Benito’s voyage follows a long campaign by activists who warned that he was suffering in the extreme climates of the border city of Ciudad Juárez.
To reach his new home, Benito is travelling in a purpose-built 5m-tall container.
Some activists shouted “we love you” as he began his trip.
Until his departure, the three-year-old Benito had been kept in Ciudad Juárez’s Parque Central zoo.
Activists had long warned that the city’s desert climate – which can reach a a sweltering 42C (108F) in the summer and dip as low as freezing in the winter – was difficult for giraffes and that the zoo was not properly equipped to handle the animals.
A second giraffe which was kept at the zoo, Modesto, died in 2022.
The operation to move Benito began early on Monday morning, when the container in which he will travel was loaded onto a truck.
Benito had been allowed to familiarise himself with the container over the weekend.
The container is designed so that he can peek his head out from inside but can be covered with a tarp to protect him from the elements and potentially stressful sights and sounds.
Image caption,Benito’s container is designed to let him see while also protecting him from potential stressors on the way.
The trip to his new home – a safari park in the state of Puebla – is expected to take approximately 50 hours.
Frank Carlos Camacho, the director of the safari park where Benito is headed, said that the container had cameras and sensors installed to allow his keepers to monitor him, as well as enough alfalfa, fruits, vegetables, and water to keep him fed along the way.
“We can check his temperature, and even talk to him through a microphone that’s inside the container,” Mr Camacho said. “He’s very well.”
Image caption,Activists from the “Let’s Save Benito” collective holding signs reading “we did it” on 21 January
At his new home in Puebla’s African Safari park, visitors will be able to see him in a more natural habitat from all-terrain vehicles.
In an interview with Mexico’s Animal Politico news outlet, activist Perla Iris Guzmán – a member of the “Let’s Save Benito” collective – thanked “all the people who made this movement grow”.
“This is an accomplishment of the entire Juárez community,” she said. “[They] believed in us and went to the zoo to see what we meant about the ‘little’ animals.”https://tehopeng.com/
The western bank of the Dnipro river in the city of Kherson is one of them.
You can’t see the Russian troops on the other low, marshy riverbank, but you know they’re there.
Incoming artillery fire as we arrive at an abandoned building serves as a sharp reminder.
There is nothing new about shelling in war. But the unit we’re meeting deals with one of the key innovations of this invasion: drones.
As we hug the side of the building and take cover in the stairwell, we’re led inside from the freezing winter winds to the warmth of a militarised living room.
The smell of a strawberry vape hangs above these Ukrainian soldiers, sitting on armchairs with looks of quiet focus and cans of Monster energy drink. You imagine the floral wallpaper wasn’t their choice.
Image caption,Soldiers don headsets to pilot FPV drones from a building on the west bank of the Dnipro
Artem, a 20-year-old pilot, suddenly sits up. They’re told the Russians have launched drones from across the water.
“It’s from a location known to us,” explains Tymur, commander of the Samosud squad in Ukraine’s 11th National Guard Brigade.
“Our goal is to destroy the pilots. We have the coordinates, so we’re flying there right now.”
There are at least a dozen drones on the floor – all loaded with grenades. A cat, the unit’s unofficial mascot, nuzzles against one of the propellers.
Image caption,Drones are simple, cheap and effective weapons in this war
One drone is taken outside as Artem puts on his VR headset.
We watch on the TV as he flies it across the river into occupied territory. From this vantage point, there are no obvious signs of life.
A few kilometres later, Artem’s drone arrives at an industrial area. It passes a warehouse before hovering next to a block of flats.
He eventually spots an antenna next to a window in the stairwell, and flies straight into it. The screen turns blue. Artem exhales and removes his headset.
“When we first did this it was emotional,” says Artem. “Now this is business as usual.”
“I didn’t get enough time to play computer games before [the full-scale invasion]. Now I’m catching up!”
Image caption,Drones can fly for kilometres to find targets on the Russian-occupied side of the river
They launch another drone but the screen turns blue as soon as it crosses the river. The Russians have turned on their jamming system.
A third then makes the same journey. This time it makes it through, and Artem returns to the block of flats.
He’s able to confirm the antenna was destroyed. With 10 minutes of battery life left, he flies off to see what else he can detect, or destroy.
