📌 Plastics, Romania, Penguin Back At Sea

Delegates from 175 countries gathered in South Korea today to discuss an international treaty to cut plastic pollution.

South Korea is hosting the fifth and ostensibly final UN Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC-5) meeting this week. The previous round of talks in Ottawa in April ended without a path forward on capping plastic production.

Instead, talks will be focused on chemicals of concern and other measures after petrochemical-producing nations such as Saudi Arabia and China strongly opposed efforts to target plastic production over the protests of countries that bear the brunt of plastic pollution.

The divisions plaguing the plastics treaty talks echo conflicts that have long stalled UN efforts to curb global warming. The most recent climate summit, COP29, just ended with an agreement that poorer nations assailed as inadequate.

INC Chair Luis Vayas Valdivieso said: "Without significant intervention, the plastic entering the environment annually by 2040 is expected to nearly double compared to 2022.”

The US delegation had yet to say whether it would reverse its new position to support plastic production caps. But it supports addressing plastic products, chemicals used in them, and the supply of primary plastic polymers,” the White House Council on Environmental Quality said.

A far-right, pro-Russia candidate is set for a shock victory in the first round of Romania's presidential election.

With over 99% of votes counted, ultranationalist Calin Georgescu has an unassailable lead of nearly 350,000 votes over center-right candidate Elena Lasconi. Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, the pre-election favorite, is in third.

The biggest surprise of the election was Georgescu's strong showing. He has no party of his own and campaigned mainly on the social media platform TikTok. Lasconi is now on track to challenge Georgescu in a final run-off on 8 December.

Georgescu has sworn to end what he calls subservience to the European Union and NATO, especially in support of Ukraine. He has condemned the Nato ballistic missile defense shield in Deveselu, Romania.

Campaigning focused mainly on the soaring cost of living, with Romania having the EU's biggest share of people at risk of poverty. The president in Romania has a largely symbolic role but considerable influence on areas such as foreign policy.

When Russian cosmonauts opened the hatch to a cargo spacecraft on Saturday, they got a surprise — a toxic smell.

“After opening the Progress spacecraft's hatch, the Roscosmos cosmonauts noticed an unexpected odor and observed small droplets, prompting the crew to close the Poisk hatch to the rest of the Russian segment," NASA said in a statement on Sunday.

According to the space agency, air scrubbers and contaminant sensors on the orbiting laboratory monitored the station’s atmosphere after observing the aberrant smell.

Russian Space Web reported that the cosmonauts aboard the Russian segment of the station donned protective equipment and activated an extra air-scrubbing system aboard their side of the facility. On the US segment of the station, NASA astronaut Don Pettit said he smelled something akin to "spray paint.”

It was not immediately clear what caused the foul odor to emanate from the Progress vehicle. However, previous Russian vehicles have had leaks while in space. Most recently, in February 2023, a Progress vehicle attached to the station lost pressurization in its cooling system. By Sunday, flight controllers in Mission Control in Houston determined air quality inside the space station was at normal levels.

A survey of 2,000 Americans reveals that 43% are increasing their good deeds, volunteering or donating as 2024 ends.

As 2025 approaches, 59% of Gen Z and millennials are doing more good, compared to 37% of Gen X and baby boomers. 47% of Gen X and baby boomers feel they have done as much good as they wanted within their community this year.

Respondents plan to spend an average of eight hours a week on good deeds from now until the end of the year, with 44% participating in Giving Tuesday.

Motivations for giving back include the satisfaction of giving (47%), a sense of purpose (43%), and wanting to make the world a better place (40%).

The survey asked what kept people from doing more; the main reasons were financial constraints (45%), health issues (34%) and time limitations (25%). 38% of respondents find it easier to do good deeds at the end of the year, especially during the holidays.

Abundant evidence shows being infected with SARS-CoV-2 – the virus that causes Covid – can affect brain health in many ways.

Covid can lead to neurological problems, including headaches, seizures, strokes, sleep issues, nerve tingling, paralysis, and mental health disorders, said Ziyad Al-Aly, a clinical epidemiologist at Washington University in St. Louis.

Studies show Covid increases cognitive deficits, with severe cases causing brain damage equivalent to 20 years of aging. A study in the New England Journal of Medicine found significant cognitive deficits in nearly 113,000 people post-Covid, with IQ drops linked to the severity of infection.

“Those who had mild and resolved Covid showed cognitive decline equivalent to a three-point loss of IQ,” said Al-Aly. “By comparison, those with unresolved persistent symptoms, such as persistent shortness of breath or fatigue, had a six-point loss.”

Al-Aly said that, to put the study's findings into perspective, he estimated that a three-point downward shift in IQ would increase US adults with an IQ of less than 70 from 4.7 million to 7.5 million— 2.8 million more adults with cognitive impairment requiring significant societal support.

Al-Aly said: “Understanding who is most at risk and the long-term impacts on education, productivity, and dementia prevalence is critical. Covid's significant impact on brain health necessitates extensive, long-term research efforts.”

Noxious smog smothering the plains of north India is choking residents and slowing the country's economic growth.

India's capital, New Delhi, often ranks among the world's most polluted cities. Experts say the country's worsening air pollution is ruining its economy — with one study estimating losses of $95 billion annually, or roughly 3% of the country's GDP.

According to the study, “India lost 3.8 billion working days in 2019, costing $44 billion to air pollution caused by deaths," and toxic air "contributes to 18% of all deaths in India.”

The study said pollution has also had a debilitating impact on the consumer economy because of direct health-related eventualities, reducing footfall and causing annual losses of $22 billion.

The numbers are even more staggering for Delhi, the epicenter of the crisis. According to monitors, Delhi faces an average of 275 days of unhealthy air annually. The capital province loses as much as 6% of its GDP annually to air pollution.

The only emperor penguin known to have swum from Antarctica to Australia was released at sea 20 days after he waddled ashore.

The adult male was found on Nov. 1 on Ocean Beach sand dunes in the town of Denmark in temperate southwest Australia — about 2,200 miles north of the icy waters off the Antarctic coast, the Western Australia state government said. He was released from a Parks and Wildlife Service boat on Nov. 20.

The boat traveled for several hours from Albany, the state's most southerly city, before the penguin was released into the Southern Ocean, but the government didn't provide the distance in its statement.

He had been cared for by registered wildlife caregiver Carol Biddulph, who named him Gus after the first Roman emperor Augustus. “I didn't know whether he was going to make it to begin with because he was so undernourished,” Biddulph said.

Gus gained weight in her care, from 47 pounds when he was found to 54 pounds. He is 39 inches tall. A healthy male emperor penguin can weigh more than 100 pounds.

“He loves his big mirror, which has been crucial to his well-being. They're social birds, and he stands next to the mirror most of the time,” she said. “I'll miss Gus. It's been an incredible few weeks.”