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More than 4.5m affected, says UN group, while tests suggest children’s shorter height increases exposure on busy roads
More than 4.5 million children in the UK are growing up in areas with toxic levels of air pollution, the UN children’s organisation Unicef has warned.
Tests suggesting that children walking along busy roads are exposed to a third more air pollution than adults, as their shorter height places them close to passing car exhausts, were also released on Thursday.
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Sightings of toads have fallen by nearly a third and frogs by 17% since 2014, RSPB survey finds
People with gardens are being urged to create simple ponds or areas of long grass because sightings of frogs and toads in gardens are drying up.
Reports of toads in gardens have fallen by nearly a third since 2014, while sightings of frogs have dropped by 17% over the same period, according to the Big Garden Birdwatch, the RSPB’s wildlife survey.
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The Kilauea eruption has wiped out rare sites and whole ecosystems. As the island mourns a tragedy, it also accepts the brutal cycle of nature
In Puna, the area of Hawaii island that’s been hardest hit by the Kilauea volcano eruption, those who lived nearest to the lava flows watched the forest around their homes begin to die first. They said the fruit trees, flowers and ferns began turning brown, languishing in the noxious, sulfur-dioxide-filled air. Then the lava came. Now large swaths of formerly verdant forest has been replaced by rough and barren volcanic terrain.
“Before the eruptions, that area was probably the best forest left in the state of Hawaii,” said Patrick Hart, a biology professor at the University of Hawaii at Hilo. “There were areas where the native Ohia forest extended right up to the ocean, and you just don’t see that in the rest of Hawaii,” he said. Now it’s covered with 20 to 30ft of lava.
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Off the tip of Cape Cod, pods of humpbacks return every summer to feed. For the past 18 years, Philip Hoare has been joining them to witness this incredible display
At the tip of Cape Cod, a sandy spit reaches out into the Atlantic, like an arm, towards a vast underwater plateau where humpbacks gather each summer to feed. This is the US marine sanctuary of Stellwagen Bank, where for the past three weeks I’ve been a guest on the Dolphin Fleet whalewatch boats, working out of Provincetown.
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Calls by joint inquiry to bring forward UK car sales ban have been resisted by government
The government has been accused of dragging its feet on air quality improvements by a cross-party group of MPs.
A partnership of four committees said serious concerns remained about the UK’s commitment to cutting pollution and its impact on public health.
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Former PM could join Craig Kelly, who has also threatened to oppose national energy guarantee
The former prime minister Tony Abbott has flagged crossing the floor to oppose the national energy guarantee, joining fellow conservative Craig Kelly, who telegraphed a similar threat three weeks ago in an interview with Guardian Australia.
Conservative critics of the policy are attempting to ratchet up internal pressure on the energy minister, Josh Frydenberg, before a critical meeting with his state and territory counterparts at the beginning of August.
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Antibiotic use on farms is a major cause of human drug resistance. Yet slick social media campaigns – funded by the multi-billion-dollar industry – are confusing and complicating the issue
Slick industry PR campaigns about antibiotics in food are muddying the water around a serious public health risk, say critics.
Pharmaceutical and meat companies are using similar tactics to the cigarette industry, in an attempt to confuse consumers and hold off regulation, despite the fact that the rapidly growing risk of anti-microbial resistance is one of the biggest health risks of our time. It’s estimated that by 205010 million people might die a year because we have overused antibiotics.
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Eleven people protesting over pollution from a copper plant have been killed by police in Tamil Nadu in south India
Another person has been shot dead during violent protests in south India against a copper plant operated by a British mining giant residents say is polluting the local environment.
Opposition politicians in the state of Tamil Nadu have accused the police of committing mass murder against protesters opposed to the expansion of a copper smelting facility in the port city of Thoothukudi.
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This year, in collaboration with Global Witness, the Guardian aims to record the deaths of all people killed while protecting land or natural resources. At the current rate, about four defenders will die this week somewhere on the planet
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Tanzanian government accused of putting indigenous people at risk in order to grant foreign tourists access to Serengeti wildlife
The Tanzanian government is putting foreign safari companies ahead of Maasai herding communities as environmental tensions grow on the fringes of the Serengeti national park, according to a new investigation.
Hundreds of homes have been burned and tens of thousands of people driven from ancestral land in Loliondo in the Ngorongoro district in recent years to benefit high-end tourists and a Middle Eastern royal family, says the report by the California-based thinktank the Oakland Institute.
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