Submit your Article

A wildfire near Yosemite National Park in California is spreading quickly, threatening thousands of homes, BBC reported.

The California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection (Cal Fire) described it as being "zero per cent under control" on Saturday morning. 

"Explosive fire behaviour is challenging firefighters", Cal Fire reported on Saturday.

Central and North Eastern regions of the US are also sweltering under extreme heat. 

Temperatures of 38C (100.4 F) are forecast in Washington DC and Dallas, with New York only slightly cooler.

Dubbed the Oak Fire, the blaze in California started on Friday afternoon local time and quickly exploded in size. Thousands of people have been told to evacuate, according to BBC.

Climate change increases the risk of the hot, dry weather that is likely to fuel wildfires. 

The world has already warmed by about 1.1C since the industrial era began and temperatures will keep rising unless governments around the world make steep cuts to emissions, BBC reported.

The monkeypox outbreak has been declared a global health emergency by the World Health Organization, BBC reported.

The classification is the highest alert that the WHO can issue and follows a worldwide upsurge in cases.

It came at the end of the second meeting of the WHO's emergency committee on the virus.

More than 16,000 cases have now been reported from 75 countries, said WHO director general Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus.

There had been five deaths so far as a result of the outbreak, he added.

There are only two other such health emergencies at present - the coronavirus pandemic and the continuing effort to eradicate polio.

Dr Tedros said the emergency committee had been unable to reach a consensus on whether the monkeypox outbreak should be classified as a global health emergency.

However, he said the outbreak had spread around the world rapidly and he had decided that it was indeed of international concern.

Too little was understood about the new modes of transmission which had allowed it to spread, said Dr Tedros, according to BBC.

"The WHO's assessment is that the risk of monkeypox is moderate globally and in all regions, except in the European region, where we assess the risk as high," he added.

There was also a clear risk of further international spread, although the risk of interference with international traffic remained low for the moment, he said.

Dr Tedros said the declaration would help speed up the development of vaccines and the implementation of measures to limit the spread of the virus. 

The WHO is also issuing recommendations which it hopes will spur countries to take action to stop transmission of the virus and protect those most at risk.

"This is an outbreak that can be stopped with the right strategies in the right groups," Dr Tedros said, BBC reported.

Strategic Affairs Nepal, a Kathmandu-based think-tank, organized a talk program titled Climate Change and Monsoon-induced Disasters in South Asia, on July 24.

The renowned environmental scientist Dr. Uttam Babu Shrestha delivered his presentation on it. He highlighted the challenges ushered by climate change. He emphasized that one of the three global crises that mankind is now experiencing is climate change. He presented an overview of climate change in the global and South Asian settings serving as the main starting point. 

Both natural and artificial systems have been influenced by climate change. Climate-related catastrophes including floods, droughts, landslides, and coastal erosion have harmed billions of people over the past 30 years and cost hundreds of billions in property and infrastructure losses. No location on earth is more susceptible to more than 800 million people in South Asia being at risk of dying due to climate change as the environment changes, and income (rise in temperature, erratic rainfall, and drying up water sources). 

He further enhanced these challenges with case studies in terms of Nepal’s context. The talk detailed on the changes in temperature and precipitation indicators' intensity, duration, frequency, and extremes during the past century on both national and global scales. In the context of South Asia and Nepal and their connections with climate change, it will present the spatiotemporal changes in climate-induced catastrophes. Future climatic changes and the threats they bring will be covered towards the conclusion of the discussion.

Kamal Dev Bhattarai, Kathmandu-based diplomatic and environment journalist spoke about the need of regional frameworks to tackle the climate-induced disaster in South Asia. He said regional organizations like SAARC and BIMSTEC can play a pivotal role to mitigate the effects of climate change. He said without political stability in this region, climate change issues will not get a priority.

Nepal reported 456 new Covid-19 cases on Friday.

According to the Ministry of Health and Population, 2,168 swab samples were tested in the RT-PCR method, of which 384 returned positive. Likewise, 1, 670 people underwent antigen tests, of which 72 were tested positive.

The Ministry said that no one died of virus in the last 24 hours. 

As of today, there are 2, 841 active cases in the country.