PHOTO: Ai Weiwei's 'Baby Formula'

A staff member displays the Chinese dissident artist Ai Weiwei's new sculpture installation "Baby Formula" which formed a map of China with cans of milk powder at a exhibition in Hong Kong Thursday. Ai Weiwei's work is inspired by the scandal over melamine-tainted milk powder in China 2008 which was reported to have affected nearly 300,000 children and causing six babies to die from kidney problems.

Due to the food-safety-conscious, Chinese people flock to Hong Kong to buy baby milk formula that cause shortage supply in the city. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

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Nigeria a newcomer in list of deadliest countries for journalists

Index of most dangerous countries for journalists. (Committee to Protect Journalists)

Nigeria is a new addition to the list of the most dangerous countries in which to be a journalist, joining mainstays such as Pakistan, Somalia and Mexico.

Five journalists in Nigeria have been murdered since 2009. None of the cases have been solved.

“Investigations into these killings are usually carried out with sloppiness, and no real culprits are caught," said Ayode Longe, a senior officer with the Media Rights Agenda, a press freedom group in Nigeria. “That has emboldened others to assault journalists, believing nothing would be done to them."

The global index is released each year by the Committee to Protect Journalists and calculates unsolved journalist murders as a percentage of each country's population.

The index also found soaring impunity rates in Somalia, Pakistan, and Brazil.

The CPJ said conditions for journalists are improving in Nepal and Russia, "although both nations remain dangerous for the press."

The analysis founds increasing anti-press violence in Somalia, Pakistan, and Brazil, where national leaders are unwilling or unable to address the issue. In Somalia, 23 journalist murders have gone unsolved over the past decade.

The CPJ report highlights the cased of Wali Khan Babar, a journalist with Geo TV in Pakistan who was murdered in 2011.

While several suspects connected to one of the country’s leading political parties, the Muttahida Qaumi Movement, are facing trial, the prosecution has been hindered by the murders of five people connected to the investigation, including witnesses and police officers.

In November 2012, an eyewitness was gunned down two days before he was due to give testimony, the CPJ said.

Iraq is said to be the most dangerous country in which to be a journalist. Over the past 10 years, there have been 93 unsolved killings of journalists in the country of 33 million. Somalia was ranked No. 2, followed by the Philippines, where 55 journalists have been murdered without any convictions in the country of 94 million.

Rick Westhead is a foreign affairs writer at the Star. He was based in India as the Star’s South Asia bureau chief from 2008 until 2011 and reports on international aid and development. Follow him on Twitter @rwesthead

Bird flu by the numbers

A farmer walks past baskets of newly hatched ducklings in a hatch room at a poultry egg trading market in Zhejiang province on April 18. (REUTERS)

Late Wednesday afternoon, the New England Journal of Medicine published the first epidemiological report of the H7N9 outbreak in China. To date, the new bird flu strain has sickened 108 people and killed 22; Taiwan has also reported the first case outside of mainland China, a 53-year-old man who recently visited Suzhou and Shanghai (both H7N9 hotspots).

The report covers up to April 17, at which point there were 82 confirmed cases and two suspected cases, and it is chock-full of numbers and statistics. Here are some of the highlights:

63 is the median age of confirmed cases. 73 per cent are male. 86 per cent live in urban areas. 

76 per cent of patients have underlying medical conditions

59 patients -- 77 per cent of the total -- were recently exposed to animals: 76 per cent to chickens, 20 per cent to ducks, seven per cent to swine. Two reported exposures to cats and one to a dog; six said they encountered wild birds and one was exposed to a pet bird.

Four patients worked as poultry workers, three slaughtered poultry at live markets and one transported poultry

Seventeen patients and one suspected case died of acute respiratory distress syndrome or multiorgan failure a median of 11 days after becoming sick.

Among 23 patients where detailed histories could be collected, the median incubation period for the virus was six days.

There have been three family clusters in two provinces, but only detailed information for two of them. In the first family, a man visited a live poultry market and observed the slaughter of a chicken which he purchased, cooked and ate two weeks before getting sick; in the second family, a man visited a live poultry market seven days before becoming ill.

