Polio Vaccine Ban in Parts of Nigeria / Safety Laws Urged for India / Two More Elements?

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VOICE ONE:

This is SCIENCE IN THE NEWS, in VOA Special English. I'm Bob
Doughty.

VOICE TWO:

And I'm Faith Lapidus. On our program this week: Some local
leaders in Nigeria continue to resist the fight against polio ...

VOICE ONE:

Indian lawmakers call for stronger safety rules for food and
drink.

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And, chemistry students may get two more elements to learn.

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Last week, the World Health
Organization led a three-day campaign against the spread of polio in
Africa. The goal was to vaccinate sixty-three-million children in
ten countries in west and central Africa. The World Health
Organization is trying to end the spread of polio anywhere in the
world this year. Recently, however, there have been more cases in
Nigeria and India.

In Nigeria, Islamic leaders in several northern states have
banned the vaccine that prevents polio. Leaders in Kano and the
other states say the vaccine is unsafe. They say the medicine
contains chemicals that give people AIDS or prevent females from
having babies. They say it is part of an American plot.

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The World Health Organization and the Nigerian government have
done tests. Health officials say the vaccine is completely safe.
They also asked Islamic leaders to help test the vaccine.

Recently the Nigerian government appointed a committee to gather
the facts. Last week the chairman said the committee was still
waiting for the results of a test performed in India. He said the
committee does not expect to release its final report to the public
until early March.

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The ten countries in the vaccination campaign last week included
Benin, Burkina Faso, Central African Republic, Chad and Cameroon.
The others were Ghana, Ivory Coast, Niger, Togo and Nigeria.

Also last week, the W-H-O reported a case of polio in Ivory
Coast. The agency said Ivory Coast could be the eighth polio-free
country re-infected because of the spreading virus from northern
Nigeria.

The disease causes paralysis. Victims lose the use of their arms
or legs. The "Kick Polio Out of Africa" campaign began in
nineteen-ninety-six. The W-H-O says two-hundred-five children each
day were becoming paralyzed. By last year, however, just
three-hundred-eighty-eight cases of polio were reported in Africa.
That was almost half of all the new cases of polio in the world.

The international goal is to defeat polio by the end of this
year. Health officials say that may be impossible if the bans on the
vaccine continue in northern Nigeria.

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VOICE ONE:

Indian lawmakers have confirmed that Coca-Cola and Pepsi drinks
made in India contain pesticides. These poisons are used to kill
insects on farms and in homes, but they can enter water supplies.
The investigation showed that the pesticides came from the
groundwater used in the drinks. The lawmakers said the problem is
that India's food safety rules do not prevent this kind of
situation.

The committee reported tests on twelve kinds of soda drinks made
by the Coca-Cola and Pepsi companies. The report said the tests
found high levels of four pesticides.

The companies say the drinks they make in India are safe and
follow internationally accepted methods of production. Coke and
Pepsi products are reported to control about eighty percent of the
Indian soda market. Coca-Cola says it had twenty-two percent growth
in India last year.

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The lawmakers began to investigate after an Indian public
interest group reported about the pesticides. The Center for Science
and Environment carried out the first tests. Its researchers used
three bottles of each of the twelve kinds of sodas. They bought the
drinks from different stores around New Delhi.

The group says its laboratory workers tested all the drinks for
sixteen kinds of pesticides. The researchers said they found one
pesticide, lindane, in all the drinks tested. Lindane can be highly
dangerous to humans.

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The researchers say most of the tested drinks also contained DDT.
This pesticide is banned in the United States and some other
countries. It can affect the central nervous system and cause
problems during pregnancy. The United States Environmental
Protection Agency says DDT is also believed to cause cancer.
However, DDT remains popular in India to kill mosquitoes.

The researchers said PepsiCo and Coca-Cola need better technology
to remove poisons from the groundwater they use. However, the
parliamentary investigators noted that neither company violated any
Indian laws. The lawmakers say it is the laws that have to change.

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All matter in the world is made of elements. Oxygen, for example,
is the most common element on Earth. Elements are substances that
cannot be separated into simpler substances by chemical methods.
However, scientists can use nuclear reactions or radioactive decay
to produce new elements. The goal is to find new materials and new
ways to do chemistry.

Russian and American scientists recently announced the discovery
of two new chemical elements. Their findings appear in the magazine
Physical Review C.

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Each element has a different number of protons in its nucleus.
Protons are particles with a positive electrical charge. How many
protons an element has establishes its place on the periodic table.
This is the list of all the elements.

Hydrogen, for example, is element number one. It has only one
proton. It is the lightest gas known. Uranium is the heaviest
element in nature. It has ninety-two protons. Elements with more
than ninety-two protons are called superheavy elements.

The two new elements are to appear as numbers
one-hundred-thirteen and one-hundred-fifteen on the periodic table.

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The Russian scientists are from the Joint Institute for Nuclear
Research in Dubna. They worked with researchers at the Lawrence
Livermore National Laboratory in California.

The two teams shot electrically charged protons of calcium at a
target. This target was enriched americium. Americium is a
radioactive metal. Very small amounts are commonly used in smoke
detector devices.

The scientists reported that a series of reactions created four
atoms found in element one-hundred-fifteen. They say the atoms
existed for ninety milliseconds. A millisecond is one-thousandth of
a second. Then the atoms decayed into the other new element, with
one-hundred-thirteen protons. The scientists say it remained this
way for more than a second. Then it changed into known elements.

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The length of time that a nucleus can exist is very important. It
is a measure of stability. Atoms that are forced together usually
break apart quickly if the combined nucleus has more than ninety-two
protons.

For years researchers have been looking for what they call an
"island of stability" on the periodic table. They believe that a
nucleus with about one-hundred-fourteen protons may be able to exist
for a long time.

The two new elements have been named ununtrium and ununpentium.
These are temporary names. The scientists will be able to choose
others.

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But first the International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry
must confirm their discovery. Two years ago, a scientist in the
United States provided false evidence about the discovery of element
one-hundred-eighteen.

Other laboratories must be able to reproduce findings of new
elements. There are also rules about names. An element can be named
after a mythological idea, a mineral, a place or country, a
property, or a scientist.

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VOICE ONE:

It appears that insects existed on Earth twenty-million years
earlier than thought. In fact, a new finding suggests that insects
were among the first creatures on land.

Two scientists from the United States have reported the discovery
of a four-hundred-million-year-old insect. It was found in Scotland
almost eighty years ago. But there was little interest until the two
scientists rediscovered the fossil in a London museum. Next week, we
will have more details about their findings.

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VOICE TWO:

SCIENCE IN THE NEWS was written by Karen Leggett, Jill Moss and
Caty Weaver. Our producer was Cynthia Kirk. This is Faith Lapidus.

VOICE ONE:

And this is Bob Doughty. Listen next week for more news about
science, in Special English, on the Voice of America.