Chinese medicine shops feel the pinch

Shops selling traditional medicines and foods in Hong Kong and Sydney say business from Chinese tourists is the poorest in years. Noah’s Trading Company is usually bustling with customers during the Lunar New Year holiday, but this year the aisles are empty. Similar scenes are playing out in traditional Chinese medicine shops in Hong Kong’s old Sheung Wan district. Stores […]

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Qatar’s weighty problem

The emirate isn’t just the world’s richest country, it’s also one of the fattest. Half of adults and a third of children are obese, and almost 17 percent of the native population suffers from diabetes. By comparison, about a third of Americans are obese, and 8 percent diabetic. The problem is that Qataris are so rich that they don’t need […]

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The mass abortion of girls

It’s official: Abortion for gender selection is widespread in Britain, said Dominic Lawson. An analysis by The Independent shows that women from Indian and Pakistani communities in Britain are aborting their female fetuses at much higher rates than male fetuses, “resulting in the ‘disappearance’ of up to 4,700 girls.” Of course, this is what we should have expected, given that […]

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Dark matter is (probably) more complex than you think

Scientists typically believe that dark matter behaves in a simple way: if one clump encounters another, the two interact solely through gravity. However, researchers have published findings which suggest that there’s more involved. They’ve noticed dark matter (the blue lines in the photo above) lagging behind a galaxy due to friction, hinting that there are factors beyond gravity at work. […]

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