Among 81 patients with available data, the median time from the onset of illness to the first medical visit was one day; the median time between getting sick and being hospitalized was 4.5 days.

As of April 17, investigators had detailed information on 678 close contacts of the confirmed patients. 62 per cent were health care workers, 20 per cent were relatives, 18 per cent were social contacts. Respiratory symptoms developed in 19 people who had contact with an H7N9 patient, including 15 health care workers and one medical intern; zero tested positive for H7N9.

The mortality rate for H7N9 is 21 per cent (although the rate will be lower if expanded surveillance efforts find more people who are asymptomatic cases).

Jennifer Yang is the Star’s global health reporter. She previously worked as a general assignment reporter and won a NNA in 2011 for her explanatory piece on the Chilean mining disaster. Follow her on Twitter: @jyangstar

World's first Braille smartphone unveiled by Indian inventor

The iPhone has been a godsend for many blind consumers.

Austin Seraphin, an American blind since birth, wrote in a blog post in 2010 that he could use the phone's voice activation function to tap an item to hear it.

He wrote that his mother "pulled out her phone, and sent me a text message. Within seconds, my phone alerted me, and said her name. I simply swiped my finger and it read her message: Hi Austin."

But what about the millions of blind consumers who can't afford Apple's high-end phones?

An Indian inventor has come up with a lower-cost alternative.

Sumit Dagar, who works out of the Centre for Innovation Incubation and Entrepreneurship, says he has created the world’s first Braille smartphone, according to a report in the India Times.

Messages and texts are sent like other smartphones. But instead of a smooth glass panel, the phone comes with a series of pins under the screen which elevate or depress to form letters and words in Braille. The pins can be felt on the screen.

A prototype is being tested at an eye institute in Hyderabad.

Rick Westhead is a foreign affairs writer at the Star. He was based in India as the Star’s South Asia bureau chief from 2008 until 2011 and reports on international aid and development. Follow him on Twitter @rwesthead

H7N9 bird flu: what we know and don't know

The story broke in China on April 1st: a new bird flu strain, called H7N9, had emerged to infect people for the first time.

At the time, there were three known patients, two of whom were already dead. Two weeks later, the case tally continues to grow at a clipped and steady pace. The latest count, from the World Health Organization: 82 cases, 17 deaths.

H7N9 has now spread to six different provinces -- most cases are in the Shanghai area, but cases have also been confirmed in Beijing and Henan.

Source: European Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (updated as of April 15)

It can be difficult knowing how much to worry when something like this unfolds. But for now, this tweet from WHO spokesperson Gregory Hartl -- who has been actively answering H7N9 questions on Twitter -- seems to best summarize the current situation:

We are not near a #H7N9 pandemic yet but we need to understand better how the virus works in order to control the outbreak. @who

— Gregory Härtl (@HaertlG) April 16, 2013

Not exactly reassuring -- but honest. Anything's still possible.

Given the information available so far, there is both reason to worry and reason for optimism. Here's a round-up of what we know:

The good news

*The single most reassuring piece of information right now is that there is still no evidence of sustained human-to-human transmission, which would certainly propel us into pandemic territory. There are, however, suspected cases of limited human-to-human spread that investigators are looking into -- but as the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention explains, this is not wholly unexpected and limited human-to-human transmission does not automatically mean a pandemic is nigh.

*H7N9 has not yet been found in pigs -- considered ideal "mixing bowls" for pandemic-prone viruses -- and health officials insist the dead pigs floating along the Huangpu river did not die by H7N9's hand. That being said, only 30-some pigs were ultimately tested out of more than 16,000 carcasses and the cause of these pig deaths remains a mystery. To date, the virus appears to be confined to poultry markets and has turned up in "environmental samples" as well as chickens, ducks and one wild pigeon.

*Some patients are improving or have even fully recovered, including Beijing's first case, a seven-year-old girl.

*China has invited the WHO and international experts to help with the outbreak response, including some top names in the infectious disease world. Labs around the world have also now received the virus and are busy studying its properties.

The bad news

*The world is in completely "new territory" with this new virus, according to this Canadian Press interview with WHO's senior flu expert. And there are troubling signs the virus is already well-adapted to infecting humans.

