By slashing food waste and improving waste management and recycling, 23 global cities and regions representing 150 million people pledged Tuesday to significantly cut the pollution-causing garbage they generate by 2030. Places like New York, Tokyo, London, Paris and Sydney vowed to “cut the amount of waste generated by each …

The World Health Organization (WHO) reports the next seven to 10 days are critical in controlling the spread of the Ebola virus in eastern Democratic Republic of Congo. Its latest update reported 111 cases of Ebola, with 83 confirmed and 28 probable, including 75 deaths. The WHO reports it is …

Julia Flores Colque still sings with joy in her indigenous Quechua tongue and strums the five strings of a tiny Andean guitar known as the charango, despite a recorded age of almost 118 years. In her long life, she has witnessed two world wars, revolutions in her native Bolivia and …

Indonesia produces an estimated 1.3 million tons of plastic every day, much of which ends up in the oceans, clogging the ecosystem and killing wildlife. Last year the country pledged to cut the amount it throws into the sea by 70 percent by 2025. As Jack Hewson reports, the sea …

President Emmanuel Macron suffered a major political blow Tuesday as his popular environment minister resigned live on radio — without informing the French leader beforehand. Nicolas Hulot, one of the most respected members of the Cabinet among the French public, took even his interviewers by surprise on the France Inter …

President Trump recently proposed cuts to the Clean Power Plan. The Obama-era plan aims to generate electricity with less coal and more renewable energy and slash carbon emissions from the nation’s power plants by about one-third by 2030. Trump’s proposal was criticized by environmentalists but applauded in West Virginia, where …

Taking a low-dose of aspirin every day has been known to help people who have already had a heart attack. But major new research has found the risks do not outweigh the benefits for most other people. Faith Lapidus has details. …

Ancient periods of cold and dry climate helped our species replace Neanderthals in Europe, a study suggests. Researchers found that such cold periods coincided with an apparent disappearance of our evolutionary cousins in different parts of the continent, and the appearance of our species, Homo sapiens. “Whether they moved or …

Doctors have long recommended that people who have had a heart attack or stroke take a daily low-dose aspirin to help prevent further heart problems. Now major research has tested whether aspirin can help prevent first-time heart problems. The results of three separate studies show it cannot. One study looked …

Marijuana’s main mind-altering ingredient was detected in nursing mothers’ breast milk in a small study that comes amid evidence that more U.S. women are using pot during pregnancy and afterward. Experts say the ingredient, THC, has chemical properties that could allow it to disrupt brain development and potentially cause harm, …

It’s a good idea for people to get an annual physical … and it’s important for animals, too. The London Zoo hosted its annual weigh-in for thousands of its animals recently, enticing the creatures with food to get their measurements. The documentation process is an extensive and time-consuming exercise for …

Brazil’s health officials say more than 4 million children still need to be vaccinated against measles. More than 1,380 people have been infected in an outbreak linked to cases imported from Venezuela. To stop the disease’s spread, Brazil’s Health Ministry launched a campaign this month to vaccinate all children between …

A doctor has become the first probable Ebola case in one of the eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s “high insecurity zones” which are dogged by militia violence and hard to access, a scenario “we have all been dreading,” the WHO said on Friday. Since the outbreak erupted on August 1, …

Thirty-six million people currently live with AIDS, a disease that claimed the lives of nearly 1 million people last year. Experts predict that by 2030, 100 million people will have been infected with the HIV virus. Despite the alarming numbers, there have been great strides in treatment. HIV is no …

Since the 1990s, annual numbers of U.S. coal miners with new, confirmed cases of an advanced form of so-called black lung disease known as progressive massive fibrosis have been steadily rising, according to a new study. The resurgence is particularly strong among central Appalachian miners in Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Virginia and …

Vice President Mike Pence is in Houston, Texas, to reaffirm the Trump administration’s plans to establish an American Space Force by 2020, return Americans to the moon, and set its sight on Mars and beyond. During a speech Thursday at NASA’s Johnson Space Center, Pence said that recent Pentagon reports …

Russian scientists have found the carcass of an ancient foal perfectly preserved in the Siberian permafrost. The fossil discovered in the region of Yakutia has its skin, hair, hooves and tail preserved. Yakutia is also famous having wooly mammoth fossils found in the permafrost.   Scientists from Russia’s Northeast Federal …

For the millions of sun seekers who head to Thailand’s resort island of Phuket each year in search of stunning beaches and clear waters, cutting down on waste may not be a top priority. But the island’s hotel association is hoping to change that with a series of initiatives aimed …

NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine has a vision for renewed and “sustainable” human exploration of the moon, and he cites the existence of water on the lunar surface as a key to chances for success. “We know that there’s hundreds of billions of tons of water ice on the surface of …

He played more than 300 games in his professional career, but NHL goalie Clint Malarchuk is best remembered for only one – a game that almost killed him. It happened on March 22, 1989, in a game against the St. Louis Blues. Malarchuk, on goal, was sliced on the neck …

In his first 12 years working as a vet in Bangladesh, Bikash Chandra Saha routinely prescribed antibiotics. Then he learned of the devastating impact of antimicrobial resistance on human health — and it revolutionized his treatment choices. The growing resistance of deadly diseases to antimicrobial drugs such as antibiotics is …

Israel on Tuesday outlawed the import and sale of e-cigarettes made by Silicon Valley startup Juul Labs, citing public health concerns given their nicotine content. A statement by Israel’s Health Ministry said the Juul device was banned because it contains nicotine at a concentration higher than 20 milligrams per milliliter …

Food waste could rise by almost a third by 2030 when more than 2 billion tons will be binned, researchers said on Tuesday, warning of a “staggering” crisis propelled by a booming world population and changing habits in developing nations. The United Nations has set a target of halving food …

Smoke from wildfires clogged the sky across the U.S. West, blotting out mountains and city skylines from Oregon to Colorado, delaying flights and forcing authorities to tell even healthy adults in the Seattle area to stay indoors.   As large cities dealt with unhealthy air for a second summer in …

Scorching summer heat waves and downpours are set to become more extreme in the northern hemisphere as global warming makes weather patterns linger longer in the same place, scientists said Monday. They said there was a risk of “extreme extremes” in North America, Europe and parts of Asia because man-made …