Almost the entire cohort of chicks from an Adelie penguin colony in the eastern Antarctic was wiped out by starvation last summer in what scientists say is only the second such incident in over 40 years.   Researchers said Sunday the mass die-off occurred because unusually large amounts of sea …

After 50 years of sitting in the National Geographic archives, 100 hours of footage on Jane Goodall and her groundbreaking observations of chimpanzees in the African forest of Tanzania have been compiled into a documentary film. The documentary titled “Jane” starts in 1960 when Jane Goodall was 26 years old. …

President Donald Trump’s decision to end a provision of the Affordable Care Act that was benefiting roughly 6 million Americans helps fulfill a campaign promise, but it also risks harming some of the very people who helped him win the presidency. Nearly 70 percent of those benefiting from the so-called …

Students are not supposed to “zone out” in class, but that’s a required part of the curriculum in the Healthy Brains, Healthy Bodies course at the University of Vermont. Faith Lapidus tells us about the unusual program. …

A groundbreaking treatment for a rare form of hereditary blindness has moved closer to U.S. approval. This week advisers to the Food and Drug Administration recommended the experimental gene therapy, which replaces a defective gene. If the FDA agrees by mid-January, this would become the first gene therapy in the …

Clearing forests for farm fields makes room for crops, but often squeezes out natural predators that can help clear the fields of crop-eating rodents. After his neighbors tried unsuccessfully to get rid of the pests by smoking them out and hunting them, one farmer in Indonesia decided to try a …

California Gov. Jerry Brown on Friday declared a state of emergency to combat a hepatitis A outbreak that has claimed 18 lives in San Diego. Brown said the federally funded supply of vaccines is inadequate. His proclamation allows the state to buy vaccines directly from manufacturers and distribute them. The …

Eighteen U.S. states vowed Friday to sue President Donald Trump’s administration to try to stop him from scrapping a key component of Obamacare — subsidies to insurers that help millions of low-income people pay medical expenses — even as Trump invited Democratic leaders to negotiate a deal. One day after …

The Carter Center, a nonprofit organization run by former U.S. President Jimmy Carter, said Friday that it had helped eliminate elephantiasis, a disfiguring tropical disease, from two states in Nigeria where the problem was at its worst. Dr. Yisa Saka of Nigeria’s Federal Ministry of Health said in the Carter …

America’s weight problem isn’t getting any better, according to new government research. Overall, obesity figures stayed about the same: About 40 percent of adults are obese and 18.5 percent of children. Those numbers are a slight increase from the last report but the difference is so small that it could …

It covers almost three-fourths of the planet, but it’s probably not a good idea to fill your cup from a river. Drinkable water flows to most of our taps only after it gets a good scrubbing. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi reports from a drinking water treatment plant in the Washington metropolitan …

A new study that even shocked the researchers shows that most people in poor- and middle-income countries suffer unimaginable pain without any help. The results of a study on pain management motivated the research group to find a way to help the millions of people who suffer needlessly. VOA’s Carol …

Felicia Knaul woke up from a mastectomy several years ago. She still remembers the horror of the pain, pain so severe she felt she couldn’t breathe. Yet because she lives in the U.S., she, like many other Americans, had access almost immediately to pain relief that allowed her to push …

The United Nations secretary-general says early action by the international community has helped avert widespread famine, but the number of people in need is continuing to grow. In February, António Guterres warned that 20 million people were facing starvation in South Sudan, Somalia, North East Nigeria and Yemen, and he …

The Trump administration handed a rare victory to environmentalists, ordering two big corporations this week to pay $115 million to clean up a Texas toxic waste site that may have spread dangerous levels of pollution during flooding from Hurricane Harvey. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt signed a directive Wednesday …

Squinting under a relentless sun, Houssin Ghodbane watches his son tend a flock of 120 of their sheep. Heads bowed, the sheep slowly search for sparse vegetation poking through the parched, crunchy soil. Fifty-year-old Ghodbane, his tanned face etched with deep lines, has been herding sheep for 20 years, having …

Som Aun contracted malaria after moving to the Thma Baing district of Cambodia’s Koh Kong province in 2002. Four years later, two of his children contracted the disease. For five years, his son, An, now 19, and daughter, Sreyna, now 12, remained infected because no effective treatment was available, he …

The former coach of banned marathon runner Rita Jeptoo has been acquitted in a Kenyan court of charges that he helped administer the banned blood-booster EPO to her.   Italian national Claudio Berardelli was cleared of charges of conspiring to harm Jeptoo’s career by administering a banned substance. An assistant …

The massive brooding stone figures peering from Easter Island’s hillsides are emblematic of the enigmatic people who once thrived on the dot of land in the middle of the Pacific. New genetic research only deepens the mystery around these people. Scientists said on Thursday an analysis of DNA from ancient …

After hurricanes Harvey, Irma and Maria blitzed the nation, most Americans think weather disasters are getting more severe and see global warming’s fingerprints.   A new poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research finds that 68 percent of Americans think weather disasters seem to be worsening, compared …

The World Health Organization (WHO) is urging action to stop the spread of tuberculosis from animals to humans. The health agency warns zoonotic TB, as it is called, infects about 150,000 people and kills more than 12,000 every year.   The WHO says TB in animals has been neglected for …

In the future, the noise of car engines revving around the streets of Paris might become just a memory.   In its latest initiative to reduce air pollution, Paris City Hall wants gasoline-powered cars off the roads by 2030. The controversial move announced Thursday follows Mayor Anne Hidalgo’s plan to …

Frustrated by failures in Congress, President Donald Trump will try to put his own stamp on health care with an executive order Thursday that aims to make lower-premium plans more widely available. But the president’s move is likely to encounter opposition from medical associations, consumer groups and perhaps even some …

During last year’s Summer Olympics in Rio, tragedy struck when a German canoe slalom coach died from injuries he received in a car accident. But his heart was unharmed and was given to a Brazilian woman in her 60’s who had been bedridden by heart troubles for nearly five years. …

SpaceX has launched and landed its second rocket in three days, this time from the U.S. East Coast. The unmanned Falcon — recycled following a February flight — blasted off with a satellite Wednesday evening from Florida’s Kennedy Space Center. Minutes later, the leftover booster landed on an offshore barge. …