Some Good news you may have missed during 2022..

hollydolly

hollydolly

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1. There were big breakthroughs for fighting tropical diseases in 2022. Niger became the first African country to eliminate river blindness; Malawi, Togo, Vanuatu and Saudi Arabia all eliminated trachoma, saving tens of millions of people from the world’s most common cause of blindness; and Benin, Uganda, Rwanda, and Equatorial Guinea eliminated sleeping sickness, a deadly disease caused by tsetse flies.

2. Cancer death rates have fallen substantially in Europe, the United States, Canada and Japan, and Rwanda revealed it is on track to become the first country in the world to eliminate cervical cancer.

3. Europe revealed that improved air quality has saved millions of lives in the last few decades. In the early 1990s, nearly a million premature deaths a year were caused by fine particulate pollution. By 2005, that number had been more than halved to 450,000, and in 2021 dropped to around 300,000.

4. Millions of Alzheimer’s patients were given hope after a new drug was shown to slow memory decline by 27 per cent over 18 months. It is the biggest breakthrough in a generation, offering real optimism that dementia can, one day, perhaps be cured.

5. The World Malaria Report said there were an estimated 619,000 deaths in 2021, down from 625,000 in 2020. India, Pakistan, Brazil and Tanzania, some of the world’s worst affected countries, all reported substantial progress. Scientists at Oxford University released results of trials of a new malaria vaccine with “world-changing” potential, giving up to 80 per cent protection from the bite of the anopheles mosquito, the world’s deadliest animal. A deal has already been reached to manufacture 100 million doses a year, and the charity Malaria No More said it might mean children dying from malaria could end in our lifetimes.
 

6. Unaids (The joint United Nations programme on HIV/AIDS) said that global Aids deaths fell to 650,000 in 2021, down by 11 per cent since 2019, and Unicef reported infections among children under five have fallen by more than 50 per cent since 2010. Oman eliminated mother-to-child transmission of HIV, and Botswana revealed it is on the cusp of becoming the first African country to do so — astonishing progress for a country that used to have the highest rate of HIV in the world.

7. The world Tobacco Atlas revealed that for the first time the proportion of smokers in the world has fallen. Out near the front of the pack? The US, where cigarette smoking is down sharply, and New Zealand, the first country to implement an annually rising smoking age, ensuring tobacco cannot be sold to anyone born after January 1, 2009.

8. This year saw the arrival of a RSV (respiratory syncytial virus) vaccine that reduces severe disease by 82 per cent, a GBS (Guillain-Barré syndrome) vaccine, a dengue vaccine that cuts the risk of hospitalisation by 84 per cent, a super-cheap cervical cancer vaccine, and a single-dose oral drug that is 95 per cent effective at curing sleeping sickness.
 
Animals, conservation and climate

9. This was the Year of the Tiger, and it kicked off with a report from the WWF showing the century-long trend of wild tiger decline has finally been reversed. In Europe, populations of bird and mammals — including bison, lynx, wolves, beavers and bears — are bouncing back, and in an incredible reversal, saiga antelope in Kazakhstan have rebounded ten-fold after a fatal disease killed half the population seven years ago.

10. This was also the year in which Britain’s landmark ivory ban went into effect, and the 150-year ivory trade in Hong Kong came to an end. Zimbabwe’s Mana Pools, one of Africa’s most renowned game viewing destinations, maintained a zero elephant poaching rate for the third year in a row, and Gabon reported its elephant population has increased by more than a third in the last decade, to 95,000 animals.

11. Giraffe populations across Africa rebounded by 20 per cent, the one-horned rhino bounced back in India, Brazil’s iconic golden lion tamarin bounced back too, bison returned from the brink of extinction to the plains of America, the number of wolf packs in the Alps jumped more than 25 per cent, cheetahs returned to India after more than 60 years, and 40 years after being declared locally extinct, rhinos returned to Mozambique.

12. Italy followed in the footsteps of France and Germany by banning the slaughter of male chicks, ending the culling of up to 40 million young birds by the egg industry each year. The US is in the middle of a multi-billion dollar shift to cage-free eggs, and Australia said it will phase out battery eggs altogether.

13. The 19th meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora (Cites) produced new trade regulations for more than 600 species, including new protection for sharks, frogs, turtles, songbirds and tropical timber species. The most significant development was the expansion of fishing regulations to protect 95 per cent of shark species fished for their fins. Shark-fishing gear was also banned across much of the Pacific, and earlier in the year, Hawaii became the first US state to ban shark fishing altogether.

14. Illegal poaching of turtles has dropped sharply around the world in the last decade, and numbers are recovering. After several decades of protection and monitoring, turtle recoveries were reported in the Seychelles, Georgia and off the coast of Louisiana.

15. Britain reported a string of successes in rewilding populations of osprey, cranes and spoonbills, the US Interior Department announced $105 million of funding to conserve or restore 116,305 acres of habitat for waterfowl and other birds in 18 states, and thanks to a collaboration between government agencies, scientists, and indigenous tribes, condors are once again soaring over the skies of North America.
 
16. Amid worrying news about global deforestation, there were some bright spots in 2022. Nepal, India and Scotland all reported notable recoveries, the EU agreed to adopt the world’s first ever legislation banning the trade of agricultural commodities driving global forest loss, and perhaps most importantly, the election of president “Lula” — Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva — in Brazil heralded a turnaround for the Amazon.

17. There was some good news for the world’s oceans too. Colombia became the first country in the western hemisphere to protect 30 per cent of its ocean, the Pacific island state of Niue created a marine park protecting 100 per cent of its waters, spanning 317,500 km², and Australia created a 744,000 km² marine park, meaning 45 per cent of its territorial waters are now protected. Europe closed 87 sensitives zones to bottom trawling in the Atlantic, putting 16,419 km² of ocean below 400 metres off limits; and in “a massive victory for the planet” South Africa banned oil and gas exploration on the country’s Wild Coast, protecting 6,000 kilometres of coastline.

