Author: Agencies

The human immune system is arguably the most complex system in the human body. But scientists have made a lot of progress in understanding how it functions. That’s important for understanding illnesses and how to manage them. For instance, it’s important to understand that an immune response takes several days to fully develop. This knowledge would hopefully prevent people from getting impatient and seeking inappropriate care. The immune system is made up of an intricate network of cells, tissues and molecules. These control the delicate balance between eliminating cancerous or infected cells, and not harming the body in the process.…

When Raquel Welch donned a deerskin bikini for a 1966 caveman screen epic, she became one of the hottest sex symbols of her time, a role she never felt able to escape. The film was mediocre, but the poster for “One Million Years BC” went round the world, taking her with it and making both of them an indelible part of cinema history. “With the release of that famous movie poster, in one fell swoop, everything in my life changed and everything about the real me was swept away,” Welch wrote in her 2010 autobiography Beyond the Cleavage. “All else would…

Sexual harassment in the workplace remains a big challenge for female journalists in Uganda. However, most women affected by it are silent about the vice. According to a 2021 study by WAN-IFRA Women in News and City, University of London, almost half of the women in newsrooms in Africa have experienced some form of sexual harassment, yet 30 per cent of sexual harassment cases were reported to management. Fear of reprisals is the most common driver behind the limited reporting. The study also found that a lack of faith in organisations’ management and awareness of reporting systems also plays a part in…

One of the issues that has generated great concern among voters in the run up to the Nigerian presidential elections is religion. Many Nigerians see the mixing of religion and politics as an impediment to progress and development. This idea can be traced to Europe. The Middle Ages were a time when religious authorities and political authorities clashed in European states, resulting in instability. The need to separate religion from politics thus became normalised in western political thought by the early 20th century. Over the years the idea found its way into other societies. Recent studies have shown that, in fact, the relationship between religion and…

The European Parliament voted on Tuesday, February 14, to approve a ban on new sales of carbon-emitting petrol and diesel cars by 2035, clearing a final legislative hurdle. EU member states have already approved the legislation and will now formally nod it into law, despite opposition from conservative MEPs, the parliament’s biggest group. Supporters of the bill had argued to that it would give European carmakers a clear timeframe in which switch production to zero-emission electric vehicles. This in turn will support the European Union’s ambitious plan to become a “climate neutral” economy by 2050, with net-zero greenhouse gas emissions.…

Russia will cut oil production from next month in response to a price cap imposed by western nations, the country’s top energy official has said, in the first sign Moscow is seeking to weaponise oil supplies after slashing natural gas exports to Europe last year. The cut of 500,000 barrels a day, the equivalent of almost 5 per cent of Russia’s production, or 0.5 per cent of world supply, was a response to the “destructive energy policy of the countries of the collective west”, Alexander Novak said on Friday. Christyan Malek, global head of energy strategy at JPMorgan, said Moscow’s…

From the recipient of the 2021 Nobel Peace Prize, How to Stand Up to a Dictator is an impassioned and inspiring memoir of a career spent holding power to account. In 2021, Filipino journalist Maria Ressa won the Unesco Press Freedom Award, and was one of two journalists awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. In her Nobel lecture, she said: “An invisible atom bomb exploded in our information ecosystem, and the world must act as it did after Hiroshima. Like that time, we need to create new institutions, like the United Nations, and new codes stating our values, like the universal…

You can’t fight city hall. And you really can’t fight the White House, Congress, Wall Street, Silicon Valley, and governments of various U.S. states and European countries — much less all of them combined. Or so one would conclude based on Akio Toyoda’s Jan. 26 announcement that he is leaving his post as chief executive of Japan’s Toyota Motor Corp., the world’s second-largest automaker, as of April 1. The car industry’s most prominent skeptic of the transition to electric vehicles, Toyoda — a grandson of the company’s founder — had frequently expressed reservations about both the feasibility and necessity, in climate-change…

1: Robert Eggers’ “The Lighthouse” Two lighthouse keepers battle insanity as they are trapped on a lighthouse island together. Where is the breaking point for the mind? The Lighthouse is all about madness, myth, and superstition. Robert Eggers’ nautical nightmare follows a pair of 19th-century lighthouse keepers — Thomas Wake (Willem Dafoe) and Ephraim Winslow (Robert Pattinson) — who spend their days getting drunk and feeling isolated. Paranoia and psychosis eventually set in. Through it all, the lighthouse stands a symbolic depiction of strength, inaccessibility and constancy. So close, yet so far. One goes through life reaching for the heart’s desire,…

Every January, the day arrives that South Africans know can decide their fates: the “matric” exam results are announced. In 2022, 753,964 full-time and 167,915 part-time candidates registered to write the secondary school exit exam – the largest cohort ever. They’ll receive the results on 20 January 2023. Many probably feel ambivalent about this massive moment in their educational journey. On the one hand, there is the feeling of completeness because the school years are done. On the other, there is a basket of emotions: stress, anxiety and excitement at the prospect of the unknown. Matrics (or Grade 12s) and their parents…