This is the members only edition of Future Crunch, a weekly roundup of good news, mind-blowing science, and the best bits of the internet (not necessarily in that order). One third of your subscription fee goes to charity.
Good news you probably didn't hear about
India has made amazing progress in reducing visceral leishmaniasis, commonly known as kala-azar. You've probably heard of it in western media as the "flesh-eating disease" (it's like crack for newspaper editors). According to a new report from the WHO, the number of cases has decreased by 97% since 1992. Last year, there were only 2,048 cases, and 37 deaths.
Cancer death rates continue to decline in the United States for all racial and ethnic groups. For men, the death rate dropped by an average of 2.3% a year between 2015 and 2018; for women, an average of 2.1% during the same time period. STAT
With more people living longer lives, the overall number of Alzheimer's cases in rich countries has risen. What you might not know however, is that the actual percentage of people with the disease is falling - there has been a 16% decrease in Alzheimer's incidence in the OECD decade-on-decade since 1988. El Pais
Last month marked the ten year anniversary of a groundbreaking treaty establishing global labour standards to protect the rights of domestic workers. Over the last decade, 32 countries have signed up, comprehensive laws have been passed in several of them, and there have been improvements in many others, including minimum wages, rest days, paid holidays, written contracts, access to labour courts, and collective bargaining agreements. The International Domestic Worker Federation, founded in 2013, now has half a million members worldwide. HRW
California, home to 40 million people, has just passed a budget with a massive increase in education spending, including universal kindergarten for 4 year olds and the United States' first free breakfast and lunch program for all students. Edsource
Work has begun in Chile on the world’s first constitution to be drafted by an equal number of women and men. The historic moment is a direct result of the 2019 protests that challenged inequality in one of Latin America’s most socially conservative countries. NBC
Urban planners across Europe are redesigning transport systems to be more accessible to all genders. For over a century, the male commute to work by car has been favoured, with wide roads that left little room for footpaths commonly used more by women. Change is now afoot in Paris, Barcelona and Vienna, where new policies are favouring pedestrians and cyclists. Bloomberg
Barcelona is converting one in three of its streets into small parks. 21 new plazas like the one below will be made at road junctions. Safe outdoor space within 200 metres of all homes that cater to pedestrians, offering shaded spaces in summer and facilitating spontaneous children's play.
A nationwide movement to ban 'tampon taxes' across the United States is gaining momentum. Maine, Louisiana and Vermont just passed laws exempting menstrual products from sales taxes, and lawmakers in 20 other states have introduced similar legislation in the last 12 months. 19thnews
File under "most unsurprising news ever." The world's largest and longest trial of a four day work week resulted in a massive increase in well-being for its participants. Around 1% of Iceland's working population took part, cutting their week to 36 hours with no reduction in pay, and no reduction in productivity either. Independent
File under "the news doesn't tell you what's happening in the world, it tells you what's rare." The proportion of Americans who consider themselves to be thriving reached 59.2% last month, the highest since Gallup started asking the question 13 years ago. The pollsters think it's down to three things: an incredibly successful vaccination rollout, improving economic conditions, and perhaps most importantly, the psychological benefit of renewed social interaction.
Saving the world is cheaper than ruining it
After reducing coal to less than 2% of its energy mix in 2020, the UK is bringing its end of coal target forward by a year, to 2024. That means that in just over 40 months, the country that gave us coal-fired electricity in the first place will become the first major industrialized economy to switch coal off. For good. Reuters
Spain won't be far behind. It's just joined an alliance of 23 countries committed to closing all their coal plants by 2030. The country is already on the leading edge, with 85% of coal capacity due to close by the end of 2022. Euractiv
Americans consumed fewer fossil fuels last year than they have in three decades. Consumption of petroleum, natural gas, and coal dropped by 9% compared to 2019, the biggest annual decrease since the EIA started keeping track in 1949. As a result, greenhouse gas emissions fell to a 40 year low.
