China
International borders: 10 remarkable frontiers
From mountains to libraries, we take a look at some of the most extraordinary international borders to be found across the globe Over the last few years, we’ve seen an impressive collection of new websites, blogs and social media accounts dedicated to ‘travel porn’. They’re filled with big, sweeping images of fairytale lands and precarious precipices. Sometimes, like this incredible piece on architectural density in Hong Kong, they’ll depict urban decay or stifling poverty – always gilded by the photographer’s lens. At Atlas & Boots, we always wanted to strike the right balance between travel porn and more in-depth content; the type that provided some previously unknown knowledge or insight. We’re using the current downtime to update some old content and came across this post about unu...
China admits coronavirus exposed ‘shortcomings’ in healthcare system
The coronavirus outbreak exposed “shortcomings” in China’s public healthcare system, a top health official admitted Saturday, saying that reforms are underway to improve the country’s disease prevention and control mechanisms. China has faced criticism both at home and abroad for downplaying the virus and concealing information about the outbreak when it first emerged in the central city of Wuhan in December. The virus has since infected nearly four million people worldwide — claiming more than 270,000 lives — and crippled the global economy. Beijing has insisted it has always shared information with the World Health Organization and other countries in a timely manner. But on Saturday Li Bin, deputy director of China’s National Health Commission, made a rare admission when he said the heal...
Pfizer, BioNTech dose U.S first participants of trial coronavirus vaccine
Pfizer Inc. and BioNTech SE announced on Wednesday, May 6, 2020, that the first participants have been dosed in the U.S in the Phase 1/2 clinical trial for the BNT162 vaccine program to prevent COVID-19. The trial is part of a global development program, and the dosing of the first cohort in Germany was completed last week. The Phase 1/2 study is designed to determine the safety, immunogenicity and optimal dose level of four mRNA vaccine candidates evaluated in a single, continuous study. The dose level escalation portion (Stage 1) of the Phase 1/2 trial in the U.S will enrol up to 360 healthy subjects into two age cohorts (18-55 and 65-85 years of age). The first subjects immunized in Stage 1 of the study will be healthy adults 18-55 years of age. Older adults will only be immunized with ...
France using artificial intelligence to check whether people are wearing masks on public transport
France is integrating new AI tools into security cameras in the Paris metro system to check whether passengers are wearing face masks. The software, which has already been deployed elsewhere in the country, began a three-month trial in the central Chatelet-Les Halles station of Paris this week, reports Bloomberg. French startup DatakaLab, which created the program, says the goal is not to identify or punish individuals who don’t wear masks, but to generate anonymous statistical data that will help authorities anticipate future outbreaks of COVID-19. “We are just measuring this one objective,” DatakaLab CEO Xavier Fischer told The Verge. “The goal is just to publish statistics of how many people are wearing masks every day.” The pilot is one of a number of measures cities around the world a...
Climbing the seven summits: a route to the top
Climbing the seven summits – the highest mountain on every continent – is an improbable dream of mine… but that’s the beauty of dreams I have always loved trekking and climbing. I usually spend several weeks of any given year on the grades of the Scottish Highlands or Welsh Snowdonia or ideally further afield such as the Arctic Circle Trail in Greenland or the K2 base camp trek in Pakistan. It was one of these trekking trips – to Tanzania in 2010 – that ignited something new inside me. It was while climbing Kilimanjaro, the highest mountain in Africa, that an idea, an ambition, began to formulate. My hobby deepened into passion and I realised that I wanted to achieve something great: to climb the seven summits, the highest mountain on every continent. Mountain Continent Altitude Tech....
10 books to transport you to the world’s most visited countries
Sample the world’s most popular destinations without leaving your home On a normal spring day, you can expect the Champ de Mars in Paris to be teeming with tourists. This vibrant swatch of green offers iconic views of the Eiffel Tower and hosts droves of visitors every year – possibly as many as 80 million. France is after all the most visited country in the world. With a pandemic sweeping the globe, however, the Champ de Mars and France’s other iconic attractions – the Louvre, Notre Dame Cathedral, Sacre-Coeur – lie largely empty. The same goes for Spain, the USA, China, Italy and the other most visited countries in the world. There are of course ways to experience these countries without physical travel. Below, we list 10 books that will transport you to the world’s most...
17 megadiverse countries of the world
We profile the world’s megadiverse countries, from obvious contenders like Ecuador and Brazil to one or two surprise entries It should be comforting to know that a mere 17 countries hold more than 70% of the world’s species. It should be easy to rally this small group of ‘megadiverse countries’ to protect the planet’s extraordinary biodiversity. Alas, some of these countries are also the world’s biggest consumers and polluters. In July 2000, the UN’s World Conservation Monitoring Centre recognised 17 megadiverse countries which hold the majority of Earth’s species and high numbers of endemic species (i.e. those unique to an area or country). To be termed megadiverse, a country must have at least 5,000 of the world’s plants as endemics and have marine ecosystems within its borde...
