MARCH 2009

Around the Region

Argentina moves to rid its hospitals of mercury

Argentine hospitals and clinics can no longer buy thermometers and blood-pressure gauges containing mercury under an order signed by Health Minister Graciela Ocaña.

The new policy, announced and implemented last month, puts Argentina in sync with recommendations made by the World Health Organization, which has warned that health facilities are a leading source of mercury contamination.

Waste requirement eased for Brazilian nuclear plant

When Brazilian authorities granted a preliminary license last September for construction of the country’s third nuclear plant, a key question remained: Would Ibama, Brazil’s environmental permitting agency, stand by the strict waste-disposal condition it had placed on the project?

New study seeks to plug Amazon information gaps

Amazonia—the world’s largest river basin, covering nine countries and draining an area three-quarters the size of China—faces a dizzying array of threats. Among them are migration, agricultural expansion, deforestation, unplanned urban development, oil drilling, mining, biodiversity loss and climate change.

Help, at last, for Lake Nicaragua

German and Nicaraguan authorities have inaugurated a US$86 million sewage-treatment project intended to clean up the putrid wastewater flowing into Lake Managua within two years.

The project includes a $50 million lakeshore plant that will turn raw sewage into fertilizer while using gases released in the treatment process to help fuel the facility, thus making it more energy-efficient.

Environment minister resigns in Costa Rica

Costa Rica’s top environmental official resigned this month amid allegations he approved a concession that benefited his uncle.

Roberto Dobles stepped down March 10 after his resignation was accepted by President Oscar Arias, who said he hopes the scandal will not taint the three years of work Dobles put in as head of the Environment, Energy and Telecommunications Ministry.