Month: October 2023

NYC rats carry COVID-19: ‘Could pose a risk to humans,’ new study says

U.S. New York City Eric Adams Rats Pests

The old adage goes that you’re never more than six feet from a rat. For those living in some of the most built-up areas of New York until recently, it may have been more of a reality than an old wives’ tale.

An August study by one pest-control firm estimated that, in 2022, there were around 3 million of the rodents living among the Big Apple‘s human population of 8.5 million—an increase of 50 percent from 2010. It noted there had been a massive uptick from 2020, suggesting the coronavirus pandemic may have helped fuel their spread.

Cassie Krejci, Ph.D, an entomologist and head of science and innovation for Rentokil Initial’s U.S. business, told Newsweek that it was seeing “several macro-economic growth factors set against a backdrop of climate change which drives a rise in the number of pests.”

The problem was large enough—and residents’ complaints loud enough—that in April, New York’s Mayor Eric Adams appointed its first “rat czar,” Kathleen Corradi, with a $3.5 million budget behind her to reduce the city’s rampant rat population. At the time, he described them as “public enemy number one.”

Stock photo of a brown rat. Sightings of the rodents in New York City are reported to be 45 percent down between May and mid-July. Getty/Newsweek

“You’ll be seeing a lot of me and lot less rats,” Corradi said at the time.

But six months on, has there been any noticeable improvement? Images and videos posted on social media suggest that rats are still very much a feature of New York’s nightlife—and some are evidently still gorging themselves, judging by their size.

A spokesperson for the mayor told Newsweek that rat complaints made with City Hall were down 20 percent across the summer, compared with the same period last year, while sightings purportedly decreased on average by 45 percent between May and mid-July—early signs that mitigation efforts may be working.

Close Encounters of the Rat Kind

It’s a convenience store, the drinks aisle—but you’re not the only being shopping around. One video, posted in late September, shows one instance of a rat the size of a possum casually inspecting the produce.

Or maybe it’s a night out on the town, but the fight on the street isn’t two drunken strangers, rather a tussle between a large rat and a pigeon. Footage shows the pigeon does not have the upper hand—or wing, or claw. You may turn a street and see a cat-sized rodent sauntering along on the way home.

New York City rats are well fed

pic.twitter.com/cNFlXZhOcj

— Insider Paper (@TheInsiderPaper) September 29, 2023

Perhaps you’re going for a drive upstate, and as the brick buildings of Brooklyn turn into leafy forestry, you notice an extra passenger onboard—clinging to the hood for dear life.

“Spoiler alert: they continue to run the city,” one poster recently told her audience. “Despite aggressive control efforts in the city, including rat birth-control, these rodents continue to run the streets.”

Notwithstanding the rats apparent continuing presence in New York City, work is now being done to bring that population down—and pest controllers say it is having an impact.

Alongside Corradi’s coronation, the city instituted a “rat mitigation zone” across the Harlem neighborhood, alongside other mitigation zones in the East Village and Chinatown, as well as built-up areas of the Bronx and Brooklyn.

Under the new zone, private properties will be subject to inspections twice a year and other locations, such as schools and parks, face monthly visits. City Hall also announced 19 full-time staff and 14 part-time inspectors would work on extermination in public spaces, with new equipment and supplies.

A spokesperson for the mayor said they had increased the number of staff working on rat control as part of the effort, but could not confirm as of the time of publication how much of the budget had so far been spent.

The New York Times reported in April that Corradi will be paid $155,000 a year.

“The mayor also continued to advance his work to containerize garbage, including kicking off an effort to get up to 100 percent of commercial trash in containers,” it added.

Since the end of July, all food businesses have been required to put their waste in containers, preventing rats from nibbling through street-level garbage bags and feasting on leftovers, and since September, the rule has been expanded to all chain stores in the city. A pilot for residential containerization is also said to be underway for schools and apartments in Hamilton Heights, Manhattan.

A rat looks for food while on a subway platform at 59th Street station on May 8, 2023, in New York City (left) and its new nemesis, Kathleen Corradi, the city’s first “rat czar,” seen on April 12, 2023. Gary Hershorn/Getty Images/NY City Hall

A spokesperson said there had been a 45 percent reduction in complaints within the mitigation zones over the summer, compared with 2022.

Perhaps surprisingly, commercial pest controls that operate in the city—and would have benefited from the rise of the rats—agree that mitigation efforts seem to be working. Pest-control company Orkin, whose New York operation is based in Queens, confirmed to Newsweek that it had seen new rodent services decrease year on year.

“This typically tells us that the demand is generally lower—which aligns with the statistics that the mayor’s office has shared,” it said.

“When comparing the number of rodent calls for service across NYC in January through April 2022 to May through September 2022, we saw calls go up 68 percent,” Rentokil’s Krejci said. “When looking at the same time periods in 2023, this increase was only 25 percent.

“Not only are rodent calls for service down year-over-year, but they are also down versus the prior period, suggesting it is more than just variation between years; mitigation measures and effective rodent control are working in the right direction.”

Selected Articles – Michael Novakhov’s favorite articles on Inoreader – The News And Times

NYC rats carry COVID-19: ‘Could pose a risk to humans,’ new study says

Maybe the rats do run this city. New York City rodents can carry the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 – and researchers fear it could be transmitted to humans, according to a new study. The new research, published Thursday in the American Society for Microbiology “mBio,” determined that the rats could…

posted 1m ago via nypost.com

 

New York’s giant rat problem

U.S. New York City Eric Adams Rats Pests The old adage goes that you’re never more than six feet from a rat. For those living in some of the most built-up areas of New York until recently, it may have been more of a reality than an old wives’ tale.An August study by one pest-control firm estimated that, in 2022, there were around 3 million…

posted 32m ago via newsweek.com

 

New York’s Giant Rat Problem – Newsweek

New York’s Giant Rat Problem  NewsweekThe post New York’s Giant Rat Problem – Newsweek first appeared on The CoronaVirus Alerts – The News And Times.

posted 40m ago by mikenova12@gmail.com via The CoronaVirus Alerts

North Korea denounced on Friday a U.S. aircraft carrier’s visit to South Korea, calling it a provocation that could bring “irrevocable, catastrophic circumstances”.

The nuclear-powered Ronald Reagan and its strike group arrived in the South Korean port of Busan on Thursday for a five-day visit, after allied exercises in nearby waters, in a show of force against North Korea.

The aircraft carrier’s visit showed that a U.S. scheme for a nuclear attack on North Korea had reached “the most serious phase”, North Korea’s official KCNA news agency said, adding this meant “the outbreak of a nuclear war comes to the fore”.

“It is an undisguised military provocation driving the situation to irrevocable catastrophic circumstances,” KCNA said in a commentary.

U.S. and South Korean forces have been staging intensified military exercises this year, involving U.S. aircraft carriers, submarines and advanced bombers, in order, they say, to better respond to evolving North Korean nuclear and missile threats.

North Korea calls the drills a rehearsal for invasion.

Seth Koenig, a spokesman for the carrier strike group, said it frequently visits South Korea providing “opportunities to build interoperability at sea together towards shared goals of a free and open Indo Pacific”.

The North Korean news agency said that in case of an imminent nuclear attack, North Korea would take “necessary action”, as enshrined in its nuclear doctrine, to “thoroughly deter and repel U.S. and its stooges’ frantic moves to ignite a nuclear war”.

Our “most powerful and rapid first strike will be given to the ‘extended deterrence’ means, used by the U.S. to hallucinate its followers, and the bases of evil in the Korean peninsula and its vicinity,” KCNA said.

The term “extended deterrence” means the ability of the U.S. military, particularly its nuclear forces, to deter attacks on allies.

U.S., Japanese and South Korean nuclear envoys will hold two days of talks from Monday in the Indonesian capital to discuss North Korea, the Japanese and South Korean foreign ministries said.

Japan has regularly participated in air and naval exercises with the allies.

U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken on Friday met with Jordanian King Abdullah in Amman, the second stop of his most extensive Middle East tour yet as Israel prepares for a sweeping ground offensive in Gaza, and he urged people in Gaza city to evacuate to the south.

His demand, which the United Nations said would be impossible to carry out “without devastating humanitarian consequences”, comes a day after Blinken visited Israel and held talks with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the conflict.

U.S. President Joe Biden dispatched his top diplomat to the region, engulfed in its most serious escalation in years, following an attack by Palestinian Hamas militants who rampaged through Israeli towns killing 1,200 Israelis.

Blinken has expanded his trip from Israel and Jordan to include all of the Gulf Arab countries and Egypt, making it his largest tour of the region since taking office in January 2021.

On Friday alone, the top American diplomat is set to visit three more countries: Qatar, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia, where he will spend the night. Before departing for Doha, he is set to meet with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas in Amman.

“Across each of these engagements, we’ll continue pressing countries to help prevent the conflict from spreading, and to use their leverage with Hamas to immediately and unconditionally release the hostages,” Blinken told a news conference in Tel Aviv.

