Day: July 31, 2021

COPENHAGEN, DENMARK – Greenland’s ice sheet has experienced a “massive melting event” during a heat wave that has seen temperatures more than 10 degrees above seasonal norms, according to Danish researchers.
Since Wednesday, the ice sheet covering the vast Arctic territory has melted by about 8 billion tons a day, twice its normal average rate during summer, reported the Polar Portal website, which is run by Danish researchers.
The Danish Meteorological Institute reported temperatures of more than 20 degrees Celsius (68 Fahrenheit), more than twice the normal average summer temperature, in northern Greenland.
And Nerlerit Inaat airport in the northeast of the territory recorded 23.4 degrees C (74.1 F) on Thursday — the highest recorded there since records began.
With the heat wave affecting most of Greenland that day, the Polar Portal website reported a “massive melting event” involving enough water “to cover Florida with two inches of water” (five centimeters).
The largest melt of the Greenland ice sheet still dates to the summer of 2019.
The area where the melting took place this time, though, is larger than two years ago, the website added.
The Greenland ice sheet is the second-largest mass of freshwater ice on the planet with nearly 1.8 million square kilometers (695,000 square miles), second only to Antarctica.
The melting of the ice sheets started in 1990 and has accelerated since 2000. The mass loss in recent years is approximately four times greater than it was before 2000, according to the researchers at Polar Portal.
One European study published in January said ocean levels would rise between 10 and 18 centimeters by 2100 — or 60 percent faster than previously estimated — at the rate at which the Greenland ice sheet was now melting.
The Greenland ice sheet, if completely melted, would raise the ocean levels by six to seven meters.
But with a relatively cool start to the Greenland summer, with snowfalls and rains, the retreat of the ice sheet so far for 2021 remains within the historical norm, according to Polar Portal. The melting period extends from June to early September.

Source: Voice of America

VANCOUVER, CANADA – When the COVID-19 vaccines started rolling out across the United States, Canada was short of supply and its leaders faced harsh criticism for not being better prepared. Expected deliveries from Europe were delayed and the country had no capability to produce its own vaccines.
By mid-July, that changed. More doses of vaccines started to arrive and Canada quickly passed the United States in vaccination rates.
As of Wednesday, 71.4% of Canadians had received at least one dose, with 57.6% having received two doses. In the United States, by comparison, 57.7% had received the first dose and 49.8% the second.
It was a different story three months earlier, when the United States had inoculated 43.2% with one dose and 29.9% were fully vaccinated with two doses. In Canada at that time, 31.3% had received a first dose and only 2.8% had gotten the second.
All vaccines being used in Canada — Pfizer, Moderna and AstraZeneca — require two doses. The single-dose Johnson & Johnson vaccine is approved but has not yet been utilized.

Dr. Brian Conway, the medical director of the Vancouver Infectious Diseases Center, believes Canada has overtaken the U.S. in vaccinations because its political leaders are in greater agreement about the value of the vaccines than their southern neighbors.
“All politicians of all stripes, in terms of major political parties, and even minor political parties, have been supportive of the vaccination program. And within the next couple of weeks, 80% of eligible Canadians aged 12 and up will be doubly vaccinated,” Conway said.

Nazeem Muhajarine, an epidemiologist at the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon and part of a national research committee on COVID-19 variants, echoes Conway and says Canadians themselves have approached vaccinations with more unity.
“The sense of, you know, that you are part of a collective purpose versus kind of, you know, you being an individual person, individual rights and responsibilities, which is so important in the U.S., is not as important here,” Muhajarine said.

“So added this extra incentive for people, which is not just protect yourself or others, but also to get your province over the percentage that you need to keep going on a reopening plan,” Tworek said.
Many public health officials across Canada are starting to wind down mass vaccination clinics and are now going to beaches, farmers markets, summer fairs and sporting events.
It is hoped this will not only motivate more people to get vaccinated, but also make it easier to get the vaccine, especially for those in more remote communities or facing other challenges.

Source: Voice of America