The average utilization rate of India’s coal-fired fleet has collapsed to 53% in the last financial year. Why does this matter? Because most
of India's coal plants were financed on the assumption they would be running 85-90% of the time. At current rates, it costs less to build new wind and solar than to keep those coal plants running. Money talks. IIEFA
Seriously. Money talks. We're halfway through 2021, and more green bonds have been issued worldwide than in all of 2020 (which was already a record year). Sustainability is suddenly very, very sexy. Every major activity is above last year’s trend lines: Corporations are making more pledges to procure clean energy, financial markets are issuing more sustainable debt, and investors are putting more money into ESG themed exchange-traded funds.
On that note, we thought it was worth reproducing in full this tweet, by Australian energy journalist, Ketan Joshi:
The only home we've ever known
Local volunteers and students in Uttar Pradesh, India’s most populated state, have done it again, planting 250 million saplings in a single day as part of a mission to increase forest cover to 15% within the next five years. DW
The EU's ‘great packaging purge’ has officially commenced. As of the 3rd July, plastic cotton buds, cutlery, plates, straws, stirrers, balloon sticks and polystyrene drink and food containers are no longer available for sale across the continent. DW
Lawmakers in Tierra del Fuego have chosen environment over industry, banning salmon farming in the waters of the South American archipelago. Chile exports US$4.4 billion of salmon each year but the impact on local ecosystems, including the macroalgae forests had become a growing concern. Mercopress
California’s new state budget has allocated millions of dollars to phase out swordfish nets. The measures will prevent the deaths of hundreds of whales and sea turtles and hundreds of dolphins, seals and sea lions over the next decade. SF Chronicle
New research has shown that falling air pollution in the United States between 1999 and 2019 accounted for an almost 20% increase in agricultural yields in the nine states – Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Ohio, South Dakota and Wisconsin – that produce about two-thirds of US maize and soybeans.
Another pipeline bites the dust. The proposed Byhalia Connection, a crude oil pipeline in Memphis, has been abandoned, following a vocal campaign by local activists and celebrities that highlighted the potential threats to the drinking water of mostly black neighbourhoods. USA Today
The Wild Ingleborough project is now underway in the UK, aiming to transform 1,200 hectares of heavily grazed pastures in the Yorkshire Dales into new native woodland. 300 hectares have already being restored, with rowan, hawthorn and hazel trees planted, and hundreds of metres of drystone wall rebuilt. Country Life
Through this project, we want to show that a wilder world is a more stable one, with nature more resilient and able to adapt to change. Together with our partners and the local community, we hope to create a rich, diverse landscape for people and wildlife to thrive - Tanya Steele, Chief Executive, WWF
Indistinguishable from magic
The first fully flushable, biodegradable pregnancy test is now available for sale in the US. The country uses 20 million tests every year, which have been accumulating in landfills for decades. These new tests, developed over six years by a women-led team, are the first major update to pregnancy testing since the 1980s. Byrdie
Paramedics in the UK have a new teammate - a robot that does the CPR for them. The robot, unlike a human, doesn't get tired or change its delivery, meaning it can deliver high-quality CPR for as long as required, freeing up its human counterparts to focus on the clinical care. Independent
Researchers at the University of St Andrews have shown that elite freedivers have brain oxygen levels and heart rates equivalent to seals, whales, and dolphins. “We measured heart rates as low as 11 beats per minute and blood oxygenation levels, which are normally 98%, drop to 25%, far beyond the point at which we expect people to lose consciousness.” Arf!
