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Empowerment linked to increased female smoking
time life pictures/mansell/getty
UPFRONT
The wrong smoke signals THE roaring twenties in the US: hemlines rose, women got the vote and the accessory du jour was a cigarette hanging nonchalantly out the corner of a lipsticked mouth. In the west, smoking among women has long been associated with empowerment. Now this pattern looks set to repeat itself as women in poorer countries become more liberated, says a report in this week’s Bulletin of the World Health Organization (WHO). Sara Hitchman and Geoffrey Fong at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, analysed the relationship between gender inequality and smoking prevalence in women compared to men in 74 countries. It is estimated that, worldwide, men are five times as likely to smoke as women, but the results showed that
in countries where women are more empowered their smoking rates are catching up or exceeding men’s, regardless of the country’s wealth. “Tobacco industry marketing strategies over the years have targeted women in countries where their independence is growing,“ says Deborah Arnott, chief executive of the charity Action on Smoking and Health in London. She cites the example of a cigarette brand from the 1960s whose slogan read: “You’ve come a long way, baby”. “This study highlights the need to act quickly to curb smoking among women, particularly in developing countries where female smoking rates are quite low,” says Douglas Bettcher, director of the Tobacco Free Initiative at the WHO.
Door closes on HIV
cells become impossible for the virus to infect. “This is the first example of genetic editing to introduce a disease-resistant gene in patients,” says lead investigator Carl June at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Preliminary results presented this week at a virus conference in Boston reveal that a year after the treatment, the altered cells had increased in number. In some patients, the cells had colonised areas of the gut and rectum mucosal linings where HIV multiplies, and where native CD4+ cells are usually depleted.
–Still a sign of emancipation–
Solar dispute
“Six solar-energy projects planned for California may threaten Native American burial sites and geoglyphs” facility in Ivanpah Valley, Solar Millennium’s proposed 2400-hectare solar thermal project, and the Chevron Energy Solutions solar facility in the Lucerne Valley. 6 | NewScientist | 5 March 2011
virgin galactic
NATIVE Americans in southern California do not see a bright side to the prospect of six new solarenergy projects crowding the Mohave, Sonoran and Colorado deserts they have called home for thousands of years. A group called La Cuna de Aztlan Sacred Sites Protection Circle has united with activists to challenge the projects, which have been approved by the US government. The group claims that the facilities will threaten burial sites and ancient geoglyphs. Work on the projects began in October last year, and in December those opposed filed a lawsuit. The projects include BrightSource Energy’s 1500-hectare solar
Although permit records show that officials consulted with the California Native American Heritage Commission, La Cuna insists they didn’t have a chance to negotiate. They say construction risks digging up as-yet undiscovered burial sites and the projects would ruin the spiritual value of the geoglyphs. In turn, the Bureau of Land Management contests the authenticity of some geoglyphs, claiming, for instance, that one 60-metre image of Kokopelli, a humpbacked, fluteplaying fertility deity, is only 20 years old, not 10,000 years old.
A PIONEERING treatment to thwart HIV by genetically altering blood cells so the virus cannot invade them has shown promise in the first nine people to receive it. The treatment involves taking the white blood cells most prone to infection by HIV, called CD4+ cells, from someone with HIV. These are then altered in the lab to sabotage a gene called CCR5, before being returned to the patient. Because CCR5 makes the molecular “door-handle” by which HIV enters cells, treated
Scientists in space RESEARCHERS may find themselves bumping up against the rich and famous now that they have contracts to board the same space flights as tourists. Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), a non-profit organisation dedicated to advancing science and engineering based in San Antonio, Texas, signed the contracts with Virgin Galactic and XCOR Aerospace. Both companies –Caution: experiment on board– are building vehicles to ferry
UPFRONT
The wrong smoke signals THE roaring twenties in the US: hemlines rose, women got the vote and the accessory du jour was a cigarette hanging nonchalantly out the corner of a lipsticked mouth. In the west, smoking among women has long been associated with empowerment. Now this pattern looks set to repeat itself as women in poorer countries become more liberated, says a report in this week’s Bulletin of the World Health Organization (WHO). Sara Hitchman and Geoffrey Fong at the University of Waterloo in Ontario, Canada, analysed the relationship between gender inequality and smoking prevalence in women compared to men in 74 countries. It is estimated that, worldwide, men are five times as likely to smoke as women, but the results showed that
in countries where women are more empowered their smoking rates are catching up or exceeding men’s, regardless of the country’s wealth. “Tobacco industry marketing strategies over the years have targeted women in countries where their independence is growing,“ says Deborah Arnott, chief executive of the charity Action on Smoking and Health in London. She cites the example of a cigarette brand from the 1960s whose slogan read: “You’ve come a long way, baby”. “This study highlights the need to act quickly to curb smoking among women, particularly in developing countries where female smoking rates are quite low,” says Douglas Bettcher, director of the Tobacco Free Initiative at the WHO.
Door closes on HIV
cells become impossible for the virus to infect. “This is the first example of genetic editing to introduce a disease-resistant gene in patients,” says lead investigator Carl June at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine. Preliminary results presented this week at a virus conference in Boston reveal that a year after the treatment, the altered cells had increased in number. In some patients, the cells had colonised areas of the gut and rectum mucosal linings where HIV multiplies, and where native CD4+ cells are usually depleted.
–Still a sign of emancipation–
Solar dispute
“Six solar-energy projects planned for California may threaten Native American burial sites and geoglyphs” facility in Ivanpah Valley, Solar Millennium’s proposed 2400-hectare solar thermal project, and the Chevron Energy Solutions solar facility in the Lucerne Valley. 6 | NewScientist | 5 March 2011
virgin galactic
NATIVE Americans in southern California do not see a bright side to the prospect of six new solarenergy projects crowding the Mohave, Sonoran and Colorado deserts they have called home for thousands of years. A group called La Cuna de Aztlan Sacred Sites Protection Circle has united with activists to challenge the projects, which have been approved by the US government. The group claims that the facilities will threaten burial sites and ancient geoglyphs. Work on the projects began in October last year, and in December those opposed filed a lawsuit. The projects include BrightSource Energy’s 1500-hectare solar
Although permit records show that officials consulted with the California Native American Heritage Commission, La Cuna insists they didn’t have a chance to negotiate. They say construction risks digging up as-yet undiscovered burial sites and the projects would ruin the spiritual value of the geoglyphs. In turn, the Bureau of Land Management contests the authenticity of some geoglyphs, claiming, for instance, that one 60-metre image of Kokopelli, a humpbacked, fluteplaying fertility deity, is only 20 years old, not 10,000 years old.
A PIONEERING treatment to thwart HIV by genetically altering blood cells so the virus cannot invade them has shown promise in the first nine people to receive it. The treatment involves taking the white blood cells most prone to infection by HIV, called CD4+ cells, from someone with HIV. These are then altered in the lab to sabotage a gene called CCR5, before being returned to the patient. Because CCR5 makes the molecular “door-handle” by which HIV enters cells, treated
Scientists in space RESEARCHERS may find themselves bumping up against the rich and famous now that they have contracts to board the same space flights as tourists. Southwest Research Institute (SwRI), a non-profit organisation dedicated to advancing science and engineering based in San Antonio, Texas, signed the contracts with Virgin Galactic and XCOR Aerospace. Both companies –Caution: experiment on board– are building vehicles to ferry