His unit has been targeting a main road which the Russians use to deliver supplies. Civilians are banned from driving there, so the Ukrainian drone pilots hit anything with wheels.
Artem spots a Russian checkpoint and flies towards it. Unfortunately for him, they use a jamming gun and the screen turns blue as he gets close. He exhales again.
“No matter how many times we hit the same places, [the Russians] are constantly replenished,” says Tymur. “They’re kind of fearless.”
With each drone costing around $500 (£396), it’s a constant cycle of launch, seek and destroy.
No matter how many times we hit the same places, [the Russians] are constantly replenished. They’re kind of fearless.Tymur Drone squad commander
Drones mean the Russians can’t hide anywhere within 10km (six miles) of the front line.
But, crucially, the invaders are doing exactly the same to the Ukrainians.
Under constant drone surveillance and enemy bombardment, life has gradually drained from Kherson’s streets. Aside from a limited crossing further up the Dnipro near the town of Krynky, Ukrainian attacks here are only probing, and require patience.
READ: Outnumbered and outgunned by Russians in brutal riverside battle
In a snow-covered park in Kherson, we meet a mobile air-defence team under an archway. We’re told to move in small groups because of watching Russian drones.
As we stride forward in our body armour, dog-walkers turn away from us with a slight look of confusion.
“My call sign is King,” says the deputy commander of the 124th Territorial Defence Brigade, with a fist bump. They’re gathered around a UK-registered truck with a .50 calibre machine gun mounted on the back.
“We work 24/7,” he says. “We destroy all kinds of drones, mainly Iranian-made Shaheds.”
Image caption,Mobile air defence units in Kherson are constantly on the move to avoid detection
“Russia’s factories are on a military footing. They are constantly increasing their power. At this point, it’s relentless.”
So does King think Ukrainian forces could cross the river in large numbers this year?
“It’s hard to think about,” he replies. “We’re just doing our jobs to make sure it happens as soon as possible.”
With major military packages trapped under political disagreements in the US and European Union, Ukraine is having to adapt, and look inwards.
A new £2.5bn military aid package from the UK has been welcomed here, with £200m of that earmarked specifically for drones. But President Volodymyr Zelensky has also pledged to make a million of them within the borders of Ukraine.
On the outskirts of Kherson in an icy field, pilots practise drone flights with plastic bottles tied beneath them, in place of grenades.
It takes just 14 hours of training to qualify as a drone pilot. Ukraine’s government is encouraging people to take part in free training, as well as to manufacture drones at home to send to the front.
Image caption,Soldiers say they can qualify as drone pilots in just 14 hours
Through his balaclava, Stitch explains their importance in this war of attrition.
“We are engaged in a struggle of technologies, an arms race: who will be the first to invent what, who will assemble something cool,” the drone commander says.
It’s widely accepted that several innovations now need to happen at once for the front lines to change significantly.
Ukraine’s commander-in-chief Gen Valerii Zaluzhnyy told the Economist magazine in November that Russia and Ukraine had “reached the level of technology that puts us into a stalemate”.
The problem for Ukraine has never been what has been supplied by allies, but when.
“During the First World War, aviation was born,” says Stitch. “Now we are starting the future war of drones, which maybe in two decades will turn the tide of any war.”https://tehopeng.com/
Denis Pushilin said a Ukrainian strike, which also injured 25 people, had hit a busy market and that the casualty figures might change.
Russia’s foreign ministry denounced the strike as a “barbaric terrorist attack” against civilians.
There has so far been no comment from Ukraine on the incident.
BBC News was not able to immediately verify the circumstances around the strike.
Mr Pushilin said the “horrendous” strike took place when the market was at its busiest.
Photographs published by Reuters news agency appeared to show destroyed shop fronts, as well as bodies lying in the street.
According to AFP, a local resident named Tatiana told local media she heard an incoming projectile overhead, and hid under her market stall.
“I saw smoke, people screamed, a woman was crying,” she was quoted as saying.
Donetsk city and parts of the wider region in eastern Ukraine were first seized by Russian-backed forces in 2014, and the area has been partially controlled by Moscow ever since.
The city is around 20km (12 miles) from the frontline. Areas near Donetsk city – including Mariinka and Avdiivka – have seen some of the fiercest fighting of late.
