Author: DW

Complex questions generally have complex answers — such as the question of what causes autism. Experts in the field have debated the topic for decades. Now, US President Donald Trump claims to have solved the mystery.  The US Department of Health and Human Services launched a “massive testing and research effort” to determine “what has caused the autism epidemic” by September, HHS Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. said in April.  The number of people diagnosed with autism in the United States has been rising for decades. About 1 in 36 children were identified with autism spectrum disorder in 2020. That’s…

Copenhagen Airport halted operations on Monday after multiple drones were spotted in the area, Danish police said. Copenhagen Airport’s official X account said it had shut down operations due to “activity.” The airport reopened a few hours later, but recognized there would still be “delays and canceled departures.” Copenhagen police earlier posted on social media that the airport was “closed for take-off and landing, as 2-3 large drones” had been seen “flying in the area.”Danish police were investigating the origin of the dronesImage: Steven Knap/Ritzau Scanpix/picture alliance Police believe ‘capable operator’ responsible “We have concluded that this was what we would call a…

“I feel fantastic,” Leo Neugebauer told the crowd over the PA system in the National Stadium in Tokyo on Sunday. Just moments earlier, the German decathlete had dragged himself over the finish line in the final event of the decathlon, the 1,500 meters. He staggered through the final few meters before collapsing to the ground as the new world decathlon champion. Neugebauer was so exhausted that he briefly accepted the offer of taking a seat in a wheelchair. However, he soon stood up again – taking to the podium to receive the gold medal, fulfilling a long-held dream. ‘Roller-coaster ride’…

US President Donald Trump on Monday announced new health guidelines on vaccines and made the unproven claim that use of acetaminophen, known in the US as Tylenol, during pregnancy was linked to autism.  Trump said the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) would notify doctors that the use of acetaminophen “can be associated” with an increased risk of autism, without providing any medical evidence for the new recommendation. What are Trump and RFK’s views on autism? The new guideline and the push to uncover autism’s roots have been a goal of Health Secretary Robert Kennedy Jr (RFK)., who has spent decades pushing discredited claims that link vaccines to…

Robert Redford’s death this week wasn’t just the loss of a screen legend. It closed the book on a Hollywood that once saw itself as America’s progressive conscience. Redford, on screen as a Watergate journalist Bob Woodward in “All the President’s Men,” off screen as an activist for environmental issues and Indigenous rights, embodied a liberal vision of the US entertainment industry, one that championed independent voices and socially-conscious storytelling. The week he died, however, brought further signs of a rightward shift in the US entertainment business, with the balance of cultural power increasingly tilting away from Redford’s Hollywood and toward something…

On the grounds of Paderborn Airport, engineer Michael Spengler demonstrates how far self-driving technology has come in Germany. He enters a route into his smartphone, taps a button, and rests his hands in his lap. The small car begins to roll, navigating at a leisurely seven kilometers per hour between buildings and parked vehicles. “It can go faster — 20 to 25 km/h [12 to 15 mp/h] is no problem,” the researcher from Augsburg University of Applied Sciences explains while sitting in the driver’s seat — only as a safeguard, he notes, ready to take over if something goes wrong.…

Apeksha Shetty, an Indian woman based in Vienna, went on the pill for hormonal reasons. One of the benefits, she thought, was being able to have sex with her steady partner, without having to worry about pregnancy. “We were initially very happy that we could have unprotected sex.” But things didn’t go as expected. The pill Shetty was prescribed stopped her periods entirely, and with it, she told DW, her sex drive vanished. “I went back to the doctor and told him I didn’t want to live my life like this,” said Shetty. “I told him I was young —…

Life in parts of the Philippines was disrupted on Monday as authorities suspended work and families took shelter in evacuation centers ahead of Super Typhoon Ragasa’s landing in northern Luzon. According to the national weather service, winds of up to 215 kph (134 mph) and gusts of up to 265 kph were recorded as of 8 a.m. local time (0000 GMT). Typhoon warning for Babuyan Islands Authorities have warned of heavy flooding, landslides and widespread power outages. Evacuations were underway in coastal and low-lying areas, and dozens of domestic flights and ferry services were cancelled. Schools and government offices were closed in…

Kenya celebrated a double triumph in the 51st Berlin Marathon on Sunday with first-place finishes in both the men’s and women’s races. The men’s race was won by 29-year-old Sabastian Sawe with a time of 2:02:15 — five months after his victory in the London marathon — while the women’s race was won by Rosemary Wanjiru with a time of 2:21:05. Despite Berlin’s reputation as the fastest marathon route on the world circuit, both times were significantly off world-record time (Sawe 1:40 slower, Wanjiru 11:49 slower). This can likely be attributed to the unusually humid late-summer conditions in the German capital as…

Sharifeh Mohammadi has been in prison since December 2023. The 46-year-old activist and engineer is accused of “armed rebellion against the state” in Iran. She now faces execution again. Already sentenced to death twice in 2024 and early 2025, this August the Supreme Court once again upheld the ruling. Her commitment to workers’ rights brought her to the attention of the authorities. She was a member of a committee for the formation of labor organizations in the northern Iranian coastal city of Rasht on the Caspian Sea, where she worked and lived with her family, including her 13-year-old son. The government…