Biologists in Chicago have developed a method, powered by machine learning, that allows them to watch how the human body converts glucose to energy at both the cellular and sub-cellular levels. This is the first time this kind of imaging has been possible, and could lead to an array of new treatments for multiple diseases. Sci Tech Daily
This one takes a little while to get your head around, but we promise it's worth it. Someone just simulated the amount of time it would take for a space-faring civilization to colonize the Milky Way and the results are confounding. It sounds like sci-fi, but the assumptions are pretty conservative: spacecraft that travel at 30km per second, comparable to our own, an interstellar range of 10 light years, and 100,000 year gaps in between the establishment of new colonies. Even then, it *only* takes a billion years to colonize the galaxy (and things speed up really fast when you get to the centre). So... where are they? And no, grainy videos from an F16 dashcam don't count. Spice up your next Fermi's Paradox conversation and read this, honestly, it's great. Universe Today
The information superhighway is still out there, buried beneath the noise
Two excellent essays on culture and politics in China, through two very unexpected lenses. The first is from Rolling Stone, and looks at what happens when rock n' roll comes into contact with an authoritarian state intent on stamping out any hint of rebellion, the second has the irresistible title of Ketamine and the Return of the Party-State, and is one of the best pieces of political analysis you'll read this year.
"At the beginning of the pandemic my homesickness was a pebble, a small stone I carried with me throughout the day. Now, fifteen months later with no end in sight, as Australia’s borders tighten and its fear of others makes the world even smaller, my sadness grows." Sisonke Msimang on homesickness, grief and global injustice. Heavy, beautiful. Guernica
So meta. 23 newsletter writers... on their favourite newsletter writers. The Cut
Marc Andreessen interviewed by a mild-mannered, centre-left economist, and an ultranationalist, alt-right fascist troll, respectively. If nothing else, you'll find a window here into a worldview held by many in the tech industry. You decide.
Former Olympian and British diplomat, Cath Bishop, on redefining what winning looks like in the 21st century. Instead of simply checking if we've completed a number of tasks or achieved a set of short-term outcomes, we're better off asking 'how have we made progress towards our longer-term purpose?" Taking Time
Razib Khan is one of our favourite Substack writers, and our go to for anything on ancient human genetics. He's got the lowdown on what the discovery of 'Dragon Man' means for the human family tree, including a reminder that most of humanity is descended from a group of about 10,000 people that left Africa roughly 60,000 years ago. Altogether now! "Race is a meaningless concept." *
Humankind
We've never profiled a celebrity in this section before (the whole point is to introduce you to people that don't usually make it into the news). On the eve of the Euro2020 finals though, we're making an exception for Marcus Rashford.
The 23 year-old British footballer is famous as a forward for Manchester United and England, but last year he traded soccer goals for humanitarian ones. It all started with a tweet. On 19th March 2020, a day after the UK announced it would cancel meal vouchers over the summer holiday, Marcus jumped onto Twitter arguing that it was the government’s responsibility to support the children who relied on free school meals to eat. A groundswell of support followed and suddenly the footballer, who rarely expressed opinions, found himself front and centre of a furious public policy debate.
Marcus understood the value of a £15-a-week school meal voucher. He was raised by a single mum, who worked multiple jobs, and often scarified her own food to make sure Marcus and his 4 siblings were fed. Posting an open letter to his local MP, he urged his 4.4 million followers to do the same and explained “the system was not built for families like mine to succeed, regardless of how hard my mum worked. As a family, we relied on breakfast clubs, free school meals, and the kindness of neighbours and coaches.”
The next day the government announced a Covid summer food fund, giving 1.3 million kids meal vouchers over the holidays. Marcus joined forces with the charity FareShare to help fill the gap for the rest. By October, he was on a mission again, petitioning for an extension of out-of-term free school meals until Easter 2021. When the government refused to budge Marcus appealed to businesses to offer free meals and food to people in need. The response was astonishing, from small cafes to supermarket chains, Marcus retweeted pledge after pledge forcing the government into a second U-turn, extending the school food programme into the Easter, summer and Christmas breaks in 2021.
Through his work with FareShare, Marcus has helped raise enough money to distribute over 21 million meals to children and families who might not otherwise have eaten. In October 2020 he became the youngest person to top The Sunday Times Giving List and has vowed to "fight for the rest of my life" to end child hunger in the UK.
That's it for this week! Thanks for reading, and keep an eye on your inbox over the next few days, as we'll be announcing a new charity partner.
Much love,
Gus, Amy and the rest of the FC team
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