It has been almost two years since Russia launched its full-scale invasion of Ukraine, but it has made little progress in recent months.
On Saturday it claimed to have captured the village of Krokhmalne in north-eastern Ukraine’s Kharkiv region. A Ukrainian military spokesman confirmed its forces had withdrawn from the area, but said the territory was of little military importance.
Days earlier Moscow also claimed to have taken control of a settlement named Vesele in Donetsk. Kyiv has not confirmed the claim.https://tehopeng.com/
Everything suggests Iran’s military, the Revolutionary Guards, were under pressure to act from Islamic hardliners inside the country.
These hardliners are increasingly unhappy with Iran apparently standing by as Israel kills huge numbers of Palestinians in Gaza.
They are also angry that Iran did nothing after its arch-enemy Israel assassinated a number of top Revolutionary Guard commanders in Syria – and only verbally supported the Houthis when they came under US-UK strikes.
And then there’s the bomb attack claimed by the Islamic State group (IS) in the Iranian city of Kerman two weeks ago, which killed at least 84 people.
The Guards felt they had to act somehow, without ratcheting up tensions with Israel or the US. Iran has been careful not to get directly involved in the Israel-Gaza war – though it does offer military support to Hamas, the Houthis and Hezbollah.
But in striking Syria, Iraq and Pakistan, they appear to have have scored a few own goals.
Iran said the missile and drone attack inside Pakistan targeted militant group Jaish al-Adli – what it calls an “Iranian terrorist group”. But Pakistan says it killed two children.
Pakistan, a nuclear power, felt it had to respond to the strike – which was a clear violation of Pakistani sovereignty and territorial integrity. It also undermined Pakistan’s nuclear deterrence.
So it launched attacks of its own against what it said were hideouts of Pakistani “terrorists” based in Iran – the Balochistan Liberation Army and the Balochistan Liberation Front. Iran says three women, two men and four children were killed.
The tit-for-tat attacks have left the normally good relations between the neighbours seriously damaged. The Revolutionary Guard did not anticipate this reaction from Pakistan.
Iran and Pakistan share a 900km (560 mile) border which is difficult for either to control without cooperation. Pakistan has been a valuable ally in international forums, often voting in favour of Tehran.
Iran shows missile capabilities with regional strikes
Pakistan launches retaliatory strikes into Iran
The attack on Syria appears to have been in response to the killings in Kerman. But even there, there are no reports of a big hit against IS or hardline Sunni groups, as Iran claims.
In Iraq – perhaps Iran’s closest neighbour and ally – the government is infuriated by attacks where Iran used some 11 ballistic missiles to hit a target in Irbil, in the Iraqi region of Kurdistan.
Iran claimed it had targeted an operations centre of Mossad, the Israeli intelligence agency. But Iraqi and Kurdish authorities say the house of a well-known businessman was hit, killing him along with his wife and two children, one of whom was under one year old.
Iraq’s government has complained to the UN Security Council, which is due to discuss the attacks. The incident has eroded neighbourly relations cultivated over years, in spite of several issues between the two nations.
The Revolutionary Guards may have taken the decision to launch the attacks against the three countries after only consulting Iran’s supreme leader. There are signs the foreign minister was not consulted before the attacks were launched.
The attacks this week appear to have undermined Iran’s international position further, putting its https://tehopeng.com/defences at risk and making the Revolutionary Guard look reckless and prone to taking uncalculated risks.
“I was giving a talk in London and I had mentioned earlier about my flatulence,” Niall McCann says.
He’d explained to the audience that a speed flying accident in 2016 – in which he smashed into the Brecon Beacons mountains at 50mph – had left him with bladder, bowel and sexual dysfunction.
“And then it happened very prominently and everyone started clapping,” he says.
We met for an episode of BBC Radio 4’s Inside Health.
In the programme he spoke very candidly – and with surprising humour and positivity – about his accident, the surgery to reconstruct his spine and his remarkable recovery.
One of the things we spoke about was what it’s been like for him living with bladder and bowel and sexual problems – the intimate challenges that don’t often get talked about.
He says he’s happy to talk because “there’s stigma and there shouldn’t be”, and he hopes that by being open maybe he will help others.
And while he recognises many others are less fortunate, as spinal injuries can often cause lasting paralysis, he wants to shine light on things people often deal with silently.
