Articles tagged with "india"

How not to handle a COVID outbreak

28 June 2021

Obviously India has been through the wringer recently with a huge increase in the number of COVID cases, and deaths, in the country. Thankfully the number of active cases is dropping, but at its peak around four and a half thousand people were dying per day, and there have been almost four hundred thousand reported deaths so far - although many experts fear the real total is likely to be much higher.

COVID's worst places

10 May 2021

A couple of weeks ago I wrote about the situation in India with COVID and how bad it was there. It turns out that it's not the worst place in the world to be (though certainly not anywhere near the best either!). There's an interactive map hosted by the New York Times that shows, per country, the rates of infection per capita.

Forum

1 November 2003

Prior to attending the NZ Skeptics conference in Wellington this year, I read the discussion paper on the role of science in environmental policy and decision making, Illuminated or Blinded by Science, prepared by the Office of the Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. It seemed to me to be a reasonable document. It included a discussion of some of the issues which have to be considered by policy makers in the environmental area and pointed to some of the difficulties, institutional and procedural, in using science to form environmental policy. Following on from the request in the paper for comments from the public on how science could be better incorporated into environmental policy, the team leader for the discussion paper, Mr Bruce Taylor, gave a presentation to the Skeptics conference in which he introduced the paper and asked for views on it.

Forum

1 August 2003

I am always astonished that famous mystical persons, such as the Virgin Mary (who was transubstantiated into an Australian fencepost in February) reveal themselves to us mere mortals. I once had an experience like that.

Forum

1 May 2003

Estimates of world poverty are grossly exaggerated

Forum

1 February 1994

The Indian Skeptics sometimes seem to be up against some very big opponents. Our Chair recently received the following letter: