earlier on, the District Police Unit held the awareness campaign against drug abuse at Kebero transit centre located in Ntongwe Sector, where they explained to those under the rehabilitation process, to look focus on their future rather than wasting their lives in abusing drugs.

    The transit centre is currently a home of 88 former drug abuser and dealers, among others.

    The DPC told them that the country requires their service, a reason as to why the transit centre was established to transform them into good and a focused citizens, which they should value as they support existing efforts to fight the use and sell of illicit drugs by providing information on the dealers.

    Source:Police

  • To understand others’ minds, ‘being’ them beats reading them

    {We tend to believe that people telegraph how they’re feeling through facial expressions and body language and we only need to watch them to know what they’re experiencing — but new research shows we’d get a much better idea if we put ourselves in their shoes instead. The findings are published in Psychological Science, a journal of the Association for Psychological Science.}

    “People expected that they could infer another’s emotions by watching him or her, when in fact they were more accurate when they were actually in the same situation as the other person. And this bias persisted even after our participants gained firsthand experience with both strategies,” explain study authors Haotian Zhou (Shanghai Tech University) and Nicholas Epley (University of Chicago).

    To explore out how we go about understanding others’ minds, Zhou, Epley, and co-author Elizabeth Majka (Elmhurst College) decided to focus on two potential mechanisms: theorization and simulation. When we theorize about someone’s experience, we observe their actions and make inferences based on our observations. When we simulate someone’s experience, we use our own experience of the same situation as a guide.

    Based on previous research showing that people tend to assume that our feelings ‘leak out’ through our behavior, Zhou, Epley, and Majka hypothesized that people would overestimate the usefulness of theorizing about another person’s experience. And given that we tend to think that individual experiences are unique, the researchers also hypothesized that people would underestimate the usefulness of simulating another person’s experience.

    In one experiment, the researchers asked 12 participants to look at a series of 50 pictures that varied widely in emotional content, from very negative to positive. A webcam recorded their faces as these “experiencers” rated their emotional feelings for each picture. The researchers then brought in a separate group of 73 participants and asked them to predict the experiencers’ ratings for each picture. Some of these “predictors” simulated the experience, looking at each picture; others theorized about the experience, looking at the webcam recording of the experiencer; and a third group were able to simulate and theorize at the same time, looking at both the picture and accompanying recording.

    The results revealed that the predictors were much more accurate when they saw the pictures just as the experiencer had than they were when they saw the recording of the experiencer’s face. Interestingly, seeing both the picture and the recording simultaneously yielded no additional benefit — being able to simulate the experience seemed to underlie participants’ accuracy.

    Despite this, people didn’t seem to appreciate the benefit of simulation. In a second experiment, only about half of the predictors who were allowed to choose a strategy opted to use simulation. As before, predictors who simulated the rating experience were much more accurate in predicting the experiencer’s feelings, regardless of whether they chose that strategy or were assigned to it.

    In a third experiment, the researchers allowed for dynamic choice, assuming that predictors may increase in accuracy over time if they were able to choose their strategy before each trial. The results showed, once again, that simulation was the better strategy across the board — still, participants who had the ability to choose opted to simulate only about 48% of the time.

    A fourth experiment revealed that simulation was the better strategy even when experiencers had been told to make their reactions as expressive and “readable’ as possible.

    “Our most surprising finding was that people committed the same mistakes when trying to understand themselves,” Zhou and Epley note.

    Participants in a fifth experiment expected they would be more accurate if they got to watch the expressions they had made while looking at emotional pictures one month earlier — but the findings showed they were actually better at estimating how they had felt if they simply viewed the pictures again.

    “They dramatically overestimated how much their own face would reveal, and underestimated the accuracy they would glean from being in their own past shoes again,” the researchers explain.

    Although reading other people’s mental states is an essential part of everyday life, these experiments show that we don’t always pick the best strategy for the task.

    According to Zhou and Epley, these findings help to shed light on the tactics that people use to understand each other.

    “Only by understanding why our inferences about each other sometimes go astray can we learn how to understand each other better,” the researchers conclude.

    Source:Science Daily

  • Latest genomic technology uncovers secrets of immune system’s response to malaria

    {Scientists have revealed for the first time how immature mouse immune cells, called T cells, choose which type of skills they will develop to fight malaria infection. Reported today in Science Immunology, researchers from the Wellcome Trust Sanger Institute, European Bioinformatics Institute and QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Australia, tracked individual T cells during infection with malaria parasites. They discovered a whole network of chemical conversations between different types of cells that influenced T cell specialisation.}

    Using the latest single-cell genomics technology and computational modelling, the study also discovered genes within the T cells that may be involved in controlling antibody production during malaria infection. One of these, Galectin 1, encouraged development of a particular type of T cell when active. These genes are possible drug targets to boost immunity to malaria and other infections.