‘Trying to be a hero when I was a beginner’
On that day almost eight years ago, Niall decided the conditions were perfect to go speed-flying.
He says it is a bit like paragliding, except that instead of gliding, you run off a cliff and plummet to the ground, but on that day he was “trying to be a hero when I was really a beginner”.
Niall accidentally turned a few degrees too far, smashing into the Brecon Beacons mountainside.
Listen to Inside Health podcast: Bowels, bladders and sex: learning to live after my mountain accident
Niall spent 38 days at the University of Wales Hospital in Cardiff, having operations on his spine and learning how to use his legs again.
The major concern was how much damage had been done to his spinal cord, which is a bundle of nerves that transmits information between the brain and the body. If damaged, there can be a range of problems, including paralysis.
But because Niall had bruised his, rather than cut it, the chance of recovery – although often incomplete – was greater.
There were many considerable challenges in hospital but once home, there were even more adjustments to be made – not least to his relationship and how he saw himself.
“At first I had the overwhelming sense of being utterly dependant. I couldn’t reach around my backside – so I couldn’t take myself to the toilet,” he says.
His wife, mother and brother all helped out.
“This wasn’t part of the marriage vows,” he reflects, “But they did it without complaining.”
There was one particular incident that he credits for giving him motivation to regain his independence in the bathroom.
His mother-in-law, who was a nurse, was due to come round just weeks after the accident.
“So she had wiped many bottoms of course, but I didn’t want one of them to be mine,” he says.
First disabled team crosses Europe’s largest ice cap in just 11 days
Niall McCann joins mountain rescue team who saved him
Humour aside, learning to live with a loss of control of his bowels was not easy.
“What many spinal cord injury patients do is manually evacuate their bowels – using their hands to pull out whatever is in their rectum at the time,” he explains.
“It took a bit of time for me to learn to do this.”
One of the funniest moments, he recalls, was a few weeks after the accident when he attempted a pull-up at his mum’s house.
“My brother had a pull-up bar on the door-frame.
“Of course I wanted to see if I could do it. So I did very cautiously.”
This put pressure on Niall’s core so he checked his incontinence pad – and it was empty.
“But my brother was stood right behind me and he watched as I curled out a very large stool on the dining-room floor,” he recalls.
‘Minor imposition’
Over time, accidents like this became less frequent.
And Niall says while it did not feel good to have them he needed to manage this “by-product” of his accident as best he could.
Now it is just “a minor imposition” that he is mindful of at certain moments.
“For example, when my daughter wants me to throw her in the air, I need to think about when I last opened my bowels.”
Another consequence of the damage to the nerves in this area is that he cannot relax his bladder to pee, something he has in common with many people with spinal cord injuries.
Niall now uses an intermittent catheter – a tube that allows him to empty his bladder.
But he thinks many people do not realise that spinal cord injuries often cause lasting problems with your bladder and bowels.
And even less frequently spoken about is sex.
‘Stepping into the unknown’
For every spinal cord patient the situation is unique – but for some it is an inability to get aroused and there can be ejaculation issues, he explains.
This has been one of the most challenging aspects of his recovery.
“So much starts afresh in terms of your married life when you come home with a life-changing injury.
“You are learning a lot of new things about each other. It is almost like being teenagers.”
At the beginning Niall slept downstairs, because the stairs were a challenge.
But when he was able to climb them, he had mixed emotions,
Downstairs, it turned out, had become a bit of a sanctuary.
“It almost felt like a pressure to go back into cohabiting after having had my own space. That almost felt like stepping into something new and unknown again.”
But if you really want to pursue an intimate relationship with your partner – then just trying things and finding out what works is so important, he says.
“And this will probably take some experimentation and some frustration and some embarrassment. But the other person is learning at the same time – you are both learning together.
“I am very lucky at how patient, accommodating and accepting my wife has been,” he adds.
In Niall’s case, he was warned very early on that having children might be difficult.
So the couple immediately registered for IVF.
Niall says he knows how lucky it is that Phoebe was born three years after his accident.
“If I hadn’t had my accident we wouldn’t have Phoebe – we would have had another child probably – but we wouldn’t have had her, and she is the best thing to come out of this.”
Niall acknowledges his recovery has had ups and downs, but he says talking about it has been so important.
“A lot of people don’t feel like they can, and I am in the fortunate position of being able to. I hope my openness allows other people to share with their loved ones too.”https://tehopeng.com/
In a news conference, a defiant Mr Netanyahu vowed to press on with the offensive in Gaza “until complete victory”: the destruction of Hamas and return of the remaining Israeli hostages, adding that it could take “many more months”.
With almost 25,000 Palestinians killed in Gaza, according to the Hamas-run health ministry, and 85% of the Strip’s population displaced, Israel is under intense pressure to rein in its offensive and engage in meaningful talks over a sustainable end to the war.
Israel’s allies, including the US – and many of its foes – have urged a revival of the long-dormant “two-state solution”, in which a future Palestinian state would sit side-by-side with an Israeli one.
The hope in many circles is that the current crisis could force the warring parties back to diplomacy, as the only viable alternative to endless cycles of violence. But from Mr Netanyahu’s comments, his intention appears quite the opposite.
Speaking to reporters following Mr Netanyahu’s latest comments, US National Security Council spokesman John Kirby recognised that the US and Israel “obviously” see things differently.
Earlier on Thursday, Mr Netanyahu said Israel must have security control over all land west of the River Jordan, which would include the territory of any future Palestinian state.
“This is a necessary condition, and it conflicts with the idea of (Palestinian) sovereignty. What to do? I tell this truth to our American friends, and I also stopped the attempt to impose a reality on us that would harm Israel’s security,” he said.
100 days since unthinkable attack triggered devastating war
Israel-Palestinian bitterness deepened by Hamas attack and war
Mr Netanyahu has spent much of his political career opposing Palestinian statehood, boasting just last month that he was proud to have prevented its establishment, so his latest remarks come as no surprise.
But the very public rebuttal of Washington’s diplomatic push, and determination to stay the current military course, show the chasm widening with Israel’s western allies.
Since the 7 October attacks – the worst in Israel’s history, when Hamas gunmen killed about 1,300 Israelis and took some 240 hostage – the US has supported its right to defend itself.
But as the death toll in Gaza has grown, and the scenes of horror there have abounded, Western governments have called for Israeli restraint.
The White House has repeatedly tried to influence Israel’s military policy: urging more precision-guided weapons rather than the blanket air strikes; discouraging a ground offensive; and calling for a two-state solution, with a role for the Palestinian Authority in post-conflict Gaza.
Image caption,Protesters in Tel Aviv have been calling for the safe release of Israeli hostages
Mr Kirby said the US has been “exceedingly clear” about what it wants Gaza to look like after the war.
“We want governance in Gaza that’s representative of the aspirations of the Palestinian people, that they have a vote and a voice in what that looks like and that there’s no reoccupation of Gaza,” he said.
Washington’s advice has frequently fallen on deaf ears or been met by outright rejection – often publicly so, during visits by the US Secretary of State Antony Blinken.
That, in turn, has hardened frustration in some American circles over the Biden administration’s apparent blanket support for Israel, with strident calls to put conditions on US aid to its Middle East ally.
Israel’s prime minister’s comments will please his dwindling support base and the far-right ministers who prop up his government.
But they will dismay those at home and abroad who are increasingly horrified by the human cost of this war. Recent polls show most Israelis want him to prioritise bringing the remaining hostages home over the potentially impossible aim of destroying Hamas.https://tehopeng.com/
It is hoped that the test will pave the way for a low-cost alternative to missiles to shoot down targets like drones.
The DragonFire weapon is precise enough to hit a £1 coin from a kilometre away, the Ministry of Defence (MoD) says.
It described the test, at its Hebrides Range in Scotland, as a “major step” in bringing the technology into service.
Defence Secretary Grant Shapps said the technology could reduce “the reliance on expensive ammunition, while also lowering the risk of collateral damage”.
The MoD says both the Army and Royal Navy are considering using the technology as part of their future air defence capabilities.
While laser weaponry might sound like something from science fiction the US Navy has already installed systems on several destroyers.
However, missiles rather than lasers have been used to shoot down drones during the current conflict with Houthis in the Red Sea.
The MoD says firing the DragonFire system for 10 seconds is the cost equivalent of using a regular heater for an hour, with the cost of operating it typically less than £10 per shot.
Image caption,What the DragonFire laser weapon system looks like
Laser-directed energy weapons (LDEWs) use an intense light beam to cut through their target and can strike at the speed of light.
The range of the DragonFire system is classified but it is a line-of-sight weapon, meaning it can attack any visible target within range.
It is being developed by the Defence Science and Technology Laboratory (Dstl), alongside some industry partners, on behalf of the MoD.
Dstl’s chief executive Dr Paul Hollinshead said: “These trials have seen us take a huge step forward in realising the potential opportunities and understanding the threats posed by directed energy weapons.”
The DragonFire weapon system is the result of a £100m joint investment by the MoD and industry.
The development of laser weapons comes amid the increasing use of drones in warfare, which has been seen during the conflict between Ukraine and Russia, with Russia believed to be using Iranian-made “kamikaze” drones to attack Ukrainian cities.
Ukraine, which also uses some “kamikaze” drones, has created its own “army of drones” which has seen the use of hobby drones for military purposes.https://tehopeng.com/
Increasingly, viral buzz means the answer for some is yes, but only if it is a Stanley cup – specifically, the Adventure Quencher Travel Tumbler.
TikTokers in the US documented their experience queuing overnight at a Target supermarket car park in an effort to secure a special Starbucks edition, which retails at an eye-watering $54.50 (£42.99).
The #StanleyCup hashtag now has 7.2 billion views worldwide and is also gaining popularity in the UK on the video-sharing platform.
Thirst for the craze has even seen people resort to attempts at law-breaking, with one popular video showing a man jumping across a Starbucks counter in an effort to steal a hot pink limited edition of the flask.
Making a splash
The Stanley cups, known for their large handle and distinguished straw, were first popularised by eco-friendly, health-conscious, often teenage TikTokers who frequent the platform’s #watertok community, wrote the New York Times in 2022.
The bottle is not the first to become a hit with the public as society becomes more sensitive to single-use plastic – Chilly’s reusable bottles, as well as branded Love Island tumblers, made famous on the show, were previous on-trend items.
The boom in interest has reaped huge financial rewards for Stanley 1913, the drinksware company behind the model.
According to CNBC estimates, profits are likely to rise significantly, as sales for the last year are set to hit about $750m, a sharp increase from the $70m in annual sales made in 2020.
Image caption,Stanley cups have sold out across the US as a result of the craze
Analysts attribute a large part of the product’s recent success to the company’s president, Terence Reilly, who was appointed back in 2020, having previously been chief marketing officer for Crocs footwear.
The role saw him credited with transforming the previously maligned shoe into a bold fashion statement, and now he seems to be overseeing the same shift for drink bottles.
“Most of his television time has been replaced by watching TikToks,” wrote Ali Donaldson in his Inc. business profile of the executive. “With his track record of driving viral levels of consumer demand, Reilly knows how to reinvigorate brands into online sensations.”
Stanley 1913 was originally founded in its namesake year by William Stanley Junior. An early advert for its bottle design boldly stated it “cannot break!”.
Image caption,The original Stanley cup advertising used by William Stanley Junior more than a century ago
More than a century later, this claim was put to the test last year when TikTok user @danimarielettering filmed the interior of her burnt-out car, only to find her Stanley cup firmly intact by the driver’s seat. She then shakes it, indicating that ice remains inside.
The novelty saw the video rack up a huge 94.8 million views, with the apparent extreme durability of the flask becoming a talking point.
However, while the bottle appears able to endure fire reasonably well, some creators have pointed out that the tumbler is susceptible to leaks if knocked over.
In response, Stanley 1913 told the BBC’s Reliable Sauce podcast: “The Stanley Adventure Quencher is not leak or spill-proof. It has a silicone seal around the straw base designed to help prevent spills. But the lid is not designed to be 100% leak-proof, but help prevent spills and splashes.”
Image caption,The durability of Stanley cups became a talking point on social media after one appeared relatively unscathed in a burnt-out car
For some TikTok users, this apparent defect is enough for them to try other products they spot online, especially with competing brands constantly fighting for attention on social feeds.
And a Guardian article on a growing backlash saw the craze dismissed as an infantilising obsession with “adult sippy cups”.
Purchase power?
But how much do the videos that TikTok users see on their “for you” page actually sway their purchasing habits?
Market intelligence agency Mintel told the BBC that 86% of Gen Z social media users feel these platforms influence their fashion choices.
US singer-songwriter and actress Olivia Rodrigo, 20, admitted to GQ magazine that TikTok spurred her into buying a Stanley cup. “I was like, I need this, it looks like it’s going to change my life,” she said.
Of course, Stanley cups are far from the first brand to benefit from online hype. In recent months we have seen a surge in popularity for Prime Energy drinks (popularised by KSI and Logan Paul), as well as Ugg boots, AirPod Max headphones, Telfar bags… and even feta cheese.
But this hype culture also feeds into dupe culture – “dupe” standing for duplicate – and the promotion of purchasing knock-off versions of more expensive items.
And 65% of 16 to 34-year-old beauty and personal care shoppers think product dupes are a good way to save money, according to Mintel.
So, it seems users who have been using TikTok as a search engine (an emerging trend) may well soon be lured towards knock-off Stanley cup alternatives.
At first, he had some bouts of fever and needed to stay in hospital for checks.
But shortly after, he was able to go home.
The backpack stayed with Arthur continuously, including in bed – and even though the pump makes a noise, he was able to have a decent night’s sleep.
Chemo had been rough for Arthur and moving on to blina was a relief, his mother, Sandrine, said.
“It was completely out of his control – we were living in a constant challenge as his body was getting hit by the drugs,” she said.
“We were curing him by making him feel worse – it’s a very difficult thing to process.”
‘Big step’
Arthur had to return to hospital every four days so doctors could top up the blina kit but was able to manage the treatment at home the rest of the time.
“He enjoyed the fact that he was able to hold it and be responsible – he embraced all of it,” Sandrine said.
And at the end of April 2023, Arthur had the final operation to remove the tubing from his arm.
“It was a big step – he was free,” Sandrine said.
Doctors say blina can replace big chunks of chemo – perhaps up to 80% of it.
About 450 children a year in the UK are diagnosed with Arthur’s type of cancer.
Image caption,Arthur with his parents during his chemo and steroid treatment
Chief investigator and consultant paediatric haematologist Prof Ajay Vora said: “Chemotherapies are poisons that kill the leukaemic cells but also kill and damage normal cells – and that is what causes their side effects.
“Blinatumomab is a gentler, kinder treatment.”
Another targeted immunotherapy drug, chimeric antigen receptor T-cell therapy (CAR-T), has also recently become available.
But it is more expensive than blina and the patient’s own cells must be taken and then altered in the lab before being given back as the medicine, which takes time.
Thanks to all the treatment, Arthur’s cancer has now gone.
Sandrine said: “New Year was when we found out that the blina had worked and there was no residual cancer – and so that was just amazing and so we had double celebrations.”https://tehopeng.com/
Image caption,Josef Fritzl kept his daughter in a cellar for 24 years and fathered seven children with her
By Bethany Bell
BBC News in Vienna
Josef Fritzl, the Austrian sex offender who locked his daughter in a cellar for 24 years and fathered seven children with her, could be moved from a high-security prison, local media reports.
Austrian public broadcaster ORF reports that a new psychiatric report on Fritzl, who has dementia, says he no longer poses a danger to the public.
It means a court may now decide whether to move him to a normal prison.
Fritzl is being held in a high-security institution for mentally disturbed offenders in Stein Prison, in the town of Krems an der Donau.
In Austria, those sentenced to life in prison can apply for conditional release after serving 15 years – under this law, Fritzl is eligible for parole this year.
Legal experts say conditional release is also a possibility, which means Fritzl, who has since changed his name, could be moved into a care home.
It is “quite obvious that a dismissal will be announced”, Alois Birklbauer, professor of criminal law at the Johannes Kepler University in Linz, told ORF.
In 2022, a regional court ruled Fritzl was “no longer a danger” and could be moved to a standard jail – but the Higher Regional Court in Vienna later blocked the decision.
The Fritzl case, which emerged in the town of Amstetten in 2008, has been described as one of the worst in Austria’s criminal history.
He was convicted of murdering one of his children through neglect, as well as rape, incest, and enslaving his daughter.
Fritzl’s daughter and her children have since taken on new identities.https://tehopeng.com/