*We still have no idea what the source of the virus is despite the 48,000+ samples that have been taken from markets, farms and slaughterhouses. Are people being infected by chickens? Ducks? Pigeons? Some other bird? A still-unidentified mammal? Dust in the air? Other people? All of the above? China's Centre for Disease Control has also stated that 40 per cent of the known cases have had no contact with poultry, thus deepening the mystery of how people are getting sick.

*Unlike other avian flu strains that have caused human infections, H7N9 doesn't seem to make birds sick. This means the virus can spread silently among birds and will be difficult to stamp out through culling -- and if the virus is getting picked up by wild birds, there's no telling how far H7N9 can travel. As Nature reports, H7N9 is "poised to spread."

*The virus has now been found in a four-year-old Beijing boy who has no symptoms, making him H7N9's first known asymptomatic case. The excellent Avian Flu Diary blog has a good explainer for why this is not necessarily good news.

*Judging from a study recently published in the New England Journal of Medicine, this new bird flu strain can make people very, very sick.

*Creating a vaccine for this new flu strain will likely be very difficult.

Jennifer Yang is the Star’s global health reporter. She previously worked as a general assignment reporter and won a NNA in 2011 for her explanatory piece on the Chilean mining disaster. Follow her on Twitter: @jyangstar

Chinese growth rate slips, world markets react

In 1979, Shenzhen was a small fishing village with a population of 20,000. Now it is rated 5th in the world in terms of population density of over 10 million people. (Randy Risling/Toronto Star)

After years of growth, the surging Chinese economy has started to run out of steam.

For the first quarter of 2013, the Chinese economy grew only 7.7 per cent. Many analysts predicted a consistent 8 per cent growth rate for China -- a country which is edging out the United States as the world's biggest economy.

A slow-down in the manufacturing sector and overall global sluggishness is partly to blame for the slip.

The Financial Times reports that China's new premier, Li Keqiang, admits the future is unclear.

“Overall, the Chinese economy had a smooth start in 2013. But many uncertainties, both at home and abroad, still persist and make the overall situation quite complicated,” Keqiang said.

New York markets reacted to the downturn this morning as commodities fell to a nine-month low, followed by gold and silver tumbling.

According to Bloomberg, the Standard & Poor’s gauge of 24 raw materials dropped 1.4 per cent  in New York after silver tumbled more than 11 per cent and gold traded below $1,400 an ounce.

"The international situation continues to concern people, both in regard to Europe and China," Boston-based fund manager John Carey told Bloomberg. "People are watching for some signs of improvement in both areas."

Tanya Talaga is the Star's global economics reporter. Follow her on Twitter @tanyatalaga

 

PHOTO: Folk dancing in Pyongyang

North Koreans dance beneath a mosaic painting of the late leader Kim Il-sung during a mass folk dancing gathering in Pyongyang on Thursday,  to mark the anniversary of the first of many titles of power given to leader Kim Jong-un after the death of his father Kim Jongi-il. (AP Photo/David Guttenfelder)

READ MORE: North Korea claims to have ‘powerful striking means’ ready for launch

Bear bile farm puts off stock market launch

A bear rescued from a bile farm, now living in a sanctuary in China. (Photo: Animals Asia)

A Chinese bear bile farm is putting off its stock market launch.

For now.

Guizhentang Pharmaceutical Company said the delay in their IPO is the result of needing more time to prepare the required information. It had been expected to file financial reports to the China Securities Regulatory Commission (CSRC) before May 13.

The company has encountered many difficulties since it first applied two years ago. Animals Asia, an agency that works in China, says these difficulties may reflect that neither the financial community nor the general public would support the listing of a company that extracts bile from live bears.

“Although we understand this is not a final withdrawal from the application process, it appears that Guizhentang has chosen to quietly withdraw from this confrontation between profit and animal welfare,” said Animals Asia.  

The bear bile trade sees over 10,000 bears — mainly moon bears but also sun bears and brown bears — kept on farms in China, North Korea and Vietnam. The bears are "milked" regularly for their bile, which is used for traditional medicine.

