What's in the News

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/5/20090803/twl-chinese-town-sealed-off-after-plague-3fd0ae9.html

A town of 10,000 people in north west China has been sealed off from the outside world after an outbreak of deadly pneumonic plague.

Wow, not good!

Yeah, getting news on that here now, too. Nasty, nasty stuff...highly contagious and lethal in 24 hours...but confined to a small mountain village in Qinghai. Apparently outbreaks of this stuff are not uncommon in China, but are quickly contained...

China closes factory after cadmium pollution protest

 http://bit.ly/152omP

Not good. Particularly since this is where I live.

Mmmmm...cadmium...mmmmmmm...

Meanwhile, the plague death toll in Qinghai has now gone up to 3.

Man, what a downer thread this has become...

OK, so Stil is getting plenty of essential zinc in his diet!

They closed the factory so everything is A Ok 

Meanwhile, the plague death toll in Qinghai has now gone up to 3.

It's not widely known, but there are usually a few cases of black plague in the US every year.  Mostly hunters in the western part of the country, just like China.  The good news is that normal cases don't tend to spread so easily.  Pneumonic ones are much more dangerous, since it's airborne and the disease is more aggressive in that form.  Since there have only had 3 deaths in extreme close proximity, that means the quarantine is working as planned.  (Amazingly, I actually was awake most of the time in Epidemiology classes.)

Man, what a downer thread this has become...

Raoul, please allow me to brighten your day.   


Prostitutes better than officials in China: survey

AFP  Tue Aug 4, 2:29 am ET

BEIJING (AFP) – Prostitutes are considered more trustworthy in China than government officials and scientists, a recent survey of more than 3,000 respondents showed.

The online survey of 3,376 Chinese showed that 7.9 percent of respondents* considered sex workers trustworthy, putting them in third place after farmers and religious workers, the Insight China magazine said on its website.

"A list like this is at the same time surprising and embarrassing," the China Daily said Tuesday in an editorial, commenting on the result of the survey, which was carried out in June and July.

"The sex workers' unexpected prominence on this list of honour... is indeed unusual."

The newspaper said the list showed scientists and teachers ranked "way below, and that government functionaries, too, scored hardly better."

Soldiers and students were ranked after sex workers on the list of trustworthy professions, the Insight China magazine said.

"Given the constant feed of scandals involving the country's elite, this is not bad at all," the China Daily editorial commented.

"At least (the scientists and officials) have not slid into the least credible category which consists of real estate developers, secretaries, agents, entertainers and directors."


*EL Note:  I wonder if there was a significant difference in trust placed in Chinese rental girls by male vs. female survey respondents? 

"A list like this is at the same time surprising and embarrassing"

Embarrassing, yes...and good job, too...but not at all surprising to me.

Visiting one of either group is likely to end up with you getting f**ked. At least the chickens are a lot more straightforward and a lot more fun.

Embarassing for whom? Why? "You do the math", as the saying goes, and there should be little surprise. (Do the math, I said, not the sex-ed. Not that I care, just let's make it clear that I'm neither condoning nor condemning) If there is little cause for surprise, why should there be shame or embarassment?

Visiting one of either group is likely to end up with you getting f**ked. At least the chickens are a lot more straightforward and a lot more fun.

But only one group tends to stick to the agreed upon price 

The online survey of 3,376 Chinese showed that 7.9 percent of respondents* considered sex workers trustworthy, putting them in third place after farmers and religious workers

8% of the people thinking you are trustworthy ranks you third in China.

I must be the most trustworthy person in China, I routinely get 10-15% from the girls I meet. 

Heavy rains and flooding in Vietnam and South China.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/asia-pacific/8134896.stm

We haven't got any Saloonies down that far south, do we?
 

Most of my QQ contacts are in Shenzhen, Dongguan, and Guangzhou.  No one's complained about the weather and I see reasonable numbers of them online during normal hours for them.

Ruth, how's the weather???

British man falls to death in Kunming

Updated: 2009-08-15 02:23(Xinhua)
 
KUNMING:A British man fell to his death off a hotel building Friday afternoon in this capital city of southwest China's Yunnan Province, local police confirmed.Police received the report at about 2 p.m. that the man was found dead outside the Chuncheng Star Hotel on Beijing Road.

The man probably fell from a stairway window between the 12th and 13th floors, police said after initial investigation.

He hit a parked car before he died.

Police found nothing on the man to identify him, but only his mobile phone helped find some clues, with which police later knew that the man was from Britain and taught at a college under the Kunming University of Science and Technology.Police are investigating the cause of the death.

http://bit.ly/AIzal

I just hate falling out of windows in the middle of the afternoon.

From the Globe and Mail: http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/politics/scholars-put-braaaaains-together-to-thwart-zombies/article1253006/

Scholars put braaaaains together to thwart zombies
Using viral outbreak models and statistics, Ottawa mathematicians discover only ‘aggressive attacks' will quell a spread of the undead.

Science is still struggling with how to get the jump on swine flu, but Canadians can take heart that a group of Ottawa mathematicians have found the key to beating a more virulent, if only cinematic, threat.

A zombie outbreak – the kind that always confounds authorities in movies – can be successfully overcome through “quick, aggressive attacks” on the undead, scholars at the University of Ottawa and Carleton University have concluded.

I'm not going to quote the whole article, but the last line bears repeating:

“Clearly, this is an unlikely scenario if taken literally, but possible real-life applications may include allegiance to political parties or diseases with a dormant infection.”