    The immune system is extremely complex and responds to disease by developing specific types of immune cells. Two different types of T cell — T helper1 (Th1) and T follicular helper (Tfh) — develop and help fight infection. The researchers discovered that more Th1 cells were produced when a gene called Galectin 1 was active. These Th1 cells help remove parasites from the bloodstream and are needed early on in an infection, however for longer-term immunity, more Tfh cells are needed.

    Dr Ashraful Haque, joint lead author from the QIMR Berghofer Medical Research Institute, Brisbane, Australia, said: “This is the first time that Galectin 1 acting inside T cells has been seen to influence Th1 fate, and has shown that Galectin 1 is a possible therapeutic target for malaria. An important next step will be to test many of the new gene targets identified by our studies, to see if they can be targeted by drugs to boost immunity to malaria.”

    The exact molecules that encourage the T cells to develop into one or the other form are poorly understood. The researchers used single-cell RNA sequencing to take ‘snapshots’ of the active genes produced by each individual T cell after the mouse was infected with malaria. With these snapshots of data, the researchers identified all the different stages between immature T cells and fully specialised Th1 or Tfh cells.

    Dr Sarah Teichmann, Head of Cellular Genetics at the Sanger Institute and joint lead author on the paper, said: “This is the first high resolution time-course of cells using a pathogen in mice, where we have used cutting edge genomics coupled with computational methods to reconstruct how cells evolve and develop over infection. With methods from machine learning, we have simplified really complex biological processes into something we can understand. This approach could be applied to resolve any biological developmental process.”

    The team also developed a new computer modelling system called GPfates* which allowed them to see how all the cells related to each other. This uses methods from spatio-temporal statistics, to show which genes were switched on in each of the two distinct cell states (Th1 and Tfh).

    Dr Oliver Stegle, joint lead author from the European Bioinformatics Institute, said: “Using genomics we uncovered the inter-cellular conversation that is taking place between immune cells such as monocytes and Th1 cells. This has not been seen before, and our data have allowed us to uncover tens or hundreds of new genes that may be involved in controlling the production of antibodies. Activity in these genes may help the body, for example in curing an infection, or may hinder by allowing cancerous cells to flourish. The principles and the computational methods we have developed here could be applied to future studies to explore these questions.”

    Source:Science Daily

  • UN delivers medicine to Yemen’s besieged Taiz city

    {WHO says eight tonnes of aid delivered for first time since onset of war to hospitals in country’s third largest city.}

    Eight tonnes of medicine have been delivered to hospitals in government-held Taiz, Yemen’s third largest city under Houthi rebel siege, according to the UN health agency.

    The World Health Organisation said it was the first time since the conflict began that the UN negotiated access by direct route to Taiz city.

    “The truck arrived in Taiz city yesterday. The medicines have been distributed to hospitals today,” Tarik Jasarevic, WHO spokesperson, told AFP news agency.

    More than 350,000 people are in need of urgent medical aid in Taiz, he said.

    The medical supplies included trauma kits, emergency medicine and pneumonia kits.

    Jasarevic also said that previously the UN had only been able to get some medical supplies to Taiz via smaller, side roads in the Arabian Peninsula country.

    The 23-month-long Houthi rebel siege of Taiz has caused shortages of food, water and medicines.

    At least 37 of the city’s 40 hospitals and medical institutions have been forced to close, and the doctors and nurses brave enough to remain are forced to operate without essentials such oxygen – which doctors require to put patients under general anesthesia.

    During his latest visit to Yemen, Stephen O’Brien, the UN humanitarian affairs chief, discussed with Houthi leaders the question of aid entry into areas such as Taiz.

    The meeting happened after he was stopped from delivering aid to the city, according to the UN News Centre.

    The latest UNICEF report says that more than 400,000 children were at risk of starvation in Yemen with nearly 2.2 million in need of urgent care.

    The report mentions Taiz as one of the main governorates affected.

    Yemen has been torn apart by conflict since 2014, when Houthi rebels, allied with troops loyal to former president Ali Abdullah Saleh, captured large expanses of the country, including the capital Sanaa.

    A coalition of Arab countries assembled by Saudi Arabia launched an air campaign against the rebels in March 2015.

    Seven ceasefire accords have failed to end the war, which has left more than 7,500 dead and 40,000 people wounded, according to UN tally.

    Taiz has been under Houthi siege for 23 months now

    Source:Al Jazeera