Out, Damn Spot!
US - Animal rights activists feared that the release of Disney's 101 Dalmations would trigger a disastrous demand for the dotted canine - and they were right. Pounds across the country are now inundated with Dalmatians dumped by fickle owners. "This dog is nothing like the ones in the movie!" one family complained to animal control officers in Miami Beach. Lured by the chance to snap up as much as $800 for a single spotted puppy, some breeders failed to warn buyers that grown-up Dalmatians shed constantly, can weigh up to 70 pounds and tend to become destructive without consistent attention and exercise. One in ten Dalmatians is also born deaf. "A dog isn't a gift, it's a new member of your family," one dog breeder noted. "It's an adoption, not a purchase." With Disney preparing a 101 Dalmatians TV cartoon show, even more puppies are likely to be purchased, abandoned and, eventually, euthanized. [To ask Disney Co. to include a pet advisory warning in its future broadcasts, write: The Walt Disney Co., 500 S. Buena Vista St., Burbank, CA 91521, (818) 560-1000.]

El Niño's Threat to Ocean Life
UK - BBC Wildlife notes that while El Niño's economic repercussions can be severe (£5 billion [$8 billion] in losses worldwide during the 1982-83 event), "the effects on wildlife have been, and will be, devastating." Off the Galápagos Islands, sharks had reportedly retreated 130 meters below the surface to evade the warm waters of the descending thermocline. Unlike the ocean's nutrient-rich cold upwelling waters, "these warm, tropical waters ... are transparent and barren," the magazine reports. Marine animals expected to suffer include sea lions, penguins, flightless cormorants and Galápagos iguanas.

Britain Douses Itself with Acid
UK - The Devil would feel right at home on a British farm these days. Thanks to a bizarre 1995 ruling by the UK Ministry of Agriculture, the country's most widely used pesticide is now sulfuric acid. Last year, around 13,000 tons of 77 percent sulfuric-acid concentrate was sprayed on English soil. Hares, moles and birds have been burned to death after coming in contact with the corrosive chemical. "We are warned about the effects of acid rain," observes Matt Phillips of Friends of the Earth/UK, "yet we spray concentrated sulfuric directly onto the soil. It is absurd." BBC Wildlife reports that the government approved the use of sulfuric acid as a pesticide even though "none of the producers, suppliers and users ... knew whether environmental safety tests had been conducted." Britain's potato farmers like to use the acid because it stops plant growth within three days, "allowing them to be sure of meeting the strict size restrictions imposed by supermarkets."

A-Bomb Fallout Covered North America
US - Last August, under pressure from citizen activists, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) released studies showing that the US atomic test program in the '50s had bathed most of the country in radiation. The NCI revealed that practically everyone living in the US was exposed to iodine-131, and as many as 75,000 citizens contracted thyroid cancer as a result. In Canada, the Toronto Globe and Mail reported that "some children living along the Canadian border may have been exposed to much higher levels" of radioactive iodine.

Summertime in the Arctic I
ALASKA - The largest spruce bark beetle outbreak in North American history has infested more than one million acres and killed 30 million trees. Warmer, longer summers have allowed the beetles to reproduce twice as fast as normal. The Journal of the Society of American Foresters reported that the outbreak may be linked to climatic changes that have caused "a significant warming trend throughout south central and interior Alaska for at least 60 years." US Forest Service scientist Ed Holsten believes that "the forest [is] unlikely to recover for many centuries, if ever."

Summertime in the Arctic II
ALASKA - The Western Arctic has warmed 0.75 degrees Centigrade each decade for the past 3 decades - several times the global average. Since 1978, sea ice covering the Arctic Ocean has declined 5.5 percent, causing reductions in algae crucial to the Arctic food chain and posing a risk to fish, seals, whales and polar bears. Warmer springs could melt snow dens and expose bear cubs to the harsh Arctic environment. Warm waters last summer caused the most massive bird kill in Alaskan history. Shearwaters, kittiwakes and murres washed ashore, having died of starvation after their food source vanished. The disappearance of krill and plankton from the unusually warm waters may also have caused the death of numerous whales.

Monsanto Soybeans Threaten Kids
CANADA - On October 17, the UN Convention on Biological Diversity's Working Group on Biosafety implored "all governments to use whatever methods available to bar from their markets, on grounds of injury to public health, Monsanto's genetically manipulated [herbicide-resistant] Roundup-Ready soybean." The warning came after the discovery that application of Monsanto's Roundup herbicide increased levels of plant estrogens in bean crops. "Young children are especially susceptible to elevated levels of estrogen," warned British geneticist Ricarda Steinbrecher. "There is a clear and serious health issue at hand." Roundup-Ready soybeans are now present in an estimated 60 percent of supermarket products. On September 25, the European Commission ordered the mandatory labeling of all genetically engineered (GE) soybeans and corn. US Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman refuses to label GE foods in the US, although he admits it is a "sensitive issue" in Europe. "When I led the US delegation to the [1996] World Food Summit," Glickman told the European press last June, "protesters pelted me with genetically-engineered soybeans, then took off all their clothes to draw the media's attention."

Sayanara, Dolphins & Whales
JAPAN - Ashai Shimbun reports that a four-year study by Japanese zoologists has found that "half of all species of Japanese mammals are now either extinct or endangered." Some 85 of Japan's 174 species "have either been wiped out or are endangered," the paper revealed. "Worst hit have been whales and dolphins: 60 percent ... are now endangered because of low breeding rates, hunting and sea pollution." According to Ashai Shimbun, scientists "could not find one species whose existence had become more secure over recent years."

"Hot Zones" on Every Continent
US - According to a Population Reference Bureau report, the acceleration of urban crowding and world poverty is causing a resurgence of infectious diseases that were once believed eradicated. New strains of tuberculosis and meningitis are proving resistant to standard antibiotics. The annual cost of infectious diseases in the US is estimated at $120 billion. The World Health Organization has identified "hot zones" of untreatable tuberculosis in India, Russia, Latvia, Estonia, Argentina, the Ivory Coast and the Dominican Republic.