Thumb sucking and nail biting protects against allergies

Thumb sucking and nail biting protects against allergies, researchers say. Research scientists from New Zealand Otago University published data from a completed longitudinal study in the American journal Paediatrics The researchers examined 1,000 children aged five to eleven years. The Otago University study found children who sucked their thumb or bit their nails were much less likely to develop allergies in later life.

The result was surprising: They tested whether the children who were reported to bite their nails or suck their thumbs when they were between the ages of 5 and 11, were at greater risk of developing allergies by the age of 13. The group were tested for skin allergies at the age of 13 and again at 32 years.

About a third of the group sucked their thumb between the ages of 5 and 11, another third bit their nails and a smaller group did both.

"What we found was that the children who bit their nails or sucked their thumb had about a 30 to 40 percent lower risk of having an allergy at the age of 13, and what's more this persisted right up until the age of 32."

Children in a group who did both had the lowest risk of developing allergies. The result support the "hygiene hypothesis", that earlier contact with dirt and germs reduces the risk of allergies. Study author Malcolm Sears.

Read More

United States of Africa Single Passport

ONE PASSPORT FOR 54 AFRICAN COUNTRIES. The road to an Africa that is integrated and united was agreed upon in 2014 and an electronic passport (e-Passport) will be launched by the African Union (AU) during the 27th AU Summit in Kigali, Rwanda, on July 10-18, 2016.

The AU e-Passport is an electronic document that permits any AU e-passport holder to enter any of the 54 African Member States, without requiring a visa.

The first group of beneficiaries of the single e-passport will include: African Heads of State and Government; Ministers of Foreign Affairs; and the Permanent Representatives of AU Member States based at the AU Headquarters in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia.The AU e-Passports will be issued to them in July 2016, at the 27th AU Summit in Kigali, Rwanda.


The second beneficiaries of the single e-passport includes all African citizens. The plan is to roll it out to all AU citizens by 2020.

In order for all the recipients to acquire the passports, they are strongly encouraged to comply with the needed paper work required to accelerate the processing lead time.

The concept of unrestricted movement of persons, goods and services across regions and the continent is not new; it has been outlined in documents like the Lagos Plan of Action and the Abuja Treaty - an indication that the unhampered movement of citizens is critical for Africa’s development.

Countries such as Seychelles, Mauritius, Rwanda, and Ghana have taken the lead in ensuring easier intra-Africa travel by relaxing visa restrictions and in some cases lifting visa requirements altogether. The scene seems to be set to realize the dream of visa-free travel for African citizens within their own continent by 2020.

Read More

Britain, Nigeria On Brink Of Divide

There are warning signs regarding Britain's future following Brexit polls. Britain voted by a margin of 52% to 48% to leave the EU. The Brexit poll result reveals how deeply divided Britain is: with Scotland voting 62 per cent to Remain, Northern Ireland 56 per cent. England – which voted overwhelmingly for Brexit – itself is deeply torn, with the North, the countryside, older people, and those who did not attend university, determined to leave, with only the cities, parts of the South East, the young and graduates favouring remaining in the EU.


Nigeria like Britain is facing security threats on multiple fronts: Boko Haram Islamists in the northeast, Biafran separatists in the southeast, Niger Delta militants in the south and Fulani herdsmen in the central states. President Muhammadu Buhari on Wednesday pleaded with militants in a statement that "We are now concentrating on the militants to know how many of them (there are) in terms of groupings, leadership and plead with them to try to give Nigeria a chance. I assure them (the militants) that when we were very junior officers, we were told by our leaders, by the head of state which was General Gowon, that to keep Nigeria one is a task that must be done. We never thought of oil. What we were after is one Nigeria. Please, pass the message to the militants that one Nigeria is not negotiable. And I pray they better accept it."


Britain and Nigeria are on the brink of becoming a permanently divided nations. Brexit is irreversible but Biafraexit or Nigexit will be terrible for Nigeria.

Read More

Oscar Pistorius and Lionel Messi sentenced to prison

South African ParaOlympic athlete Oscar Pistorius has been sentenced to six years in prison for the murder of his girlfriend Reeva Steenkamp. Pistorius, 29, shot Reeva Steenkamp four times through a locked toilet door in February 2013.

It comes after his initial five-year conviction for manslaughter was changed to murder last December on appeal.

He was taken immediately to jail. Both the prosecution and defence can appeal, but his lawyers say they will not.


Argentina and Barcelona footballer Lionel Messi was on Wednesday sentenced to 21 months in prison for tax fraud in Spain. Messi is a five time winner of FIFA World Player of the Year.


The court ordered Messi to pay a fine of around £1.7m and his father to pay £1.27m for defrauding Spain's tax authority of £3.19m from 2007-09.


Messi and his father, Jorge, received the same sentence but under Spanish law a jail sentence under two years for a first-time non-violent crime can be served on probation, meaning they are unlikely to be imprisoned.

Read More