According to reports, bile is usually extracted twice a day through an implanted tube; the process is believed to be painful as the bears moan and chew their paws while being "milked" for their bile.

Traditionally, bear bile was extracted by killing a wild animal and removing its gallbladder. But in the 1980s, bile farms began appearing in North Korea and eventually spread to other regions.

The Asian black bear, most commonly seen on farms, is listed as vulnerable on the World Conservation Union’s Red List of Threatened Animals.

Guizhentang announced in February 2011 that it would raise funds through a public listing and increase its number of bears from 400 to 1,200.

There are about 240 bear bile farms in China.

Raveena Aulakh is the Star's environment reporter. She is intrigued by climate change and its impact, now and long-term. Follow her on Twitter @raveenaaulakh

Why badminton-crazed Indonesia is feeling the effects of bird flu in China

An official holds a chicken during a poultry check at the border with mainland China in Hong Kong on Thursday. (Philippe Lopez/AFP/Getty Images)

Any new outbreak like the H7N9 situation unfolding in eastern China is bound to be disruptive. To date, there have been 38 confirmed cases and 10 deaths, according to the latest update from the WHO, and predictably, there are now reports of busy hospitals, suffering airlines, falling stock prices and, of course, the thousands of poultry now being slaughtered as public health officials try to stem the outbreak. KFC in China is apparently also taking a hit -- as are McDonald's McNugget meals.

But there are other, less obvious ripple effects when a new virus suddenly pops up and causes widespread alarm. A few examples:

• sales of isatis roots, used in herbal remedies, have "skyrocketed" in Fujian, China, according to China Daily

• a sudden share boost for Malaysian rubber glove makers, according to Borneo Post
  

• a feared shuttlecock shortage in "badminton-crazy Indonesia," which imports dried duck feathers from China for its shuttlecocks, according to this Agence France-Presse story

Jennifer Yang is the Star’s global health reporter. She previously worked as a general assignment reporter and won a NNA in 2011 for her explanatory piece on the Chilean mining disaster. Follow her on Twitter: @jyangstar

Inside a Japanese urban farm

Pasona's headquarters in downtown Tokyo. (All photos courtesy of Kono Designs)

Work cafeteria food just got a lot more interesting. A downtown Tokyo office building is one of the first urban farms in Japan, connecting the ideas of green energy and sustainability with the day-to-day realities of office life. Office workers at Pasona, a staffing firm specializing in farming and related jobs, are encouraged to cultivate indoor and outdoor gardens and eat the fruits (and vegetables) of their labour.

Pasona's headquarters in the bustling Japanese metropolis features both interior and exterior "green" ideas. There are vegetable and fruit bushes -- beans, tomatoes, eggplant, broccoli and passion fruit -- next to desks and work stations.  There's a rice paddy field on one office floor. There's a pumpkin patch by the reception area.

Outside, roses and other flowers grow from Pasona's balconies.

The multi-million dollar project included a complete renovation of the 50-year-old building. The entire project was designed by New York City-based design firm Kono Designs.

Yoshimi Kono, the president of Kono said one of the many challenges with designing the project was creating urban farming examples that were actually edible and sustainable and not just decorative items.

"Living plants and a living human environment is sometimes not the same," Kono said in an interview with the Star.

He said that while plants and vegetables need certain lighting and temperature conditions to grow and thrive the same conditions are not always the same for a human environment. (Just think about all of that humidity in a greenhouse and what it would do to your hair.)

The project is a work in progress. While it was completed in 2011, Kono often heads back to Tokyo to try out new "green" projects at Pasona, see how the building’s irrigation system is working or find out how the workers are doing with their plant "coworkers."

Urban farming is a growing trend around the world. As food shortages continue to dwindle, scientists, designers and environmentalists are all looking for innovative, urban ways to increase the supply of food.

Projects range from community gardens to gardens in unlikely places like in the case of Pasona.

In the last two years, Pasona has helped train and secure jobs for about 350 people as farmers throughout rural areas of Japan, Kono said.

"We are spending some (energy) to grow some vegetables but behind it, we have a bigger purpose," he said.

Lorianna De Giorgio is the Star's foreign web editor. Follow her on Twitter: @ldegiorgio