18. Vladimir Putin arguably did more for the climate than any individual in human history, by turning clean energy into a national security issue, but no, coal power didn’t bounce back. In the first half of 2022, renewables and hydro met all of the growth in global electricity demand, preventing a 4 per cent increase in fossil generation, avoiding $40 billion in fuel costs, and avoiding 230 megatonnes of CO2. It’s worth drilling down on the numbers for the world’s four biggest emitters. In China, wind and solar additions caused fossil fuel power to fall 3 per cent, rather than rise by 1 per cent. In India, they slowed down the rise from 12 per cent to 9 per cent, and in the US, from 7 per cent down to 1 per cent. In Europe, they prevented a major carbon bomb; without wind and solar, fossil fuel generation would have risen by 16 per cent instead of 6 per cent.
 
People and society
19. The death penalty was abolished in Malaysia, Zambia, the Central African Republic, Papua New Guinea and Equatorial Guinea, one of the world’s most authoritarian countries. More than 70 per cent of the world’s countries have now removed the death penalty in law or in practice.

20. The US Supreme Court’s decision to overturn Roe v Wade was a huge setback for reproductive rights in the United States, but in the rest of the world, it was the opposite story. Colombia decriminalised abortion and India’s supreme court upheld the right to choose for 73 million unmarried women — the first time a legal question about abortion in India has been approached from a women’s perspective. Finland and San Marino liberalised their abortion laws, France’s National Assembly passed a bill enshrining the right to choose, and Spain approved a draft bill removing the requirement for 16 and 17-year-old girls to have parental consent before terminating a pregnancy. Spain also made it a criminal offence to harass women attending reproductive health clinics, and passed a historic ‘only yes means yes’ law for sexual consent.

21. Slovenia became the 31st country to legalize same-sex marriage, Cubans overwhelmingly backed same-sex marriage in a referendum, and the last two states in Mexico legalised it.

22. Canada, France, New Zealand and Greece all officially banned gay conversion therapy this year, and Israel and India took their first steps towards formally outlawing it. Singapore effectively decriminalised homosexuality, and Antigua and Barbuda decriminalised gay sex, removing a colonial era law.

23. Pakistan passed a new law significantly strengthening protections for women in the workplace, India’s supreme court ruled police could not take criminal action against sex workers, and gave them access to social welfare, bank accounts and voting rights, and teenage mothers in Tanzania were allowed back to school after the reversal of a 20-year-old ban.
 
24. Crime statistics fell in England and Wales. Compared with the year before the pandemic, burglary in 2022 was down 28 per cent, robbery down by 23 per cent, vehicle offences have fallen by 19 per cent, knife crime by 9 per cent, gun offences are down 10 per cent, and murders have decreased by 5 per cent. Overall crime is now at its lowest level since the 1980s.


25. The Department of Justice reported that between 2012 and 2021 rates of violent victimisation in the US (robbery and sexual, aggravated and simple assault) declined from 26.1 to 16.5 incidents per 1,000 people, youth crime fell to its lowest level on record, and so did the number of young people being prosecuted, giving tens of thousands of teens a second chance.

26. The US Congress took its first significant act on gun safety in nearly three decades in 2022, 45 new gun safety laws were adopted in states, and 95 per cent of gun lobby-linked bills were blocked.


27. Two of the countries most affected by landmines continued to make steady progress in 2022. Angola reported that more than 10 million km² has been cleared since the end of its civil war, and Cambodia marked the 30th anniversary of its removal program, which has made land safe for nine million people and reduced deaths from 4,320 in 1996 to less than 100 in 2021.
 
28. There was a watershed moment for Moroccan labour rights in 2022, with the government extending paid paternity leave from three to 15 days as part of a social pact to improve conditions for the working class. This is part of a wider global trend: in the last decade 38 countries have increased the duration of their paid maternity leave, and 37 have introduced paid paternity leave.

29. Poland welcomed more than two million Ukrainian refugees this year. Private citizens spent $2.1 billion on aid, the government spent $3.4 billion, and 1.2 million Ukrainians were granted access to health care, education, and social benefits. Attitudes changed too. 80 per cent of Poles now support taking in refugees fleeing violence and war, up from 49 per cent in 2018.

30. In what the UN called a “historic change”, in India between 2005 and 2019, nearly 415 million people were lifted out of what is known as multidimensional poverty, a measure that includes health, education and standard of living. Children saw the fastest reduction, with child poverty falling from 34.7 per cent to 21.8 per cent.
 
31. The pandemic did not result in the feared reversal in progress on global child mortality — rather, child mortality has actually decreased to its lowest level ever, at 37 deaths per 1,000 live births. Nigeria, Egypt, South Africa, Zimbabwe, Bangladesh and India have all reported significant declines in the last few years.

32. Fewer teenage girls as a proportion of the global population are giving birth today than at any point in human history. Oh, and 357 million women and girls are using modern contraception in low and lower-middle income countries, and in the last year alone, their use averted 135 million unintended pregnancies, 28 million unsafe abortions, and 140,000 maternal deaths.

33. The UN reported that global electricity access rose from 83 per cent to 91 per cent of humanity between 2010 and 2020, with the number of unserved falling from 1.2 billion to 733 million.
 
Holly, that is all fantastically good news for the human race.

Thanks for that post. Could I please have a link so that I can pass it on to my more cynical and pessimistic friends.

Never mind. I have found it in The Sunday Times, but it is paywalled so I am copying it from your multiple posts.
 
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