“We’ll also discuss how we can continue to make real our affirmative vision for a region that’s more peaceful, more prosperous, more secure, more integrated. And in fact, that is the choice, and the choice in some ways has been made even more stark by the actions of Hamas on Saturday.”

Washington says at least 25 Americans were killed in the Hamas attacks and more are believed to be among the scores of hostages taken to Gaza. U.S. Deputy Special Envoy for Hostage Affairs Steve Gillen traveled with Blinken to Israel and will stay to support efforts to free them, Blinken said.

Gaza moved closer to a humanitarian catastrophe on Thursday as the death toll rose and vital supplies ran low after Israel imposed a siege on the enclave. Israel said there would be no humanitarian break until all hostages were freed.

But a ground invasion of Gaza Strip, home to 2.3 million people and now under siege by Israel, poses serious risks with Hamas holding scores of hostages kidnapped in the assault.

Global shares slipped on Friday after stronger-than-expected U.S. inflation figures and upcoming consumer price data from Europe kept markets on edge about central banks keeping interest rates higher for longer.

MSCI’s broadest index of global equities (.MIWD00000PUS) fell 0.3%, while Europe’s Stoxx 600 share index (.STOXX) nudged 0.2% lower in early trade, following a bruising session in Asia.

Data on Thursday showed an increase in U.S. consumer prices in September including a surprise surge in rental costs, an indicator closely watched by economists for signs above-target inflation has become embedded in the economy.

“The hawks calling for at least another (Fed) hike will be supported based on these numbers,” said Ryan Brandham, head of global capital markets, North America, at Validus Risk Management.

Futures markets reflected about a 40% probability of a U.S. rate hike in December, compared with about a 28% chance seen before Thursday’s consumer prices report.

Inflation reports from Sweden, Spain and France are due later on Friday.

The U.S. inflation report along with poor demand for an auction of U.S. 30-year bonds sent Treasury yields higher on Thursday.

In early European trading on Friday, the yield on 10-year Treasury notes was down 3.9 basis points at 4.670% but remained far off the two-week low of 4.5300% it touched at one point on Thursday.

Recent gains in stocks and a slide in Treasury yields had followed comments from Federal Reserve officials suggesting that U.S. interest rates – which tend to drive global borrowing costs – may have finally peaked.

“Much of the ‘good’ work done in the past week in the form of bull flattening of the U.S. yield curve has been undone by the latest U.S. CPI report,” said Ray Attrill, head of FX strategy at National Australia Bank.

In Asia, where markets are caught between worries of higher dollar borrowing costs and a slowdown in China’s economy, MSCI’s index of equities outside Japan (..MIAPJ0000PUS) fell 1.2% as it remained in negative territory for the year-to-date.

Data on Friday showed China’s consumer prices were flat in September, while factory-gate prices shrank at a slower pace, indicating deflationary pressures persist. Japan’s Nikkei (.N225) was 0.53% lower.

The week’s sharp escalation of Middle East tensions also ensured the mood remains cautious across markets.

In a speech in Beijing on Friday, European Union foreign policy chief Josep Borrell called for Europe, China and the United States to work together to resolve the conflict. Israel’s foreign ministry also announced it was “deeply disappointed” China had not yet condemned last weekend’s attacks by Hamas.

The risk-off mood also prevailed in the currency market, with the dollar holding on to most overnight gains. Against a basket of currencies, the dollar eased 0.07% to 106.40, having gained 0.8% overnight.

The euro climbed 0.12% to $1.054, while sterling was at $1.21, also up 0.12%. The dollar’s ascent has again put the Japanese yen under pressure, with the yen at 149.75 per dollar, close to levels where the Bank of Japan has previously intervened to strengthen the currency.

Gold prices edged up on Friday but remained below two-week highs hit in the previous session. Spot gold added 0.4% to $1,876.6 an ounce.

Oil prices rose on Friday after the U.S. tightened its sanctions programme against Russian crude exports, raising supply concerns in an already tight market. U.S. crude advanced 1.3%% to $83.70 per barrel and Brent was at $86.93, up 1.1% on the day.

Brent looked set for a weekly gain as investors keep a wary eye on the potential for disruptions to Middle Eastern exports due to the Gaza crisis, but it remains 8.7% down for the month.

Despite the recent friction over Ukrainian grain, Polish aid to its neighbor has gone well beyond mere charity. Interest in Ukrainians has spread from political to personal and cultural relations.

The government plans to make the island the site of a new industrial park dubbed Rempang Eco-City that will host a giant Chinese-owned glass and solar panel manufacturing facility.

The factory will be part of a joint project between the Batam Indonesia Free Zone Authority; PT Makmur Elok Graha, a local Indonesian company; and China’s Xinyi Glass, which wants to take advantage of the island’s quartz sand, a component of glass and solar panels.

Ariastuty Sirait, spokesperson for the Batam Free Trade Zone Authority, told VOA’s Indonesian Service the total investment is predicted to reach $24.6 billion and produce 306,000 jobs by 2080.

Xinyi plans to invest some $11.6 billion to build the factory, according to a spokesperson who told VOA Indonesian during a phone interview that not all island residents oppose relocation.

The plan requires the eviction of some 7,500 residents of the 17,000-hectare island, which is located about 44 kilometers from Singapore. Many of its residents belong to Indigenous communities.

Rempang Island investors, including PT Makmur Elok Graha, did not respond to requests for comment on the relocation tensions.

In August, the government told residents to leave the island by the end of September, sparking protests in which at least 20 people were injured and 43 were arrested for alleged violence and vandalism, according to Reuters. The last protest was three weeks ago.

Police used tear gas and rubber bullets against the protesters, which critics denounced as an excessive use of force.

In a Sept. 22 statement, Indonesia’s National Commission on Human Rights said it found evidence of human rights violations carried out by joint forces of the police, military and public order officers.

Indonesian President Joko Widodo struck the Rempang Eco-City deal in July during a visit to Chengdu, China. In August, the Indonesian government named Rempang Eco-City a “national strategic project.”

Analysts say the Indonesian leader sees securing investment from China, Jakarta’s biggest trading partner, as critical to his country’s economic development.

But land disputes and forced evictions have often been a source of conflict between the government and residents in Indonesia, and the Renpang dispute appears to add a new dimension to the tensions, given the government’s eagerness to secure a portion of China’s massive investment in overseas projects.

“I would say that the main concern Indonesian officials should focus on are the potential impacts on the environment and local population,” said Abdul Rahman Yaacob, a research fellow in the Southeast Asia program at the Lowy Institute in Sydney, Australia, in an email to VOA’s Korean Service.

An Indonesian news site, iNews.id, has quoted Ministry of Investment official M. Pradana Indraputra saying the new factory will create an estimated “35,000 jobs” without providing a specific timeframe.

But if most of those jobs go to imported Chinese workers, Rahman said, “this will create domestic resentment, as the locals will see little or no benefits from the investment, besides losing their ancestral homes.”

At the strategic level, the project is consistent with the government’s focus on internal economic development, according to Rahman.

“More than 50% of Indonesians are between 18 to 39 years old, and economic development is critical as it leads to jobs for young Indonesians, and jobs lead to domestic stability. … Indonesia must insist that the investors should hire local workers as much as possible and monitor closely the project’s impact on the environment,” he said.

Andreyka Natalegawa, an associate fellow in the Southeast Asia program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, told VOA’s Indonesian Service that the planned eviction of thousands of Indigenous residents from the island “raise serious concerns about the governance of the project and its impact on human security, human rights and the local environment.”

In an apparent attempt to ease tensions, the government announced at a Sept. 25 press conference that it would ease the evacuation deadline and offer incentives to those who are willing to be relocated.

“The president has directed me to hear the aspirations of the local residents, ensure their rights and prioritize their needs in line with existing laws, and conduct ourselves in a cordial manner,” said Bahlil Lahadalia, Indonesia’s minister of investment.

Lahadalia said the government will move residents who object to the development of Rempang Eco-City to another part of Rempang Island instead of moving them to nearby Galang Island.

Each family member will be given $78 per person per month, in addition to $78 for rent per month, while they wait for their new homes to be built, according to the investment minister. Indonesia’s average monthly earnings in December 2022 were $192, according to government figures.

Families will be given a freehold lease of 500 meters of land and a 45-square-meter home.

The government will also provide compensation for the loss of property that generates income, such as fishponds. Authorities have agreed not to move the community cemetery.

The compensation plan, however, has not satisfied the residents. Nine civil society organizations and religious groups criticized authorities for prioritizing investment over the interests of the people, according to BBC News.

Of the 2,600 families the project will displace, only about 300 have so far signed up to move, said Investment Minister Lahadalia.

In a written statement to VOA’s Indonesian Service, residents of 16 villages refused any form of forced eviction and demanded the government recognize their ancestral land rights. The villages are populated by native Malay, one of Indonesia’s Indigenous people, and Orang Laut, a seafaring ethnic group.

“We urge the Indonesian President to give us our legal rights to own ancestral land and acknowledge our Heritage Homes,” the statement said. “These rights have never been recognized since our country gained independence” in 1945.”

Christy Lee of VOA’s Korean Service contributed to this report, which originated in VOA’s Indonesian Service.