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American money

Biden administration to forgive $1.2 billion in student debt for over 150,000 borrowers

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The Biden administration will forgive another $1.2 billion in student debt for nearly 153,000 borrowers enrolled its new repayment program, called the Saving on a Valuable Education, or SAVE, plan. The relief will go to borrowers who have been in repayment for a decade or longer, and originally took out $12,000 or less. Biden has now canceled debt for almost 3.9 million borrowers, totaling $138 billion in relief.

Man giving a helping hand to woman in need sitting on dark street

Baltimore finalizes $18 million deal to acquire hotels for long-term homeless housing

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Once the city takes over operations of the hotels at the end of this year, it intends to convert the units for “permanent supportive housing,” a form of affordable housing that provides subsidized rent and social services, health care, counseling and other supports. The city plans to partner with a nonprofit provider to offer services to residents in the two buildings.

Brain scan

Belgian boy becomes first child in the world to be cured of brain stem glioma

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Brain stem glioma, officially called diffuse intrinsic pontine glioma (DIPG), is rare and lethal, diagnosed in just 300 children annually in the United States. The two-year survival rate is 10%, and no drug is widely available for its treatment beyond radiotherapy. After the boy’s diagnosis, the family traveled to France to take part in a randomized controlled trial. He was randomly assigned the drug everolimus, which he took for more than 5 years with remarkable success.

Bolivian rainforest

Bolivian town Sena protects 1 million acres of Amazon rainforest

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Called the Gran Manupare Integrated Management Natural Area, the law was overseen by, and passed for the benefit of, “peasants and indigenous communities,” per a statement from the mayor’s office. Located in the Pando Department in the far northern corner of Bolivia, the new protected area represents almost 8% of its forests and has significantly increased the region’s conservation coverage to 26%. In the past 25 years, Bolivian towns like Sena have protected 10 million contiguous 25 million acres of Bolivia’s Amazon—an area nearly the size of Iceland.

Dentist's Hand Taking Saliva Test From Woman's Mouth

Hand-held test for breast cancer uses your saliva and gives accurate readings in 5 seconds

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A new hand-held portable device is not only extremely quick and easy to use but very cost effective, say scientists from the University of Florida and National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University in Taiwan. Compared to the costly alternatives of Mammograms, which expose women to radiation—or MRIs and ultrasounds which require expensive equipment—researchers called the device revolutionary.

Bicyclist on city street

Denver will now pay residents who commute on bikes

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The city’s new Bicycling Rewards Program aims to encourage community members to ride a bike instead of driving. The program comes as a response to the city’s lagging climate goals. According to Denver Streets Partnership, transportation was responsible for 30% of the city’s greenhouse gas emissions in 2018, and this incentive is part of a larger research project to see what motivates locals to ditch their cars.

Colorful ribbons on pink background|Doctor

New drug offers breakthrough in treatment of asbestos-linked cancer

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Scientists at Queen Mary University of London have developed a drug to treat mesothelioma, a notoriously deadly and hard-to-treat cancer linked to asbestos, in the biggest breakthrough in two decades.
An international trial spanning five countries found that the new drug, ADI-PEG20, cuts off the tumor’s food supply and quadruples three-year survival rates. It is the first of its kind to be successfully combined with chemotherapy in 20 years.

Elephant

2023 was the first year without elephant poaching in Republic of Congo’s Nouabalé-Ndoki National Park

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The park, which celebrated its 30th anniversary on December 31 of 2023, also shared an exciting conservation milestone: 2023 was the first year without any elephant poaching detected. “We didn’t detect any elephants killed in the Park this year, a first for the Park since [we] began collecting data. This success comes after nearly a decade of concerted efforts to protect forest elephants from armed poaching in the Park,” Ben Evans, the Park’s management unit director, said in a press release.

Good news for LGBTQ rights

Greece legalizes same-sex marriage

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Greece has become the first Christian Orthodox-majority country to legalize same-sex marriage. Same-sex couples will now also be legally allowed to adopt children after the 176-76 vote in parliament. Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis proclaimed “People who have been invisible will finally be made visible around us, and with them, many children will finally find their rightful place.”